You're listening to audio from Red Rocks Baptist Church. For more information about our church, visit our website at redrocksbaptist.org or follow us on Instagram at redrocksbaptist. Do you realize how much time we spend waiting in lines every year? There's a survey that went out in 2022, a customer survey, that found that the average American spends four and a half days in line every year, whether that's in physical locations like in retail stores or in virtual lines, you know, with customer service on the phone, four and a half days per year. How does that make you feel? The survey noted that, quote, the vast majority of respondents view waiting in line negatively. Waiting most commonly elicits feelings of apathy, boredom, annoyance, or frustration, end quote. Do you get frustrated by waiting? I confess, I do. And it's frustrating enough waiting for like your Costco pizza to get done and you're standing there for like 20 minutes like, come on, I ordered this, and you're seeing other people go through, but that's really quite minor in life. especially compared to waiting for God to answer a prayer, waiting for God to change a hard or a difficult situation. And the reality is there are many times in life, many occasions in life when God says to us, wait. We don't like it. It's hard, it's uncomfortable, it's frustrating. It's like being put on hold. And sometimes digital holds, they tell you, there are 527 people ahead of you in line, or you're gonna be on hold for the next hour and 20 minutes. But when the Lord tells us to wait, he doesn't tell us how long we have. He doesn't tell us that it's gonna be six months, six years, or 60 years before he answers that prayer. And so when we're waiting, sometimes we start to question the Lord. We start to question if God knows what he's doing. The Bible teaches us that God has a plan for these periods of waiting. The Bible tells us that he uses them to accomplish his loving purpose in our lives. There really is a sanctifying grace in waiting. Because waiting is one of God's best tools for growing us and preparing us for greater service. But let's be honest, waiting is difficult, it's hard. The 2022 survey noted this and its analysis said this, quote, people are becoming far less patient than before. A 2015 Microsoft study found that the average human attention span clocked in at eight seconds. A full second shorter than that of a goldfish. Technology, the report continues, technology is teaching us to expect instant gratification, but the physical world rarely works that way, end quote. Well said. We have a cultural expectation that what is good can be acquired immediately, so we associate instant with good, and faster with better. That's not the way God works many times. That does explain why it's so difficult to wait, because we're impatient. And the culture around us, I mean, if we have to wait for two day shipping, it's a minor trial now. We don't like waiting. But when we look in the scriptures, and this would be a larger study, but the people God used most powerfully, all had to experience a period of waiting and preparation. including the disciples. They spent three years with Jesus before he died. Then after Jesus rose, they spent another 40 days with him, and then before they could be Jesus' witnesses to the ends of the earth, they still had to wait, Jesus said in Acts 1-4, to go back to Jerusalem and to wait for the promise of the Father, because they needed the Holy Spirit to empower their ministry. But when we think of waiting, we shouldn't think of being passive. Like we're just gonna go sit on the couch, flip on the TV, and just kind of veg out for the next week and a half. The disciples certainly didn't do that either. They weren't passive at this time. They didn't kick back and relax and do nothing. What they did while waiting for the Spirit to come teaches us what to do when God says to us, wait. And the fact of the matter is, God tells us to wait often. So this is a lesson, or these are lessons, plural, that we really need to take to heart. So let's work through the text this morning. Let's see three lessons, three actions that they did while waiting for the Spirit to come. And verses 12 through 14 begin the passage. They record what the apostles did immediately after Jesus ascended into heaven. Look at verse 12 with me. Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet. Jesus, as you know, ascended on the Mount of Olives. And this mount is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day journey, about three quarters of a mile away from Jerusalem. The distance that most practicing Jews would have said is the limit of how far they could travel on the Sabbath day. So they returned back to Jerusalem, verse 13, and when they had entered Jerusalem, they went up into the upper room where they were staying. And this is probably not the same upper room as they used a month and a half earlier. Could be, the text doesn't say, but there were many houses in Jerusalem that had large gathering spaces for meeting, and so the disciples gathered in an upper room. Their number has grown, we'll find that out here in verse 15, but now there's about 120 people gathering together. And in the end of verse 13, Luke lists the apostles, the people that are there leading the group. He says Peter, James, John, and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon the zealot, and Judas the son of James. With Judas Iscariot gone, there are now 11 apostles. And verse 14 mentions that there were more than just these 11, there's additional people mentioned. Luke records, these all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and with his, speaking of Jesus, with Jesus' brothers. The women, were likely a mixture of those who had traveled with Jesus. Luke records in his gospel account that there were many women who traveled with Jesus in his ministry. They actually financially supported his ministry. It's also likely that these women include family members, wives of the disciples. We've learned later that Peter, or we learned earlier in the gospel accounts that Peter had a wife because he had a mother-in-law. Most of the time you don't take a mother-in-law if you don't have a wife. Mary is mentioned here, that's Jesus' mother, and this is the last time she's mentioned in the text of scripture. And Jesus' brothers are mentioned. Now they were not believers during Jesus' earthly ministry. John 7, 5 says that they had not yet believed in him, but when Jesus rose, he appeared to his brother James. The same James that wrote the book of James, the same James that's going to lead the church at Jerusalem. And now, after Jesus' resurrection, his family, his brothers, have believed. But the important detail for us of these three verses comes at the beginning of verse 14. Notice what it says. These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication. The first thing the disciples did while they were waiting for the promise of the Father is the first thing we ought to do when God calls us to wait. And that was they prayed. But they didn't just pray a little bit, they were devoted to prayer. The word continued refers to being busy with an activity, to be devoted to something. Paul uses the same word in Colossians 4 too when he says, continue earnestly in prayer, the new American standard, be devoted to prayer. This isn't just a passing habit or a passing activity. Like, oh, I should pray today before my meal because that's the right thing to do. That's good, but to be devoted to prayer means that they were engaging in the ministry of prayer and really having a prayerful spirit throughout that entire time. They made prayer a major priority while they waited on the Lord. And I think there are three reasons we should devote ourselves to prayer in our own waiting. First, prayer expresses our belief in God's promises. That's really why the disciples are praying here. They're showing the Lord that they believe him, and they're praying that God would fulfill his promises to them. Not that God is untrustworthy, but God acts in response to our prayers. It's kind of amazing. So when we pray, we're in a way declaring to God that we believe that he will do as he's promised. If you don't believe something, you don't pray for it. And prayer then shows our dependence on God and our desire for him to work in our lives. In seasons of waiting. We devote ourselves to prayer because prayer strengthens our faith in the Lord. We may not feel like we can do anything, but prayer is real spiritual activity. It's real spiritual ministry. And so prayer isn't just a filler of time. Something we do, well, I guess we got nothing better to do, we might as well pray. No, that's not it at all. Prayer is the first choice, the first recourse. And the longer we wait, the more our faith will be tested, the more we need it to be strengthened, the more endurance we need. So what do we do? We pray. Now you may be thinking of a question here. Why did they pray if God had already promised to do this? We could put it in our words today. Why do we pray if God made a promise to us? God's trustworthy, he's gonna do his promises. He's gonna fulfill them. As I mentioned a moment ago scripture teaches us that God often chooses to work in response to the prayers of his people. We can't thwart the purposes of God but God in his sovereign wisdom has chosen human prayers as the means by which he acts. That's a little bit mind-blowing. But we see this principle, this truth played out in the life of Daniel. In Daniel chapter nine, Daniel is reading in the prophet Jeremiah, and he comes across the passage that God predicted the exile would last 70 years. And Daniel's not a simpleton. He takes out his calendar or racks his brain and realizes that these 70 years are almost fulfilled. They're almost over. So what does Daniel do? Does he start packing his bags? Does he start booking a vacation with his travel agent? Of course not, he prays. Daniel 9.3, then I set my face toward the Lord God to make request by prayer and supplications with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. He is praying for God to fulfill his word to bring the people back from exile. And God does it. In this way, we see that God's promises, our prayers, and God's working come together. God acted to fulfill his promise in response to prayer. How encouraging is that? That your prayers matter, not that we can manipulate God, that's not what the text is saying, but that God chooses to respond to our feeble prayers. That when we pray as faltering and stuttering as we feel like we are, God says, I'm gonna listen to that. I listen, I bend my ear to hear that. A huge temptation in waiting is to be discouraged by God's lack of perceived movement. I think if I asked for a raise of hands, I think most hands would be up. I've been discouraged before that God doesn't seem to be answering. He doesn't seem to be working. And it's disheartening. Well, how do we stay encouraged? The answer is by devoting ourselves to prayer, by expressing our belief in God's promises, which builds our faith. Now verse 14 also mentions that the apostles prayed in one accord. Now there's these old kind of cheesy Bible jokes that talk about what was the first vehicle that the apostles drove? It was a Honda Accord because of this verse right here. It's not what it's talking about. The word means to be united in mind, to be one soul, to be together. How did they maintain their unity? It was through prayer. Prayer protects unity while we wait. Because the longer we wait, if there's a group of people together, whether it's a small unit like a family or a large unit like a church, the longer we wait, the more temptation there is to divide and splinter. We all get ideas about what we ought to do next and we need to do this and we need to do that. Prayer keeps us united. King Saul experienced this pressure back in 1 Samuel 13. This is an illustration of this. That the longer we wait, the easier it is to become divided. He was waiting for Samuel to come offer a sacrifice before a battle. Samuel providentially delays and the text says the people were scattered from him. The people were splintering. Saul then made a huge mistake. He sinned, he offered the sacrifice when he shouldn't have. He didn't wait the way he should have. In our lives, if we are waiting together, it's easy to start pulling apart and allow disunity and allow selfish ambition and the pride of saying, I think this is what we need to do. It's easy to let these things slip in. Prayer keeps us united. If we see praying churches, if we were to say this is a praying church, we would see a united church. These two things go hand in hand, prayer and unity. But the third reason that we should be devoted to prayer is because prayer patiently keeps us in step with God's timing. There's another huge temptation while we're waiting, perhaps you felt it, I know I have. And it's trying to get your head around God's timetable. Why hasn't God moved yet? Lord, it feels long enough. Can't you get me through this period of time? I've learned the lesson that you wanted me to learn. Can't you get me past this now? But even saying that means that we haven't quite learned what God wants for us. God's timing is much better than our timing. We need to follow the guidance of Psalm 37, seven. Rest in the Lord, wait patiently for him. Some of the hardest things in all of life is to wait patiently for God. To just be faithful and to wait. Habakkuk 2.3 reminds us that when it feels like God is moving too slow, the vision is too far off, Habakkuk said, God's response was, wait for it. It will happen, it will surely come. You see, God uses periods of waiting to drive us back to himself. Perhaps God has put you in a season of waiting in your life so that you will learn to depend on God, so that you will learn to pray, so that you will learn to be content until he moves and works in your life. It's very humbling to realize that sometimes God's purpose may not be to get you out of the season of waiting, but to grow you closer to him during the waiting. And if God isn't ready to move, I mean, let's just be honest here. If God isn't ready to move, no amount of pushing and worrying and cajoling on your part is gonna get God to move one second faster. It is prayer that enables us to wait in a way that honors the Lord as we talk to the Lord and pour out our heart to him and rest in him. So in our season of waiting, we are to be devoted to prayer. Now as the apostles prayed, they realized something else needed to be done. They needed to replace Judas and fill his open apostolic position. And so we begin in verse 15. And in those days, Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples, altogether the number of the names was about 120, and said, so just to interrupt the text for a second, Peter here is taking the initiative, he's leading this group of believers, We'll see next week in chapter two that Peter is gonna be the one that takes the lead preaching. Peter leads the church in its early days. And what does Peter say? Verse 16. Men and brethren, this scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke before by the mouth of David concerning Judas, who became a guide to those who arrested Jesus. For he was numbered with us and obtained a part in this ministry. All right, we need a pause here. Peter is saying, Peter is arguing even, that Judas' betrayal fulfilled scripture. Even this treachery, this wicked act of betrayal was not outside the plan of God. In fact, David's words, Peter says, David's words in the Psalms 1,000 years earlier predicted it. We need to be reminded that God's word is trustworthy. There is nothing that happens outside of the control of God. God is not the author of evil. James 1 makes that very clear. But he is in control even of evil things. Sinful things do not thwart God's sovereign plan. Because the alternative is far worse. The alternative would be that evil operates in a world that God has no control over. I mean that evil would run unchecked and that's not true. God uses even the wicked plans of men to fulfill and further his good purposes. That's what Peter's saying. We see that through the cross and we'll see that in the preaching of the apostles next two through four. But in verse 17 Peter gives two reasons for replacing Judas. You see him two reasons. First, Judas was part of the apostolic group. He was numbered with them. And then second, he had a share in the ministry. He obtained a part in this ministry. Now before we move on, we need to bring up a couple questions that kind of loom over this passage. Is this even necessary? Do the disciples really need to do this? Even worse, are they being presumptuous? Are they making a mistake here? Adding someone to the apostolic group, especially you think of a guy named Paul who is known as the Apostle Paul. What about him? Where does he fit into all this? Those questions we're gonna try to answer as we go along. But Peter here is convinced that they need to replace Judas. Now, verses 18 and 19, kind of given aside, it's a parenthetical. In fact, the New King James puts it in parentheses, and it describes Judas's graphic death. Now, I'll try to be discreet, but here's what the text says. Now, this man, Judas, purchased a field with the wages of iniquity. And falling headlong, he burst open in the middle, and all his entrails gushed out. And it became known to all those dwelling in Jerusalem, so that the field is called in their own language, achel dama, that is, field of blood. Sorry to talk about that before lunch here. Now at first glance, this seems to contradict Matthew's account, because Matthew tells us that Judas had overwhelming feelings of regret, and he went back to the religious leaders, and he wanted his money back. He wanted to return the money and let Jesus go, and they were not having that. So he threw the money into the temple, and the Bible says he went out and hanged himself. What Luke writes here actually reconciles with that. So a couple things. Verse 18 seems to say that he purchased the field himself. Well, it doesn't have to read that way. When it says that Judas purchased the field, it refers to the money that was his that was used to purchase the field. Just like your tax dollars go to a host of things, Judas's money purchased the field he died in. Verse 19 gives us the name of the field and tells us that the whole city knew this story. And so if Luke was making something up here, anyone could easily just say, no, that's not true, because this was common knowledge. The other issue or seeming contradiction here is Judas' death. Matthew says that he hanged himself, but verse 18 says that he fell in such a way to burst himself open. And again, these are not contradictory. These things do reconcile. Either this was a failed hanging, or what I think, more likely in my mind, he died by hanging, and after his body became bloated by the heat, the rope snapped, and when he hit the ground, let's just say it wasn't pretty. It's kind of gross, I know. But his graphic death, the people would have recognized as a marker of God's judgment on him. That his body was not laid to rest in the ground, he was not given a proper burial, God's judgment was on this man. So Judas is dead, Peter says to replace him, in verse 20 he continues, and this is Peter's scriptural reasoning. He says this, quote, for it is written in the book of Psalms, in the book of Psalms, let his dwelling place be desolate, let no one live in it, and let another take his office. So Peter is quoting two Psalms in support of his argument, saying that the Psalms predicted this, and this is what we ought to do, guys. We ought to replace Judas. And he quotes these two Psalms. And if you're like me, you look at those two Psalms and you say, I don't know if I see that, Peter. How did those two Psalms fit your situation? Is Peter like proof texting here? Is he like ripping verses out of context because it was convenient for him? Absolutely not. He's not proof texting. How the early church used the Old Testament is very instructive to us because what was the Bible of the early church? It was the Old Testament. They didn't have the New Testament. Nothing else was written yet. They had stories about Jesus. But everything else in your New Testament was yet to be written. So their Bible was the Old Testament. And Peter is not ripping these verses out of context. Both Psalms are imprecatory Psalms which cry out for justice against God's enemies, and Peter interprets these passages, some have called it, in a typological prophetic manner, meaning what was written about David's enemies in his day has a future fulfillment in Peter's day. The first quote comes from Psalm 69, 25. Psalm 69 petitions God to pour out his justice and his wrath against evildoers. And Psalm 69 25 says that the result of God's justice will be that the homes and the tents of these enemies of God will be abandoned, they'll be desolate. In other words, God's righteous judgment results in their dwelling place being empty. And this gives us a much clearer line of sight into Peter's thinking. Peter is saying that the judgment that God has placed on Judas has removed Judas from this office. God justly judged Judas just like the evildoers of Psalm 69. When Judas betrayed Jesus, that was a heinous abomination. It was a wicked thing, and God judged him, and the judgment of God meant that Judas's office was forfeit, that Judas forfeited his office. The evidence of the judgment is the vacant office. So the real judgment on Judas not just his gruesome death, was his expulsion from the apostolic group. So this first quote explains what happened to Judas. He opposed God, betrayed the Messiah, and was judged for it. He was judged for all eternity as well as he went to hell. His rebellion necessitated a removal from the apostolic group. The second quote then comes from Psalm 109 verse eight, which Peter uses to say this is what needs to happen now. This is also a psalm of judgment on God's enemies. David prayed that God would remove an evil man from his office and replace him with someone else. Peter then applied that to Judas' situation. God has removed Judas from his office, now someone else should take his place. Well, who should take his place? Verses 21 and 22 give the criteria. Therefore, Peter says, of these men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John to that day when he was taken up from us, one of these must become a witness with us of his resurrection. So Peter lays out the criteria for this decision. There are really three things here. First is that it had to be a man. Though women traveled with Jesus, Peter used the specific word for a male. The second criteria is that he needed to have experienced Jesus's ministry from the beginning, from John's baptism to the end, to the resurrection and ascension. And if you remember, in the Gospels, Jesus sent out 70 others to do ministry, so there were many others that had walked with Jesus. The pool was actually fairly big. The third criteria is that he also had to be a firsthand witness of the resurrection. Jesus appeared to 500 brethren at once, Paul says. So there's a fairly large pool here to draw from. As an aside, this criteria also shows us that the apostolic office is not something around today. After this generation of men died, the office of apostles ceased because no one today walked with Jesus from the beginning of his ministry. No one here is a firsthand witness of his resurrection. They didn't see the risen Jesus. So the apostolic office has ceased. Now before we go on to make application to us, I'd like to come back to a couple of those big questions. Is this process really necessary? I was asked this just a couple weeks ago. Did they do the right thing here? Peter certainly believes so, because his conclusion here in verses 21 and 22 have an urgency to them. In fact, the New American Standard, the NASB, translates verse 21 a little more literally. Listen to the force of the conclusion. He says this, therefore it is necessary that of the men, et cetera, et cetera. The words it is necessary is part of the original. There is a compulsion here. Peter is saying it's required of us to do this. And no one from the group of 120 argues with him. Now the number 12 held significance here. Jesus chose 12 disciples which mirrored the 12 tribes of Israel. Jesus formed a new people. that in one chapter, one chapter later, would become known as the church. But there was some continuity with Israel, the 12 is a big part of that, 12 tribes of Israel, 12 apostles. But there's discontinuity, there's a newness to this, there's something different about it. The church was not in the Old Testament. Jesus says that 12 was the number, that's what he chose. Now, as the book of Acts goes along, we read about some apostles being martyred. The church didn't replace faithful apostles when they were later killed. So why did they replace Judas? Well, the word faithful, hopefully, is what's jumping out at you. Judas was not a faithful apostle. He was judged by God because of his rebellion. To have a complete, qualified group of apostles at the start of the church, his position needed to be filled. So what about Paul? Are the disciples being presumptive here because God had already planned for Paul to be an apostle? And the best I can say to that is perhaps you could make that argument. Personally, I don't believe this is presumptuous or outside of God's will. Of all the things that 120 people said in seven to 10 days, this is the one thing the Holy Spirit inspired Luke to record. Nothing in the text portrays this as a negative event. In fact, this action to replace Judas was birthed out of a prayer meeting. As for Paul, Jesus specially appointed him as a witness sent to the Gentiles. Sent out is what apostle means, they sent one. Paul's apostolic authority was not because he walked with Jesus from the beginning of his ministry to the end. Paul's apostolic authority came directly from Jesus, specially commissioned by him. So I don't think they're making a mistake here. The text doesn't portray it that way. Luke certainly doesn't seem to think so either. Now let's step back from the details of the text to notice a second action we should take when we are waiting on the Lord. What are the apostles doing here? Big picture, what are the apostles doing? They're looking to the Old Testament to guide their actions. They're looking to the scriptures for guidance. Secondly, when we are in seasons of waiting, we ought to search the scriptures for guidance. Even if there's nothing that specifically applies to our waiting, we still study the Bible. Why? Because God leads his people through the word. God leads his people through the word. The scriptures teach us how to live. It teaches us doctrine, reproof, correction, instruction of righteousness. It teaches us how to live wisely in a broken world. And we have to interpret it properly. We can't rip it out and make it say whatever we want it to say. Remember what Psalm 119 says about the Word? It's a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. The Word counsels us and shows us how to live. And what I'm about to say next may be really obvious, but really important. The Bible can't direct our lives if we don't look in it, if we don't search it. How ironic it is when believers talk about, I can't hear from God, I don't know what to do, I don't have any guidance, when they're not in the Word of God. Is it possible that God has not specifically led you even after searching? Yes. But you can't claim that God hasn't led you or spoken if you don't start with what he's already said. God guides us through his word. So if we're not in the word, we shouldn't expect God to guide us. And God doesn't give us specific advice about every situation. You will not open your Bible and see which stocks to buy for your portfolio. It's not in there. It's not gonna talk about which house to buy. It's gonna give you principles and truths to live by. And as we study the word then, we are actively listening to God. We're hearing what God has said. And as we wait on the Lord, we are listening to what he has said in his revealed word. But quickly, the apostles didn't stop with merely noting what the scriptures said. They didn't sit here and Peter say all this and they say, that's true, Peter, nice job. All right, let's go to lunch. That's not what they said. They decided to take action. In verse 23, two men are put forward. They proposed two men. Joseph, called Barsabbas, who was surnamed Justice, and another man named Matthias. Then they prayed. They asked the Lord for what his will would be. Verse 24, they prayed and said, you, O Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which of these two you've chosen to take part in this ministry. to take part in this apostleship from which Judas by transgression fell that he might go to his own place. Again, Judas's death did not open up this position, it was his transgression, it was his sin that opened this office. So they're petitioning the all-wise God to make his will clear in which man to replace Judas. Verse 26, and they cast their lots and the lot fell on Matthias and he was numbered with the 11 apostles. Well, why did they cast lots? Potentially, this was to eliminate rivalry or disrupt unity. But more likely, they're casting lots to determine God's choice. This was an Old Testament way of determining God's leading. The lot belonged to the Lord. So should we cast lots today? No. This is an Old Testament action. This is really the final act of the Old Testament era, because the next verse begins the church, the day of Pentecost. Acts, remember, is a transition book of sorts. It's not prescriptive like the epistles. So the church now has a better way of following God's leading, and that is through the Spirit of God. One final objection before we move on to this decision about replacing Judas with Matthias and not waiting for Paul. Sometimes it's said, well, Matthias isn't mentioned ever again in the Bible. We never hear from him. What happened to him? Well, that's true. That's also true of eight of the other 11 apostles. The only three apostles that are mentioned by name and acts from here on out are Peter, James, and John. So nine of the 12 apostles are not mentioned any longer. Early church history tells us that Matthias was part of the 70 who Jesus sent out to do ministry, and that he died as a martyr in Ethiopia. This brings us now to the final principle of what we should do in a season of waiting on the Lord. What are the apostles doing? They're seeking God, they're searching for his will, and then when God revealed what to do, the apostles obeyed God when he spoke. Third, when God reveals to us what to do, we must obey. Now there's a difference between the apostles and us. They had a direct decision from the Lord. They had direct revelation from God. While that might be nice at times, we do not have such direct matters. Instead, Peter says that we have a more sure word of prophecy. We have a completed scriptures. Hebrews one, one through three, says that in the former days, God spoke to us by his prophets, but in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son. whom he has appointed heir of all things, through whom also he created the worlds. So if God has given us a completed revelation in the Bible, what should we do? We should start by obeying what God has already revealed. You might be thinking, okay, I'm waiting on the Lord, what do I do? Just start with what scripture says, begin there. Sometimes, especially when I was a counselor at camp, working with young people or in college ministry, I would get questions about, what's God's will for my life? How do I know what God wants me to do? Who should I marry? What career should I choose? What graduate school should I go to? I'm not sure, but that's probably running ahead. You need to start with obeying what God has already said to do. In fact, there are several passages of scripture that say, it is the will of God, and then it gives us something. It is God's will that we should be saved. It is God's will that we should be surrendered. It is God's will that we should be sanctified. It is God's will that we should be spirit-filled. It is God's will that we should be fruitful and thankful. And if you're not applying those things to your life right now, you don't need to worry about what God wants you to do, because that's where you need to start. That's where you begin. You start by what God has already revealed, then you will be ready to follow God's leading when he directs you. We don't cast lots, we don't do what Gideon did and put out fleeces to determine God's will. Instead, in the New Testament era, with the completed scriptures, what do we do? We search the scriptures, we pray, we seek wise counsel from godly people, we walk in the spirit, and then we exercise wisdom. Yes, God sometimes prompts our hearts, but he prompts the hearts of those who are already walking in the spirit, walking in the scriptures. Then when God tells us what to do, when he shows us what to do, when he makes it clear for us that this is the next right thing for us, then we need courage to obey. And God gives us that through his presence. Hebrews 13 says that he will never leave us or forsake us so we can confidently say the Lord's my helper. I will not fear, what can man do to me? When God says wait, what should we do? We pray, we search the scriptures, we obey God's revealed will. You say that's really, really simple. Yes, yes it is. But let's note also that waiting is not passively sitting back and doing nothing. Praying is not a one-time thing. Well, I prayed once, now God should tell me what to do. No, we devote ourselves to prayer. We search the scriptures. We walk in obedience. The apostles were spiritually active while they waited. And through their activity, they revealed their faith. They revealed that they were trusting the Lord, believing that he would fulfill his promise. And so this is what this passage illustrates for us today. In seasons of waiting, God calls us to exercise faith by actively preparing for him to work. It's faith that leads us to devote ourselves to prayer. It's faith that reads and studies the scriptures, believing that God is going to show us. It's faith that steps out in obedience when God says this is what's right to do next. No doubt, God has told many of you right now, wait. You're in a season of waiting. You're waiting for a child to come back to the Lord. You're waiting to find a spouse. You're waiting for a diagnosis. You're waiting for spiritual healing after a hurt. You're waiting for God to lead about a decision. You're waiting for a prayer to be answered. The list could go on and on. You are not a victim of these circumstances. God has not left you on hold and walked away. He is working his wise and loving purpose in your life. Because he's growing you. He's stretching you. And when he grows us, and when he stretches us, he always gives us the grace to sustain us. So devote yourself to prayer, dwell in the scriptures, and walk uprightly. That's what we ought to do when God says, wait. Thanks for listening to audio from Red Rocks Baptist Church. If you enjoyed this content, please consider sharing it with others. Our mission at Red Rocks Baptist Church is to know Christ and to make Him known. May God bless you as you follow Him.