Take your Bibles, if you would, and turn to Acts chapter one, please. Acts chapter one. Acts one. Calvary Baptist Academy, thank you all for being here with us and singing for us. That was a blessing to us. Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones tells of a story of a Welsh preacher who went to a small town to preach at a convention. And at this town, they had all assembled together in a room, and they were waiting for this preacher to arrive. Several minutes went by, and several more minutes went by, and still he had not arrived. And so he, they sent, the leaders of that assembly sent a maid, this is in London area, a maid to let him know that it was time for the service. She went and as she approached the room in which he was staying, she heard him talking to someone. And she, it sounded like a very serious discussion. So she didn't want to interrupt at all and so she felt like she had to just go back and tell him and said, she's, so the maid went back and said, he's talking with someone, I didn't feel like I could really interrupt, it sounded pretty serious. Well, a couple more minutes went by and the leader said, you really need to go back and check again. So the maid went back and the same thing, he was talking again to the people behind the, or he was talking to someone behind a door and she did not feel like it was her place to interrupt the discussion. So she goes back and she says, I just don't feel like I can interrupt this. Well, the leader said, well, what did you hear? What was this man saying? He was saying, she said, well, I heard him say to this other person who was with him, I will not go and preach to these people if you will not come with me. And the leader said, oh, we better just wait then. The man, the Welsh preacher, was praying to God. He was expressing his dependency upon the Lord. to do what he could not do, for the Spirit of God to work in the lives of the people that he was going to be preaching to, to take the Word of God and to do what he could not humanly do himself. That is the kind of spirit that he wants us, God wants us to have, the kind of attitude that he wants us to have when it comes to doing his work. when it comes to serving Him, when it comes to fulfilling the commission that God has given us, to be witnesses for Him. God wants us to understand the kind of attitude we need to have is one of great dependency, realizing that we cannot do on our own what God can only do through us. And we find in this passage in Acts chapter one the mention of the Spirit of God in this passage on several occasions. Jesus Christ, when He was talking to the disciples, the 120 disciples that were there, and they asked a question of Him, He says to them that when I go, when I leave you, you must wait for the Spirit of God. There was a condition of the Spirit of God being with them in order for them to be able to do what He had called them to do. We find in the book of Acts, as we looked at it last week, that the theme of the book of Acts is the advancement of God's kingdom. We noted last week that Acts chapter one, verse three, talks about the kingdom of God. And then again, in Acts 28, verse 31, the very final verse in Acts is preaching the kingdom of God and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ. This tells us, because at the very outset of this book and the very end of this book, this tells us that the theme of this book is the kingdom of God and how God desires to advance His kingdom through Christ until Christ returns. And it's God's desire for us to be used of Him to further his kingdom. And I gotta tell you, I am greatly excited about what we are going to learn in this book, how we are going to fulfill our roles as witnesses for him, what God desires for us to do, and how God desires to be dependent upon us to be dependent upon him and his spirit. The Bible actually says we didn't do our scripture reading, so we'll do it now. Picking up in Acts 1, it says, the former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach until the day in which he was taken up after he, through the Holy Spirit, had given commandments to the apostles whom he had chosen, to whom he had presented himself alive after his suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during 40 days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. And being assembled together with them, he commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which he said, You have heard from me, for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. Therefore, when they had come together, they asked him, saying, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? And he said to them, it is not for you to know times or seasons which the father has put in his own authority, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit shall come upon you. And you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and in Judea and in Samaria and at the end of the earth. Now when he had spoken these things while they had watched, he was taken up and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they had looked steadfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by him and in white apparel, who also said, men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus who was taken up from you unto heaven will so come in like manner as you saw him go into heaven. Then they returned to Jerusalem from the Mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem on a Sabbath day's journey. And when they had entered, they went up into the upper room where they were staying. 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. These all continued with one accord in prayer. and supplication, and the woman, and Mary, and the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, as we come to you and we look at this passage this morning, and we see such a pivotal passage, Jesus' teachings, the final words that he is going to give to his disciples before he ascends to you, and then all of what is implied by his ascension. I pray that you would help us through this passage to not only see the whole thrust of the book and what the book of Acts is going to teach us, but that it would be compelling for us to understand just how needful it is for us to be dependent upon you, how much we need you. We cannot live without you. And I pray these things in Christ's name, amen. Well, we're picking up from last week and we learned last week that the disciples were talking to Jesus and they asked this question. They said to Jesus, are you going to set up your kingdom at this time? They were very urgently preoccupied with the idea of Jesus overthrowing the Roman government and setting up his kingdom, as they had been all along, and really the nation of Israel was constantly looking for this Messiah that would set up the kingdom on earth. And Jesus says to them, it is not time for that. In fact, he tells them, do not occupy yourselves with this timing of the coming of myself to set up the kingdom. For that is something that is of the authority of God alone. We pick up there in verse six of this passage and we see that to be the case, he says, Therefore, when they had come together, they asked him saying, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom of Israel? And he said to them, it is not for you to know the times which the father has put in his own authority. And then he says this, he says, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and the end of the earth. Now let me ask you a question, brothers and sisters in Christ. Do you ever find yourself preoccupied with what you can't control? Do you ever find yourself worried about what you really have no ability to be able to do anything about? God is telling us, Jesus is telling the disciples here, and we can apply this in a very important way, that we need to stay and remain under the control of God in our lives. And what Jesus does here to help the disciples to understand their own focus is he helps them to understand, first of all, that they must focus on God's sovereign control. And we see in the passage three ways that he does this. First of all, he says God is in control of your timing. You ever wondered why God does what he does, and his timing and things, and his bringing things about a certain way? And sometimes we get confused, like, Lord, why did you set it up that way? Why did you do things the way that you did them? I really don't understand. God says his timing is his timing. And the coming of Christ, they were looking forward to this time, and frankly, the early church, the first century church, was always looking for the, they thought it was gonna come in their lifetime. And yet God's timing is so different than our timing. God will fulfill his promises. God will do what he says he will do. He will fill the Old Testament prophecies in the Old Testament, but God will do it in his way. Very frankly, not in our way. And you see that the Old Testament and the New Testament is replete with examples of this occurring where the nation of Israel thought God was going to fulfill His word a certain way, and God actually is going to fulfill it His way. We find also that God is in control of our service. Now a lot of times when this message is preached, when this passage is preached, and it's a very common passage, nearly everybody in this room, or many of you anyway, know Acts 1-8, and you shall be witnesses to me. But I want you to notice something about this passage in verse 8. Is that verse a command? Look at it, verse 8, it says, And ye shall be witnesses to me. You shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem. Is that a command? That is not a command. And I'll just let you know in the Greek, it's not a command either. Notice what it says in the passage. It says, you will be witnesses. That is just a be verb with a future tense being verb is what that is. He actually says that this is what is going to happen. You will be witnesses to me. Now, there are certainly other passages of Scripture that tell us that there is a command there. For example, in Mark 16, 15, it says, go ye into all the world and preach the gospel. That's a command. Or in Matthew chapter 28, it says that you should make disciples. That's a command. But in this passage, actually, it says that you will be doing this. This will happen. You will be witnesses. I don't know if you have ever realized this before, but when it comes to God's working in your life and our role, do you realize that God will carry out what God wants to carry out in your life? Now, we have a role to play and we have a responsibility to focus on, and we're gonna look at that a little bit later, but at the outset of all of this, we must understand that God will do what God will do in your life and in my life, and we need to be tethered to that. God also says he's in control of your advancement. He says, you'll be witnesses to me in Jerusalem. And then the kingdom is going to advance into Samaria and Judea and then into the end of the earth. And by the way, the end of the earth really is talking about the Gentiles. You find that actually, we'll look when we get to there, you'll see that, but in Acts chapter 13, It says, actually, verse 47, it says, for so the Lord has commanded us, I have set you as a light to the Gentiles, that you should be salvation to the ends of the earth. So when it talks about, in this verse, the ends of the world, or the uttermost part of the world, it's actually talking about the Gentiles. You might wanna even cross-reference that, Acts 13, 47. But God is in control of our, he knows how to advance us at the right time and the right way. He says, this is going to happen in your life. Philippians chapter one tells us that he who has begun a good work in you will complete it in the day of Christ. It is so important that we stay firmly grounded in God's control. Of course, I grew up being very familiar with trains. I lived very close to train tracks. My dad worked on trains for a living. I used to play with model trains, especially at Christmas time with a HO train set. How many of you all have one of those as a kid? I don't see them a lot anymore. You can't even find a hobby shop anymore, but you can still buy it on Amazon like you can everything else. So when you're thinking about a train, What is the thing that controls the train the most? And I will tell you that it's not the engine, and it's not the operator, and it's not the people running, the management that take care of the operator. You know the thing that controls the train the most? It's the track. If you derail off of that track, you are in big trouble, right? Dad, I got an expert here. Verify everything I'm saying. If I'm wrong, tell me later, not now. If you get derailed off of that track, you're in big trouble. And I'd like to suggest to you that understanding and living in light of the sovereignty of God, the control of God, and I do not mean that you're gonna take that to an extreme like some groups do, but understanding that God is in control of your life is a absolute necessary foundation that what I need to do is figure out my role in the train that's tethered to the track. But there are things in our lives that often derail us from being and living under God's control. Now, actually, we're always under His control whether we like it or not. But derail us from living under God's control. I thought of a few things, I just sort of sat down and thought about it. One is unrealized expectations. You ever wanted something to happen and thought something was going to happen a certain way? And so, just like the disciples here, they expected the kingdom to happen. They were despondent before Christ came and appeared to them. They didn't know what was going on. Unrealized expectations will untether us from God's control sometimes. We won't feel like God is really in control, that he's really sovereign. Sometimes I think idealism does that. We're just overly idealistic. You know, the older I get, and I'm not old, but the older I get yet, but the older I get, the more I realize that life is just not that ideal. I mean, if you really think about it, think about when you're in your 20s, you think you can do everything and you can't do anything. Well, not anything and everything, that's pretty absolute, but you know what I mean. I mean, you think you can take on the world, and by the time you get to your 30s, you start realizing, you know, maybe life isn't quite that, the way I thought it was going to be. I don't know what happens when you get to your 40s and 50s. Some of you, a lot of you can tell me about that. The point, I can simply say, in 60s and 70s, too, anyway, I'll stop there. But the truth of the matter is we sometimes are overly idealistic. Sometimes it's pride. We just simply think God could do it a better way. We would never say that. But God can do it a better way than he's doing it. And we begin to lose our trust in what God is doing because we think there's got to be a better way. Frustration can do this. Just general knee-jerk reaction to things. Folks, it is vitally important that if we are going to fulfill the commission that God has given us to be witnesses, if we're going to please God with our lives, we have to be firmly, firmly on the track of God's sovereign control in our lives. Not only that, he wants us then not to focus on what God's role is, which is his timing and his way of doing, and he says, God has full authority for that. But God wants us to focus on kingdom responsibility, on what our responsibility is. He says, you need to focus on being a witness for me. He says, you will be witnesses for me. This is what you need to focus on. You will be witnesses for me in Jerusalem, in Judea, in Samaria, and other most parts of the earth. A witness is someone in the Old Testament who testified in legal matters. We see the same way that the word is used in Matthew 18 as well, where they are testifying as to what has actually happened, what has actually taken place. The book of Luke and the book of Acts, which Luke wrote, speaks a lot of this idea of a witness. For example, in Acts 2, verse 32, it says, this Jesus who God has raised up, of which we are all witnesses. In Acts 3, verse 15, it says, and they killed the prince of life, whom God raised from the dead, of which we are witnesses. So in the very beginning chapters of the book of Acts, we see that what they are witnesses of is the risen Christ, that Christ is alive. Let me just make this application. You and I need to be witnesses, but we need to be really thinking about what this verse actually means. So oftentimes this verse is preached and the application is simply you just need to preach the gospel and give the gospel to everybody. But we're going to actually find 28 chapters in this book of Acts that's going to really help us to understand what a witness for the resurrection of Christ really is. I want to take a few moments just to look at a couple of testimonies, one of Peter and one of Paul in this book. Would you take your Bibles and turn to Acts chapter 10 verse 39? He says in this passage, beginning in Acts chapter 10 and verse 39, Peter says, and we are witnesses of all things which he did both in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, whom they killed by hanging on a tree. Now, let me pause for a minute. What I want you to notice from both of these passages is how sincere, how, can I even say passionate, Peter is about telling and witnessing of who Christ is and what Christ did. Verse 40, him God raised up on the third day and showed him openly, not to all the people, but to witnesses chosen by God, even to us who ate and drank with him after he arose from the dead. Can you imagine Peter's telling, look, he ate and drank with us. He chose us to be witnesses for him. There is this compelling nature to what Peter is saying. And he commended us to preach to the people and to testify that it is he who was ordained by God to be judge of the living and the dead. And to him, all the prophets witnessed that through his name, whoever believes in him will receive remission of sins. While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word. And then look over at Acts chapter 22, if you would, and we'll see Paul's testimony, the same kind of language and the same kind of urgency that the Apostle Paul has as he bears witness of the living Christ. Verse 14, Acts chapter 22 says, then he said, the God of our fathers has chosen you that you should know his will. and see the just one and hear the voice of his mouth. For you will be witnesses to all men of what you have seen and heard. And now why are you waiting? Arise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord. Now it happened when I returned to Jerusalem and was praying in the temple that I was in a trance and saw him saying to me, make haste and get out of Jerusalem quickly for they will not receive your testimony concerning me. So I said, Lord, they know that in the synagogue I imprisoned and beat those who believe on you. When the blood of your martyr Stephen was shed, I was standing by consenting to his death and guarding the clothes of those who were killing him. Then he said to me, depart for I will send you far from here to the Gentiles. The Apostle Paul is speaking of his own conversion and God's working in his life to bring him to a place where he was going to be a great witness for the cause of Christ. And I hope you can see in Peter's testimony and Paul's testimony, and you're going to see it many times over in the book of Acts, this urgency and this passionate telling of the living Christ. You think of Paul's testimony, here he was murdering Jews, or Christians rather, murdering Christians. And God converts him and he goes out and he brings people to Christ. It really speaks then of what the idea of a witness really is. I mean, just think about it for a minute. What is, what really is a witness? Well, it's somebody that tells you about Jesus. That's what a witness is. Folks, that's not wrong, but that's not really all of it. A witness is more than just someone who tells you about Jesus. There is this inclination in our lives to sort of think that if I just give my 15 minute gospel presentation, or if I just hand out a tract, then I'm a good witness. And those things are helpful, and they are important, and they are part of it. But folks, we really need to grasp a fuller understanding of what it really means to be a witness for Christ. George Whitefield was a man who was getting people up in Edenburg, out of their beds at five o'clock to preach to them. I'm not suggesting that that is prescriptive. Don't worry, I won't be doing that anytime soon. I get up at five o'clock, but I don't think All of you do. I actually had somebody call me this past week and see if we had an early service. I thought to myself, I'd be fine with that, but I'm not sure we all would. Anyway, a man by the name of David Hume, who was a philosopher and a skeptic, went readily to hear this man, George Whitefield, at five o'clock in the morning. And when he was asked on his way to see Whitefield, he was asked, why are you going to see him? You don't believe in what Whitefield is saying. And he replied, I do not, but he does. See, it was so compelling, even for this man, Hume, it was so compelling, the preaching of George Whitefield, because he really believed what he was preaching. George Whitefield would preach multiple times a day, five to eight times a day, all over the area, seven days a week. I don't know when he studied, I'm not really sure about that, I hadn't figured how that works out, but maybe at night, I guess. because he really wanted people to hear the gospel and he wanted people to come to Christ. There was this authenticity, this genuineness about a witness for Christ. I was reminded this week about a woman whose name is Rosaria Butterfield. This is a woman who was a tenured English literature professor at Syracuse University. She was also a feminist and a lesbian. This is a woman who, all of you are awake now, that was funny, anyway. And this is a woman who wrote a memoir called The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert. It's a woman who actually came to Christ, who now is a wife of a pastor and homeschools kids. The conversion of the gospel, in the life of this woman is quite amazing. In her memoir, she says this, my Christian life unfolded as I was just living my life, my normal life. In the normal course of my life, questions emerged and exceeded my secular feminist worldview. Those questions sat quietly in the crevices of my mind until I met a most unlikely friend, a Christian pastor. Had a pastor named Ken Smith not shared the gospel with me for years and years, over and over again, not in some used car salesman way, but in an organic, spontaneous, and compassionate way, those questions might still be lodged in the crevices of my mind, and I might never have met the most unlikely of friends, Jesus Christ himself. This is a perfect example of what God can do with someone who is a biblical witness. Someone who not only says, I will preach the gospel at you here. Let me sell you the gospel, but let me live it out in front of you. Let me, let me show, show you who Jesus is. This lady is going to be writing another book actually to explain in more detail how this person came to, how she came to Christ and how this couple that witnessed to her did it in such a way that was very compelling for her even though she was absolutely prior to that, completely antagonistic to the gospel. And one of the things that was very compelling was that they showed great love and compassion. The very first time they had this woman over their house, they didn't even give her the gospel at all. And you say, well, that is horrible. It's not. Sometimes we've got to live it before we can tell it. You say, boy, I've never heard somebody preach about not giving the gospel the first time. Let's, isn't it gonna be exciting as we go through the book of Acts and see how these folks were witnesses of what Christ did? And sometimes they did give the gospel right out front. There are other times where they had previous conversations. But the point, folks, is simply this. There was a witness of the living Christ from the inside out. This was not something they just did as their duty. This is something they understood because of who Christ is and what they wanted to do as a result. Then we see then that the kingdom witness depends on Christ's working in this passage. We notice in the passage that the focus is clearly on the Holy Spirit. He says you will receive power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you. I think one of the things that is most difficult for us as Christians is the fact that we feel that we can't be a good witness. And you know the answer to that is you absolutely cannot. You can't do it. You can never do what God wants you to do in being a good witness for Him. Let me just get that out in the open. You can't. Boy, I've never heard preaching like this. You're telling me I can't do it? You can't do it. He says, you will receive power. After that, the Holy Spirit has come upon you. And then you will be witnesses for me. There is this absolute necessity of the Spirit's power in our lives. And I will just say this as you, the more you work with people, the more you rub shoulders, whether it's believers and discipleship or unbelievers and helping them come to a place of discipleship, you will find how little you can really do in their lives to convince them of the truth. You really have absolutely no ability to convince them of what they are not convinced of. Have you ever actually tried to motivate somebody to want to do something? If you're a parent, you've tried this. And if you're a parent, you have failed. See, it's the spirit of God who is able to do this in the life of a Christian and helping them to minister to others. And I think sometimes we're not very dependent on the Spirit of God because we're not really as engaged as we ought to be in the lives of people to come to a place where we just sort of sit back and go, I can't do this. This is not working. Lord, I need you. I can't do this without you. And we have clearly, not just in this passage, but throughout the entire book of Acts, this constant reference to the Spirit of God working in the lives of people to bring them to Christ. And at the outset of all of this, we need to understand how dependent we are on Him. Albert Muller said it this way, he said, God does not build his church through gimmicks or programmatic cleverness. The church is not dependent upon marketing strategies for its success. Our only hope is to see lives changed by the gospel, is to faithfully proclaim God's word and then trust God's spirit to make our proclamation effective. This is absolutely necessary for us to understand. If we are to be the witnesses that God wants us to be, we must be dependent upon the Spirit of God in our lives. Then what Christ does after explaining what is going to happen, he now is going to help them, he now is going to leave them. You'll notice what it says in verses nine through 11. He ascends from them and ascends into the clouds. He's taken up, the Bible says there. We find from the angels that he's going to come in the same way that he went up. That is still yet to come. We still one day will see Christ coming in the clouds. I don't know what side of that we'll be on. That will be up to the Lord. That's his business, but we know one day that he will come. Until he comes, we need to be focused on what God wants us to be focused on. But there are two things in the Bible, two ways that the Bible specifically says, helps us to understand the significance of the ascension. One way is to help us to understand the reality of Christ's Lordship. When Christ was on this earth, the disciples did exactly what Christ wanted them to do. At least they were supposed to, and overall they did. Christ would talk with them about the fact that they need to take up their cross and follow him. They needed to be following him and obedient to the lordship of Jesus Christ. But Christ's plan was to do more than just to use these disciples, these 12 disciples. The kingdom is going to expand. You know enough about the book of Acts to know that the kingdom is going to really expand and to advance. And in order for that to happen, Christ is now going to have to ascend to his throne, ascend to the right hand of the Father. When you take your Bibles, and I want us to see this in Ephesians chapter 1, take your Bibles and turn there, and I'd like you to see just the significance of the ascension, the fact that Christ is now In the heavenlies, he is seated with the Father in the heavenlies. And what that means for us in the fulfilling of what God wants to do in our lives in the advancement of the kingdom of God. Ephesians chapter one, verse 20 says, which he worked in Christ when he raised him up from the dead and seated him at the right hand in the heavenly places. Far above all principality and power and might and dominion, above all of that, and every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in that which is to come, that he may put all things under his feet and gave him to be head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all." The fact that Christ ascended to the right hand of the Father, shows his authority, it shows his lordship, it shows what he is, his plan in working out the kingdom of God on this earth is to do it from above, to be able to be in control of all things, to see what is going on, to be aware of what is happening, to direct in the lives of his people. Christ is the great orchestrator of history from this point on, especially in his church, which he is the head of. When we think of the Ascension, we ought to, the Ascension is often very much downplayed, but when we think of the Ascension, we ought to think of the authority of Christ and what he is now doing. While he is not mediating his throne directly right now, he's not mediating his kingdom right now, that will come in the future. He is certainly on his throne, and he is certainly advancing his kingdom in his way. I want us to know this one second thing about the Ascension. And that is the fact that Christ is the mediator of all things. It says in Hebrews 4, verse 14, Seeing then that we have a high priest that has passed into the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted, like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore now come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Jesus came and walked among us and lived 33 years in this earth and lived a perfect life, but underwent every temptation imaginable. Jesus, Jesus experienced every heartache. He experienced loneliness and struggle, and he experienced heartache, suffering of every kind. Have you ever had a boss that didn't know what he was doing? I know you have, because several of you have told me that. A boss who might have been trained in management, but has never actually turned a wrench. Or one who is trained in a certain way, has a college degree from a great college perhaps, but never actually worked on a computer. Someone who's never actually swung a hammer and he's trying to be your boss. You ever find that frustrating? I'm just curious, how many of you have been in that experience? Okay, really, a lot of you have been in that experience and we have double hands back from the sound booth. Okay, all right. That was fun. Do you know the truth of the matter is, folks, you never can say that about Christ. You never can say that about Jesus. You never are praying to a Jesus who doesn't know what you've gone through. You're never praying to a Jesus who isn't aware of what is happening, who can't identify with your suffering, with your struggle, with your frustration, with your confusion. You have never prayed to a Jesus like that. Jesus knows. He is not a high priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of your infirmities. And the reason that we ought to be motivated to come to Him in prayer is because He knows what you're going through. And there may be no one else that has any clue what you're going through, but Jesus knows. And there ought to be great comfort in that. There ought to be great strength in that. You're trying to be a witness, you're trying to fulfill your responsibility as a witness for Christ and you come into a situation and you just don't know what to do or you're discouraged or frustrated or feel like a failure, tell it to Jesus. Or perhaps you're just struggling as a Christian. You're having a hard time getting through this life that is so pervasively evil and the world is constantly pressuring you and causing struggle and we live in a fallen world and things are so confusing. Tell it to Christ. He knows. And it's interesting that after Christ ascends and the angels say, why are you still standing there watching up in heaven? You have been given orders. The disciples then take a journey over to Jerusalem. And it wasn't likely on the Sabbath day. It just says it was a Sabbath day's journey. And they went and walked and went to Jerusalem. And then it was very commonplace to eat in an upper room. They would have these community areas and upper rooms above houses. And they found a place, 120 of the disciples of these people, they went in and they immediately got to work. They immediately just went out in a blaze of glory and told everybody about Christ. That's not what they did at all. Do you notice what they did? I just want you to notice what they did. Now what Christ had said to do was go and wait. Go into the upper room and wait until the Holy Spirit comes. But they did something while they were waiting. Notice what it says in the passage. Then when they returned to Jerusalem from the Mount of Olivet, which is near Jerusalem in the Sabbath day's journey, then look at verse 14. These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication. Now, I just want you to picture this. They have been under, for 40 days, they have been under the teaching of Christ as to what is going to happen with the kingdom. how Christ is going to advance his kingdom. And they may not understand, you know, maybe they don't understand everything. We don't really know exactly what Christ said. We know it was things pertaining to the kingdom. That's really all we know. And they know, they are probably very confused by the fact that they were going to go beyond, beyond Jerusalem into Judea and Samaria. Really gonna go into Samaria? And then in the other most parts, we're gonna go to Gentiles? They're really very likely confused by all this still a bit. And I would imagine that they are daunted by the task that is set before them. They know they've gotta wait for the Holy Spirit. And they turn to prayer. To continue, it says they continue in prayer. That is the idea of to give a constant attention to a thing. These folks were fervent in prayer toward God. They were devoted to prayer. And it says in the passage that not only in prayer, but in supplication. The Bible's gonna, the book of Acts is gonna also see, we're gonna see a lot about them gathering together corporately for prayer. The word supplication is a very interesting word. In 1 Corinthians chapter 10, it's actually translated to beg. Prayer is one thing, but supplication is a deep, fervent prayer where we are coming to God on our knees as a beggar. Totally destitute. Totally emptying ourselves of anything that we are and saying, I can't do this. I have nothing in my hand I bring. And sitting before the throne and praying and asking God to do what we cannot do for ourselves. That's the kind of prayer that this 120 disciples were fervent in. while they waited for the Spirit of God to come to them, to empower them for service to God. And when I read this this week and studied this out this week, my heart was gripped. So oftentimes we try to do God's work in our strength. So often we try to do what only God can do. We fail to see ourselves as vessels, as conduits of God's grace to others. We think we're the ones that have to make it happen, have to figure it out. And what the disciples did here was they simply fervently prayed. I wonder what would happen in our churches if we got our knees more often. What would happen if prayer meeting was given its proper place in the week? What would happen if we focused on corporate prayer as not an optional thing, but as an absolutely essential thing? We are going to find throughout the book of Acts this constant mention of the people gathering together in one accord, in corporate prayer together. I can think of some of the challenges that I've had just in ministering and pastoring, wanting to help people spiritually. And there are many times I I should do this more often, I just need to sit back and I need to go, Lord, I don't know what to do. Would you do what I can't do? Jay Hudson Taylor said it this way, I was also reminded of this quote this week. Learn to move men through God by prayer alone. You can't move men. I can't move men. Only God can take the gospel of Jesus Christ and with his spirit move men to salvation. And the way that he does that and the timing he does that and how he does that is all up to him. And we're going to find a variety of ways in which God chooses to do that in the book of Acts. But it's only God who can. Maybe you're a parent today. and you're looking at your kids and you're saying to yourself, you know, I just can't seem to do what I need to do with them. It's not working. I feel like I'm doing everything right. Get on your knees and pray, brothers and sisters in Christ. Do we really think we can do this on our own? Maybe you say, you know, I think I've got life pretty well figured out. I can guarantee that if you feel like you've got life pretty well figured out, I can guarantee that you're not very involved in the lives of people. Because if you're involved in the lives of people, I guarantee you don't have life figured out, and you'll know it. And what ought we to do in those situations? We ought to pray. That's why Oswald Chambers says, prayer is not the means to the ministry, prayer is the ministry. And there are some of you here today that you may feel as though you can't do a lot in the church. You're doing a lot if you're praying. I'm thankful for the prayer words we have. I'm thankful that there are people in this church that tell me that they frequently, daily pray for me. And they tell me they're praying for our church and praying for other people in the church. Folks, prayer is absolutely important. And at the very, I mean, if you think of what Luke starts off with, with all of the things he could have selected to put in this first chapter to set us off on the right trajectory, the one thing he says is that these people came together, they continued in one accord, in unified manner in prayer. And when they did this, when they were of one mind, the Bible's gonna, Acts is gonna use that several times. Acts 2.46 says it, 4.24 says it, 5.12, I've got a lot here that I'm not going over. Because they were unified in prayer together as a body of believers, God did great things. Now it's God's business how he does what he does. God gives the increase in his way. And, you know, we really can say, can't we church, that God has given us increase in ways that we never expected and done things that we didn't anticipate. And we've seen God do that. But we need to continue more in fervent prayer that God would make us a witness in this community for his purposes. That God would help us to influence people for the cause of Christ in this community. That he would help us to fulfill the great commission to make disciples. And that does bring me to this. Maybe today, you are not really a follower of Christ. You have heard different things and understood different things. You're not really, truly a follower of Christ. Can I ask you a question this morning? It doesn't matter what age you are. You could have been in church for years. Do you know for sure that if you were to die today, you would spend eternity with God? 1 John 5 tells us, these things are written that we may know that we have eternal life. God's desire is for you to know. And if you don't know, you're not sure. And I encourage you to come talk with me after the service, and I'll be glad to take a Bible and show you how you can know for sure that you are truly a follower of Christ, that you are a disciple of Christ. I have three questions for us just in concluding this. Number one, where is your focus? Brothers and sisters in Christ, are you focused on what God says He is in control of and you're not? Are you preoccupied with the wrong thing. And you're not living in God's control. Maybe you've been disillusioned. Maybe you have been derailed. Maybe you've had misplaced expectations or unrealized expectations. That is all of us. We need to focus on the fact that according to his word, God is in control. Even though it doesn't seem like it sometimes. And secondly, we need to ask the question, where is our assurance? Where is your assurance? Is your assurance on the fact that Christ is sitting on the throne, ascended? He is the one in control. He is the one who is Lord of all. He is the one who knows you better than you know yourself. He is the one who has experienced what you have experienced. Is your assurance in the living Christ? You know why these witnesses were so effective in telling others about Christ? Because they were fully assured of who he was in their lives. And we need to have full assurance as well of who Christ is in our lives. And then thirdly, where is your dependency? Is your dependency on your own ability to figure it out? Or your own willpower to make it happen? God desires for us to be dependent on him alone and what his spirit can do in our lives to be witnesses for him. Let's pray together. Father, we do come to you and we pray that you would help us to follow an application This passage. Give us a greater dependency upon you. We know that the dependency that we. Have is measured by the amount of. Fervency we have in prayer. Lord, help us to get on our knees. Pray to you. And see you do what we can't do on our own. Lord, we've seen it in the past. We are in this building because you did something that we couldn't do our own. Lord, we want to see people come to Christ. We want to help disciple people and help people grow. Lord, would you help us as a body of believers to unify together to make corporate prayer a priority? We pray these things in Christ's name, amen.