We are going to hear a story, dear friends.  “In the first book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning…” is how the story begins.  Theophilus means “friend of God,” or “loved by God,” or “lover of God.”  So – friends of God, those who love God, beloved of God, let me tell you a story. We are going to hear this story, God willing, over many weeks.  We’ll take a break for Advent and for Lent, but in God’s will, we’ll be in this story until next spring/summer.  The Acts of the Apostles.  Luke’s second volume.  The Gospel of Luke tells of Jesus, conceived by, empowered by, guided by, and indwelt by the Holy Spirit.  Jesus living the Way, being the Way, making a way for others to live in the Way of Christ, and in so doing fulfilling the Divine plan.  The book of Acts tells of Jesus’ followers – indwelt by, empowered by, guided by, transformed by the Holy Spirit, unstoppably bearing witness (making known, declaring) in word and in deed the good news of Christ; and in so doing fulfilling the divine plan.

This is the plan.  This is the commission.  Witness is our business.  We are declarers, dear church.  This is a story that continues to this day.  To follow Jesus is to apply our lives to this story.  Throughout the story of God, God calls and forms a people for himself and for his purposes.  A group of people are called out – a church.  Traditionally, this book is called the Acts of the Apostles, but in reality, it is more like the Acts of God.  Someone has suggested “The Acts of the Risen Lord (because Christ is risen – this is where we start) by the Holy Spirit in and through the Church.  The acts of God, the acts of Jesus Christ, the acts of the Holy Spirit.  The three-in-one. 

“Before Peter gives his first sermon in chapter 2, Luke gathers people from Jerusalem, Asia, Egypt, and Rome.  Paul preaches in the intellectual marketplace of Athens, he is driven out of the religious centre of Ephesus, and he finds hospitality on the insignificant island of Malta…. The apostle Matthias and the prophesying daughters of Phillip appear and disappear on the road as abruptly as tollbooth attendants. Rhoda and Eutychus enliven the journey with their excitement on one hand, and their sleepiness on the other. Lydia and the islanders of Malta offer hospitality sorely lacking elsewhere.  And Peter, who would seem to be a major figure in the journey, simply disappears without warning or explanation… An angel directs Philip to a deserted place during the heat of the day, where he encounters a marvelous Ethiopian eunuch who hears the gospel eagerly.  The gift of the Holy Spirit is promised to those who repent and undergo baptism, but it falls on the Gentile Cornelius, along with his family and friends, while Peter is still in the process of explaining Jesus to them.”   Phew!     

What might this book have to tell us about how to be the church?  How to be a people called out to do the work of Christ?  How to be the church in the face of moral and spiritual chaos?  How to be the church in the face of vast indifference?  How to be the church in the face of internal strife?  These are the questions that we will be asking over the coming weeks.

This morning, we’re looking at the transition scene that marks the transition from the presence of Christ Jesus with his disciples to the presence of the Holy Spirit with them.  It starts in much the same way Luke began Part 1 of his work.  “In the first book, Theophilus, I wrote to you all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning…”   The other way to translate this is “all that Jesus began to do and teach.”  In other words, the work continues in Jesus’ church.  Jesus gives instructions through the Holy Spirit.  Everyone is involved here.  He spends forty days with them, speaking of the kingdom of God.  A new beginning.  We can’t hear 40 without thinking of the people of Israel being prepared to enter the land of promise over 40 years.  We can’t hear 40 without thinking of Christ preparing for his work in the wilderness for 40 days.  A time of preparation.  A whole new beginning.  Jesus is speaking of the kingdom of God.  This story did not begin with Jesus’ birth, of course.  The script had been written long before.  Promises had been made.  A new prophet like Moses, in whom would be God’s word.  A suffering servant; a man of sorrow acquainted with grief.  Hearts of stone replaced with hearts of flesh.  “A new heart I will put within you, a new spirit I will give you.”  The story is not over.  It continues in us.  This story in which we are caught up is a big deal.  It’s the biggest deal of all.  We need to be reminded of this, don’t we?  I don’t think it is opposition to this story that we face so much in our world as indifference.   We need to be reminded of its importance.  Of its big-dealedness.  All starting here with the risen Jesus. 

Jesus tells his followers to go to Jerusalem and wait.  The place where Jesus died for us.  The place where God raised him from the dead.  Then comes a most interesting command.  What is the first thing they are to do, these followers of Jesus?  We’re the ones whom God has called out.  Let’s get busy, right?  Let’s go do something.  Let’s start with a study, maybe – a survey of the neighbourhood.  There must be something to do.  Look at how Jesus tells them to start.  He tells them to wait.  Stop.

Just stop.

And wait.  A great man once said something about waiting on the Lord.  Those that wait on the Lord will renew their strength.  In an age where we feel/are told we need to be constantly doing, we are told to wait.  So how is our waiting?  I said recently that the future is by definition unknown/uncertain.  In Christ, we know who holds the future.  How is our waiting, and what role does our waiting play in us being reminded of the one on whom we depend?  There is nothing wrong with activity, of course, there isn’t.  There is nothing wrong with being able to read the signs of the times and our culture and our neighbourhoods.  We begin with waiting. 

Patience is a gift of the Holy Spirit, of course.  Someone has said this about patience:

“…patience means the willingness to stay where we are and live the situation out to the full in the belief that something hidden there will manifest itself to us. Impatient people are always expecting the real thing to happen somewhere else and therefore want to go elsewhere. The moment is empty. But the patient dares to stay where they are. Patient living means to live actively in the present and wait there. Waiting, then, is not passive. It involves nurturing the moment, as a mother nurtures the child that is growing in her.” We wait patiently.  Waiting should come naturally to us.  To follow Christ is, after all, to be waiting on something.  We’re waiting on the same thing the disciples ask about in v. 6.  “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”  We needn’t think of this as a misunderstanding on the disciples’ part, necessarily, or wonder how they’re not getting it after having spent 40 days with Jesus.  The restoration of Israel was promised. (Read Ezekiel 37:16-19)  This is important for people who are living under the rule of an expansionist empire.  There is a purpose to restoration.  Read Is 49:5-6.

Jesus doesn’t rebuke the disciples for their question.  They’re simply asking the wrong question.   When it comes to a timeline, it is not for us to know.  Jesus turns their focus to the situation that exists now in light of his resurrection and ascension.  The kingdom of heaven is about restoration, and Jesus’ followers are going to play a part in that restoration through the empowerment of the Holy Spirit.  Restoration begins now, and God’s great restorative work is going to involve not only Israel but everywhere and indeed all of creation.  The kingdom of heaven is not about national or nationalist aspirations.  “You will be my witnesses,” says Jesus, starting in Jerusalem, to Judea, to Samaria, to the ends of the earth.  This list of places crosses not only geographic lines (as we will hear in our story), but religious lines (Judea/Samaria), ethnic lines (the ends of the earth – the inclusion of Gentiles), and political lines (to call Jesus Lord means Caesar is not Lord and a political leader is not saviour).

The day of fulfillment will come.  The day when all things are fully restored and renewed will come.  Jesus tells them (and us) it’s not for them to know when.  Don’t get distracted by what someone has called apocalyptic enthusiasm.  The day of fulfillment will come.  We live in the already and not yet of the kingdom of God.  We live in the promises of God.  We stand on the promises of God; this is what we do.  How is it that we can trust so deeply, stand so firmly on God’s promises?  I have never been let down by any promise of God.  I have known God’s faithfulness in my life and in the lives of those around me.  My peace I give you, I do not give as the world gives, said Jesus.  I know that peace.  God’s lovingkindness is better than life, goes the song.  I’ve known that lovingkindness and know in the people of God.  You don’t need to have studied theology (not that there’s anything wrong with that; we support it) to talk about what God has done in your life.  To declare.  To witness.  

 “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses,” says Jesus.  The Holy Spirit empowerment and the mission.  This is the church, my friends.  We begin by waiting.  We begin by praying.  Together.  The next scene has Jesus’ followers devoting themselves to prayer. 

How are we doing with praying together?  What should we be praying for?  There are two things that we’ve already been speaking of in this passage.  Pray for the kingdom to come.  Even so, come Lord Jesus.  Pray for the Holy Spirit.  Pray that we might be filled with the Holy Spirit and that we might be a people who show the fruit of the Spirit of God.  Paul told the church in Ephesus that he prayed that God would give them a spirit of wisdom and revelation as they came to know him.  He prayed that they would be strengthened in their inner being with power through his Spirit, that they might be filled with all the fullness of God.

Let these things be our prayers, my dear friends.

“When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.”  Here come the men in white.  When the men in white show up in Luke and Acts, it’s significant.  “Why do you look for the living among the dead?” they asked the women at the tomb.  Remember?  “He is not here, but has risen.”  Remember what he told you.  Remember what he promised.  “Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?  This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

A double warning here.  Don’t be so heavenly-minded that you’re no earthly good.  Remember that we’re not just to gaze wistfully at the departed Jesus and remember what a great man he was.  We’re called to a purpose.  We’re called to continue his work.  We’ll see what that looks like for the people of Acts over the coming weeks.  We’ll continue to figure out together and in the power of the Holy Spirit what it means for us here today.  We don’t gaze wistfully as we consider our world and the role we are called to play.  We don’t despair as we are reminded that Jesus reigns on high.  We look back, we look around us, and we look ahead.  This Jesus – the same unchanging one – will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” This same Jesus will come on a cloud to restore all things, to renew all things, to fulfill all things.  The arc of history is long, and it bends toward justice.  We’re living in the gracious interim.  May God continue to be revealed to us and through us.