ACTS 1 (FROM CAC'S NOTES)
ACTS 1 (FROM CAC’S NOTES)
We might call Acts the second volume of Luke. Luke was the salvation which began to be spoken of by the Lord, and Acts was what was “confirmed to us by those who have heard” (Hebrews 2: 3). Luke was what He did, in Acts it is confirmed.
It is very interesting that both books are written to Theophilus; he was a Gentile, his name tells us that it means loved of God. So these books were written to a Gentile loved of God. “Excellent” is his title. In Luke he is addressed thus, but not here: it is beautiful to see that he had given up his title. The Holy Spirit is so very careful to give every person his title, his distinction; God recognises them in grace. The Christian is the most polite person possible; he always shows courtesy, honour to whom honour is due. Abraham bowed to the ground to the angels (Genesis 18: 2); he might well do it to them perhaps, but you read in Genesis 23: 7, 12 that he bowed down to the sons of Heth — he showed them all the honour due to them. No one is so polite as the man of God. Theophilus evidently had a position or appointment in this world, just as Felix was addressed as “most excellent governor” (Acts 23: 26). ‘Excellent’ was a title in those days as ‘honourable’ or ‘right honourable’ might be now. Joseph and Nicodemus were honourable councillors, members of the council, but they could never have gone back to the council after they had put the Lord’s body in the grave. The Spirit always recognises a man’s position, so Theophilus’s position is clearly stated in Luke. But after he had learnt the gospel, he evidently gave up his position and title, so here he is plain Theophilus. It is beautiful when you see people give up a title or position, but dreadful to see a man accept a dignity from the world — it is different to see it if he is born in it. If we accept anything from the world we lose. It was beautiful to see our young brothers refuse commissions or any dignity [p. 271] and go into the ranks to serve. The world can make you a slave but it cannot make you accept honour.
You will notice the recurrence of the word “taken up”, it is characteristic here; it follows on Luke 24: 51. The gospel of Luke hinges on His being taken up. We have all noticed the division in the gospel after the Lord set His face to go up to Jerusalem to be received up (Luke 9: 51). The whole character of things changes after that: everything depends on His death and resurrection and ascension, and everything comes to us from a risen Christ. He could forgive sins on earth (Luke 5), but He could not have been the good Samaritan before He died. The whole character of the gospel changes. We could not know Him as the good Samaritan, He could not give the oil and wine. In the book of the Acts He sets us on His own beast. We get two aspects of the Holy Spirit. We get character and joy in the oil and wine. The oil is character. We had a character as natural men, now we get the Lord’s character by His Spirit. The other aspect of the Holy Spirit is He set Him on His own beast. We get all from the risen Man who is received up into heaven. If the disciples had only known Christ on the cross, how miserable they would have been when He left them; they would wish they had never known Him; and we should be just as miserable if we had only known the cross. Christianity does not start with the cross though it is the basis of it: it starts with a risen and glorified Man received up into heaven.
The Lord did not go to heaven for forty days. Have you ever thought of that? What a wonderful thing that He stayed on earth those forty days, so that there might be many infallible proofs of His resurrection. We are risen with Christ though on earth, as we see in Colossians.
We get the two baptisms here (verse 5). In the first, the baptism of water, we are buried, we go out of sight. In the second, the baptism of the Spirit, Christ comes into sight and is seen in us by His Spirit. So in the one you go out, and in the other Christ comes in! If we could but enter into these things more, and yet they are all there for us!
“[p. 272] It is not yours to know times or seasons, which the Father has placed in his own authority”. The Father keeps them in His own hands — that shows we are not to be occupied with them. So many Christians go off on to a sideline, and get occupied with prophecies and dates and whether they are fulfilled or not. I daresay hundreds at this moment are trying to fit the war in with prophecy, and to see whether the war is mentioned in Scripture; but directly you do that you are off on a sideline. Nothing is so simple as Christianity, it is we who complicate things. Christianity is so simple, it is just a risen Man in heaven and we as witnesses to Him. Everything else is a sideline and you get off on it if you get occupied with times and seasons.
If you get a wrong thought, the more you took at it and twist it round, the more crooked it becomes. But if you get a truth from the Lord, the more you look at it the more beautiful it becomes. It is always so; you can test things that way, because wrong thoughts get more and more tangled as you examine them, but the truth shines more and more in the light. It is just like looking at things through a microscope — divine things will bear to be looked at through a microscope, for God’s work becomes more and more beautiful, but man’s work looked at through a microscope becomes more and more coarse. The truth illuminated for us is like radium that becomes more and more beautiful — it gives out waves and waves of light that radiate around; the light never diminishes but goes on increasing in waves.
“He was taken up, ... and a cloud received him out of their sight” (verse 9). They had nothing but clouds before the Holy Spirit came, but now there are no clouds. How often do we sing, ‘No cloud or distance ere shall dim’ and ‘Not a cloud above’. We do not think of what we are singing. There was no cloud with Stephen; he looked up steadfastly and saw the Lord. That is where christianity puts us in full view of a glorified Christ. The Christian says, “We see Jesus, ... crowned with glory and honour” (Hebrews 2: 9). When the Lord was leaving them He says, “The world sees me no longer;
but ye see me” (John 14: 19). For many Christians a cloud has received Him out of their sight. He is gone from them and is nothing to them but the Christ of the gospels. One often hears that expression, how cold it is, the historical Christ of the gospels — a cloud has hidden Him! But Stephen saw Him and witnessed to a risen Man in heaven. He not only witnessed by his words, “I behold ... the Son of man standing at the right hand of God” (Acts 7: 56), but all the time the stones were pelting him his face was shining; they saw his face as the face of an angel. I believe if we saw the Lord in glory it would be reflected in us in that way. Every Christian’s face should shine, you could not describe it but there would be something about it that would express the glory of God. At any rate we have it in Stephen, and if in one man why not in a second, and why not in me? We know very little about it, but shall we not pray that it may be so?
In verse 14 we get prayer. This company of one hundred and twenty were of “one accord”. Accord means of one mind; they were all agreed in prayer. What a wonderful thing to think of one hundred and twenty all praying for the same thing! They had not the Spirit, but how much more should it be so now that the Spirit has come. The Lord is our perfect example: we see Him praying seven times in Luke’s gospel. He prayed in such a manner that they said, “Teach us to pray”. How wonderful to be taught by the Lord to pray! He does not teach us to say our prayers. Many Christians do that, and would not feel happy if they did not, but the Lord teaches us to pray. We pray when we want something from God. We need absolute dependence and prayer to keep us in the good of all we have been brought into.
Then there is another thing, the Scriptures. The apostles gave great attention to the Scriptures, they had companied with the Lord and seen that He did — He could have given a scripture for everything He did if He had been asked. When Satan tempted Him He answered three times, “It is written”. He could have spoken as God and said, ‘I am God, depart from me, Satan’, but He took the place of man in dependence saying, “It is written”. It would not have helped us if He had spoken as God.
Then they cast lots (verse 26). That was before the Holy Spirit came. It was right for them to do it, although it would not be right for us. Some do it now; they pray and then put a finger in the Bible and open at a text! But we have the Spirit so we could not cast lots. They were right, they put the whole thing at the Lord’s disposal. “The lot is cast into the lap; but the whole decision is of Jehovah” (Proverbs 16: 33).
They chose two who had companied with them and the Lord, the two most suitable. The Lord had said another was to fill Judas’s place, so they had Scripture for it and acted on it.
Judas was a man who had preached and done miracles — he had actually been with the Lord three and a half years and yet was not born again. How solemn! Judas was a man of note and looked up to by the disciples. It is amazing to think that all that time he was not converted.