Acts chapter 1, we'll start in
verse 12. We're going to have some closing
highlights of this first chapter. We'll look at the early New Testament
brethren and the church in its infancy after our Lord had ascended. And let's try to glean all that
we can from the situations that they underwent here in the last section of the
first chapter of Acts. Now, you remember that verse 4, they were assembled together
and our Lord commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem,
but wait for the promise of the Father, which saith He, Ye have
heard of Me. The Lord Christ had been crucified,
been set in that tomb he had raised from the dead and he appeared
back to his church back to his brethren and he's with them and
he says wait at Jerusalem until the promise of the Father which
would have come in the day of Pentecost and as we noted last
week as Christ was speaking to them he ascended into the heavens
and went out of their sight And now they are by themselves. The Lord has gone to heaven to
intercede for them. And we come upon the context
in verse 12, Then returned they unto Jerusalem from the mount
called Olivet, which is from Jerusalem a Sabbath day's journey.
And when they were come in, they went up into an upper room, where
abode both Peter, James, John, Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew,
Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon, Salotes, and Judas
the brother of James. These all continued with one
accord in prayer and supplication with the women and Mary, the
mother of Jesus, with his brethren. And in those days, Peter stood
up in the midst of the disciples and said the number of names
together were about 120. And he said, Men and brethren,
this scripture must needs have been fulfilled which the Holy
Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which
were guide to them that took Jesus. For he was numbered with
us and had obtained part of this ministry. Now this man purchased
a field with the reward of iniquity and falling headlong, he burst
asunder in the midst and all his bowels gushed out. And it
was known unto all the dwellers at Jerusalem insomuch that the
field is called in their proper tongue, that is to say, the field
of blood. And he's speaking of Judas Iscariot,
obviously, not in verse 13. He's not speaking about Judas,
the brother of James. He's talking about Judas Iscariot,
the betrayer. In verse 20 it says, verse, For
it is written in the book of Psalms, Let his habitation be
desolate, and let no man dwell therein, and his bishopric let
another take. Wherefore of these men, which
have accompanied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus
went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John unto
the same day that he was taken up from us, must one be ordained
to be a witness of us of his resurrection. And they appointed
two, Joseph, called Marsabus, who was surnamed Justice, and
Matthias. And they prayed and said, Lord,
which knowest the hearts of all men, show whither of these two
thou hast chosen, that he may take part of this ministry and
apostleship, from which Judas by transgression fell, that he
might go to his own place. And they gave forth their lots,
and the lot fell upon Matthias, And he was numbered with the
11 apostles. Now, I'm not going to go into
what's going on here historically. I'm not going to go into it verse
by verse. I simply have about four or five points that I think
the struggles that the early New Testament church were going
through, they just had lost, or I say lost, they just had
seen their Lord and Master, whom they loved and served and worshipped,
He just ascended out of their sight. They felt alone. They felt, you know, obviously
they're in Jerusalem, and Jerusalem is pretty well hostile to the
Gospel. Hostile to that way that they
called Christianity. It was in its infancy. So given their struggles and
their difficulties, I think there's four or five things in here that
would help and encourage us as well. The first thing I noted
was in verse 4. They returned unto Jerusalem
from the mount called Olivet. And verse 14, they all continued with one accord
in prayer and supplication with the women, Mary the mother of
Jesus, and with his brethren. The first thing I noted was that
they returned and waited in Jerusalem as they were commanded. I read
in verse 4, I did that on purpose because I wanted you to see how
they connect, because they were all assembled Together and Christ
commanded them in verse 4 that they should not depart from Jerusalem,
but wait on the promise of the father So now they're in Mount
Olivet the Lord of sins. He's gone. So the first thing
they do is they all together go back to this upper room and
They wait They wait they returned and waited as they were commanded
And for you and I this morning, if we do not know what to do
in any given circumstance or situation, perhaps the best thing
to do is to wait in patient obedience to Christ and His Word. The tendency of our flesh and
our nature is to solve, to resolve, and to go. Get up and go. We spoke about this the other
day. The religious world calls you a failure or unsuccessful
if you're not going out and witnessing and talking and doing all these
different things. Sometimes the best direction
is no direction. It's not how many but it's the
quantity, it's the quality. It's not so much how many that
we see or we talk to or whatever, but the fact that we're telling
them the truth. Sometimes when the scripture
says, answer not a fool according to their folly. Not everybody
needs an answer. And I've learned this because
people like to argue about religion, they like to argue about what
the gospel is, they like to argue whether God's on the throne or
not, or he's just a weak-kneed baby still in a manger that can't
do anything unless you help him. I'm not going to argue those
things. This book clearly states that God is God on the throne,
He's sovereign, He rules and reigns, and does whatsoever He
pleases among the inhabitants of the earth, the armies in heaven,
and none can stay his hand or question him, what are you doing?
Isaiah is very clear about that. So these things, this first point
is that these brethren, after they were left by our Lord, they
returned as they were commanded and they waited. They waited. These brethren spent time together
and waited for the promise of God upon them. And the fulfillment
of the promise, the promise of the Father, the gifts of the
Holy Spirit, if God had spoken it and Christ had reiterated,
these promises are sure and guaranteed. There's nothing very sure and
guaranteed in this life. There's just a few things. But
for the most part, there's nothing sure and guaranteed in this life.
But if God says something, It's sure and it's guaranteed. And he had promised them, go
back, stay in Jerusalem, wait for the promise of the Father,
and it'll be fulfilled. I like what Robert Hawker, one
of the old writers of the gospel writers of years gone by, he
said, a promising God is a performing God. A promising God is a performing
God. Maybe not the God of this century,
maybe not the God of this country, or so-called gods, small g, but
the God of this book, the God who gives grace as he sees fit,
as he pleases through the preaching of the gospel, through the blood
of Christ. If he has given you a promise in this book, he'll
perform it. We will be kept helped and one
day glorified because of him and with him. I know some religions
teach, well, if you're saved, you can lose your salvation.
This book says if he has bled and suffered and died for your
sins. It's it's irreversible. It won't
change. It can't be taken away. But if your God is a weak God
and has to have your help, I think I was listening to a message
the other day and they were saying, you know, there's a saying that
goes around that God's, your eyes are God's eyes, your hands
are God's hands. Those times, have you ever heard
that? I've heard that where what they're saying is that God can't
do anything unless he uses your eyes and your hands. You know
what? I believe When Christ was coming into Jerusalem, and they
were crying Hosanna and palm leaves and stuff, and they said,
tell these people to quit crying and quit praising you. And Christ
said, if I tell them to stop, this day was prophesied thousands
of years before it actually happened. And if people quit praising me,
he said, the rocks and the stones will start singing praises. We need we need to see that it's
a privilege that God uses us to spread his gospel It's a privilege
when we gather together to worship him because he doesn't need anybody.
He is all sufficient Totally sufficient by himself in need
of nothing Job tells us that all the Old Testament writers
says what what can we add to God? Why how do we think why
do we think he needs us? I? He's independent, supreme,
monarch that is in need of nothing. So if he's promised that he will
keep his people, he'll do so. He'll do so. It's a privilege
to obey him and to walk with him. He just so happens to use means
to fulfill His ends. The second thing that I thought
was beautiful is not only they didn't have any full direction
as far as what to do or what was going to happen the next
day or the next minute, but they were told, go back to Jerusalem
and wait, and that's what they did. The second thing is when they
went back and waited, they didn't waste time. So, okay, well, I'll
just go back to my house and just sit and not do anything.
Verse 14, and these all continue with one accord in prayer and
supplications with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus,
and with his brethren. The second thing I see that is
helpful for you and I as well as we glean the remaining thoughts
of this first chapter is while they waited in obedience and
the command of Christ, they were together and they were praying.
They were one accord because they believed the one gospel.
There's not many gospels. There's one gospel. There's not
many Redeemers. There's one Redeemer. I don't
care what Islam says. I don't care what Buddha says.
It doesn't make any difference what they say. If it's not in
this book and according to this book, they're wrong. And the reason why these all
continued, look at how it's worded in verse 14 of Acts 1 with one
accord in prayer. It's called fellowship. And everybody that's here this
morning is here because they want to be here. I didn't call
you up and browbeat you and say, you better be here. You know,
we need you, we need the money, we need this, we need that. I
think God can take care of His own people. He sees fit and he
will take care of his own people, but they were of one accord they
were waiting but they were praying they were one accord because
they believed the one gospel one Redeemer one message and
as we saw earlier in this first chapter, there's only one witness
worthy of our evangelism and that is Christ and They weren't
there to see if they could promote John. They weren't there to talk
about John the Baptist. They weren't there to see if
Matthew might be promoted. They were there with one accord
because they had a single purpose. And I'll guarantee you this,
if preachers today understood this point alone, all this political
and all this others nonsense that goes on in the name of Christ
would cease. We're not interested in fundraising.
We're not interested in bake sales. We're not interested in
all these other things. We are interested one accord
in the promotion of the glory of God in the preaching of his
gospel. One witness, one message. It
says one faith, one baptism. And that's what's so beautiful
when we go to these different conferences that we've got throughout
the year, you go to these conferences, I get people ask me, well, what
did they preach on there? Oh, they preached on Christ.
Well, didn't they preach on how to be a better husband? No, they
didn't preach on that. And they never preach on that.
They simply proclaim as this whole book from start to finish,
the blood and righteousness of Christ. Because you know what?
If God does something for you, you're going to be a better husband.
If God does something for you, you're going to be a better wife.
If God does something for you, you're going to be a better father.
You're going to be an excellent worker at work. They were one of cord in prayer.
If God moves us to pray, He is going to shower us with blessings. That's if you look at every instance
where the Lord starts moving these people to pray He's preparing
the way for a blessing Which throws some light on prayer?
Another thing you often hear Oh prayer changes God not done
Malachi 3 6 says I am the Lord God I change not You can't change
God by praying him which is a good thing because God is, He's all-knowing
and He knows what's best for His people. What it does is it
prepares the heart and the mind and it prepares you for what
He's about to do. And it causes us to submit. When
we bow in prayer, we are submitting that, you know, as our Lord said
to pray, Our Father which art in heaven, thy will be done. So, if the Lord starts working
on you and starts causing you through your study of the Scripture,
or the preaching of the Word, or your daily readings, starts
to cause you to be in prayer about something, if it's from
Him, He's fixing to bless you. Now, I know this from personal
example, because I was talking to some of the younger men about
this a while ago. I was twenty-something years
old. I didn't need a wife. I didn't
need a woman. I was doing fine. And then, in my daily readings and some
other things, I started seeing how a woman from the Lord is a good
thing. I said, yeah, maybe for that person,
but not for me. And then it became overbearing.
As is the case. And I began, okay. I began to
pray for a wife. And the Lord blessed me with
Melinda. Children. Children. Oh, what a blessing.
We didn't really want children right off the bat. And then He starts dealing with
you about certain things. And then you have a child. God's people are a praying people. Prayer does not change God's
purpose or decree. It causes us to see things His
way and say, Thy will be done. It's the Lord's will to give
us care. and no more. And what a blessing
she has been to us. But that was the second thing
I saw in here is that these all continued with one accord in
prayer and supplication. You want to know why there's
so much fussing and fighting in churches today? It's because
there's just too many things going on. And not the single
issue and purpose of honoring and glorifying Christ. I remember
when we sold the other building when we were in Cape. And the
lady that bought the building said, we don't have a pastor.
She was real active in her church. She bought it for her church.
And she said, would you be our pastor? But the condition is,
my husband has to be the deacon. And I said, nope. Isn't going
to happen. Because then you're going to
try to run the church through your husband. And God has a pastor,
not pastors. Isn't elders, deacons as the
need arises. It's not a dictatorship. This is not my church. It's the
Lord's church. He's put me up. He can take me
right out. But I'm so thankful when I come.
Nobody has ever told me You need to preach on this, or you should
do this, or that, telling me what to do. You come, and we
all are involved in worship, the Lord Christ. Now, as soon
as I deviate from that, and start telling you how to
vote, and how to do this, and how to do that, then you pull
me aside and say, and you have every right to. because my responsibility
is to feed the sheep with what? Good food. And the only food
is the bread of life. And who's that? I am the bread
of life, Christ. Thirdly, look at verse 16 and
verse 20. They were talking about this
one Judas who sold the Lord for 30 pieces of silver. which was guide to them that
took the office. In verse 20, for it is written
in the book of Psalms, let his habitation, speaking of Judas,
be desolate, and let no man dwell therein, and his bishopric let
another take. Now you can find this in Psalm
1, I had it written down here. Psalm
69 and Psalms 109 is exactly the prophecy that
Peter's talking about. Here's the third point for you
and I to hear today. The Scriptures are going to be
fulfilled, and God's will and purpose is going to happen. Okay? Whether it's the shameful
sins of a reprobate, whose name was Judas, or the glorious workings
of his sovereign free grace in our soul, his will and his word
shall be fulfilled. Thousands of years before Judas
actually did what he did, it was prophesied that he was going
to do it. So whether this book talks about
God's predestination, oh, that's a bad word. Of course, the scripture
uses it. or his election, his choosing
of someone to salvation and bypassing others, whether it's his foreordination, it all honors him daily and ultimately
and gives his sheep much comfort. And I'm telling you this, the
quicker that we bow to him in submission, to his truth, and
ask him for mercy to understand his truth, the sooner we shall
have peace that's given under his blood." When we fight against
these things, we're not going to win. Oh, I don't believe that
doctrine. I don't believe Christ. I don't
believe your God's that way. Well, I always tell people, this
is not what I say. If I'm quoting scriptures, you're
issues with the scriptures. And now you think about the historical
setting of Acts chapter 1. You think about what Peter is
standing up. Do you not know that Judas was
their so-called brother, or they thought their friend, for what,
over three years? Jesus' earthly ministry was over
three years. He was with them day in and day out. He was with
them in the synagogue. He was with them out in the fields. He was with them praying. He
was with them when the gospel was being preached. He was there
three to three and a half years. And then he sold Christ for 30
pieces of silver. One old writer said, it's interesting,
and I tried to look it up last night, and my numbers didn't
exactly match, but they said in Psalms 109, the curses towards
the wicked are exactly 30, which is exactly the 30 pieces of silver
that Judas sold Christ for. Whether that's so or not, Peter
stood up there, and somebody that had broken bread with them,
wept with them, laughed with them, betrayed the Lord of glory,
and how do you deal with that? Well, the Lord opened up their
mind to the Scriptures and said, you know what? That's the way
it was supposed to be. Is that fatalism? It is if you
don't believe the Gospel. If you believe the Gospel, you
realize that it was for God's glory and for the early New Testament
church's good. Because now that Judas is gone, There's going to be room for
one name, Paul, to take his place. This one Matthias we never hear
anything about. But Paul, the Lord used him to
write just about almost the whole New Testament. All things work together for
good. Now people, I heard that quoted
a couple weeks ago, people stop right there, but that's not the
whole scripture. All things work together for good to them who
are the called, to them who love God and are the called according
to His purpose, God's purpose. And so this scripture, they understood
this, they found comfort in that. And Peter said, this must be
fulfilled. And you know what? That gives
every believer a peace which passes all understanding. A peace
in every storm, a peace amidst trial and tribulation, a peace
that shall endure unto the end. There's no peace in this world. Every time I get online and look
on my webpages and stuff, it's the economy. Oh, there's a recession.
It's this and that. All these different things. There's
no peace there. What about the jobs? Well, you've
got stuff going on at the jobs. There's no peace there. You've got bill collectors, tax
collectors, you've got all these things going on. But knowing that things are as
they are because God is on the throne, there's a peace that
passes all understanding. Peace that passes all understanding.
Fourthly, look at verses 21 through 23. Wherefore, of these men which
have accompanied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus
went in and went out. Now, you remember, there's two
that they're thinking about, because Judas is gone, so they're
going to cast lots for somebody to fill his place. And they decide on Matthias,
and then there's this other one called Justice. But my point
is, is the only reason why they considered these two guys is
because they had been, look at how, look at the way it's worded,
we're for of these men which have accompanied with us all
the time that the Lord Jesus went in and went out among us,
beginning from the baptism of John unto the same day that Christ
was taken up from us. You know what blesses me as a
pastor more than anything, and I'll just tell you straight up,
when you're going through some trials and some tribulations
and some difficult times, the death of somebody you love, or
whatever it might be, financial woes, the worst thing you can
do is quit coming to hear the gospel. Bruce and I have seen
this time and time and time again. Don't abandon your hope. Don't abandon your daily portion. Don't abandon the gospel. It is your safety. It is your
food. It is your meat." And these men
continued. They're going to look at these
two men. Why? Because they've been through the whole thing. They weren't
Johnny-come-latelys. Fourthly God's people go through
many hardships and sorrows many struggles and persecutions Yet
God keeps them and they shall continue on Beware of an outward
zeal beware of a surge in religion 9-11 after the terrorists hit this
country and All the polls, all the magazines said religion skyrocketed. People got scared, people got
worried, people got upset. The churches were packed. And
I think they did another survey about nine months later and things
were back the way they were. Oh, it's easy to get God when
you're scared. It's easy to get God when you're
in a foxhole. It's easy. One war veteran said, there's
no atheist in the foxhole. But is that God the God? Beware of an outward zeal. Beware
of a surge in religion. Beware of emotionalism and easy
decisions. Look at how it's worded in verse
21. Wherefore, of these men which
have accompanied with us all the time. All the time. There's a reason why I call Bruce
my right hand man. And you can talk to most of these
other pastors that we know and there's, you've got some members,
these older preachers that have been there from the beginning. And it's not because they didn't
have anything better to do. It's because they love Christ and
his gospel. Tried and true. Always about
the Lord's business. Staying the course. Finishing
the race through His good grace. You know, when I used to be a
super, when I was a supervisor with the city of Cape, what bothered
me when I would do interviews is if I would see somebody's
resume or job applications and they, they were, you know, they
were like 30 years old and they'd had 20 jobs. I've seen it. And you know what? A red flag
goes up. Well, this guy is going to give
us about two or three months and then he's gone. So why spend
the time and money training? But you get somebody that if
you look at a resume and they're about 30 years old and they've
had maybe one or two jobs, you're thinking, okay, this guy's... And when we support our missionaries,
I've heard Jean-Claude tell me many times, it's not the amount
that we give, it's the fact that it's the consistency of it. If
we say we're going to collect missionary offerings in August,
then he knows he's got something coming the 1st of September.
It's the consistency. In closing, our last point is
that our God knows all things, and therefore He knows the hearts
of all men. Look at verse 24. As they were
praying to figure out what to do, and they prayed and they
said, Thou Lord, which know the hearts of all men, show whither
of these two men you have chosen. Our God knows all things and
therefore He knows the hearts of all men." You and I don't.
You and I do not. That's why judgment is not left
up to us. But there's two things in that
last point. To the unbeliever, if you're
not a believer here this morning, it's usually a fearful thing.
You don't want God knowing everything in your mind. You don't want
Him knowing everything in your heart. You want to hide from
Him and you can't. because He knows the hearts of
all men. And unless He gives you grace to repent and come
to Him, your sins will most certainly find you out. Can't hide. But oh, to the believer, it causes
us to reverence Him, respect Him, as well as it's very comforting
You know why it's comforting, that fact that He knows the hearts
of all men and He knows the believers' hearts? You know why it's comforting?
And you know when your flesh dwells, no good thing. You know
that we'll probably sin in the next 20 minutes. And if God did
not look down upon us and see the blood of Christ, we would
be annihilated like anybody else. So why is this comforting to
the believer to know that He looks and knows the hearts of
all men? Well, I'm going to read from
you out of Ezekiel 36. God says, I will take you from
among the heathen and gather you out of all countries. will
bring you into your own land then will I says God sprinkle
clean water upon you and you shall be clean from all your
filthiness and from all your idols will I cleanse you and
then God says in verse 26 of Ezekiel 36 a new heart also will
I give you Do you know why it's comforting that He knows to the
believer that He knows the hearts of all men? It's because when
He looks at us, He sees the heart that He gave by His grace. And that's comforting. Because if it's our own heart,
we're in trouble. But if it's His heart, we're
cleansed and we desire to glorify and honor Him. These brethren,
these New Testament brethren, they were about ready to go through
some very, very difficult times. But they were all together. They prayed and encouraged one
another. They knew that God was on the
throne and they knew that if it was initiated by him, it would
be fulfilled by him. Christ is our peace. Nothing
else is. Nathan, would you close us please?