Theological Commentary: Click Here
The story
continues. The book of Acts is the
natural continuation of the book of Luke.
In Luke, Luke relays the story of Jesus to his sponsor, Theophilus. In Acts, Luke relays the story of the
disciples and those who became the leaders of the early Christian movement.
I think that
it is important to note the first few stories of Acts. Even after the resurrection, the disciples
are following orders. Jesus tells them
to stay put until they have received the Holy Spirit. The disciples follow, obey, and receive the
Holy Spirit. Then, they continue to
follow and obey until the ascension.
They see Jesus go up into heaven.
Their obedience continues to pay off.
Life is
hard. Life is difficult. Following Jesus is no easy task. Knowing what God desires us to do, much less
doing it, is downright difficult. The
disciples struggled to follow Jesus and understand His teachings prior to His
death, and Jesus stayed with them through their successes and failures. As we start Acts, we see that they are
finally making progress. They have
grown, developed, and matured. They are
capable of obeying now. Of course, they
aren’t perfect. But they are growing and
maturing.
For me, it
is easy to think that is about perfection.
It’s easy to get down on myself for my inability to obey. The story of Acts helps with that propensity. In Acts we will watch fledgling followers of
Christ grow, mature, develop, make mistakes, but continue to follow God. God’s will continues to be done in spite of
the failings of His followers. God’s
followers continue to obey and pursue Him in spite of their own circumstances
and failings. The best way to defeat the
feelings of sadness that comes when we make mistakes is to remember that the
journey towards God is often more important than any of the individual mistakes
along the way.
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