Today's Word Radio

Brett Meador: There's this tendency, especially in the modern day church, to say, "Man, I'm saved by grace so I can still do bad stuff and no big deal." But one of the things the book of Acts will convict us as we read it is the early church, yes, they were saved by grace through faith, but they also did a lot of good stuff and ordinary people doing extraordinary things.

Announcer: Pastor Brett Meador with scripture's call on all believers to further the gospel message.

Brett Meador: And the story's not over. You and I are supposed to be the continuation of the book of Acts.

Announcer: The birth and growth of the early church through the power of the Holy Spirit is dutifully documented for us in the book of Acts by the apostle Luke. Pastor Brett Meador opens today's word for an introductory overview highlighting God's unstoppable worldwide mission, reminding believers that the same spirit empowers the faithful even today for spreading the good news.

And we're so glad you've joined us on today's word as we jump back into the New Testament and one of the most exciting books, Acts. Pastor Brett, thanks for being here.

Brett Meador: It's always a pleasure.

Guest (Male): Brett, the book we're about to start explores the beginning of the early church through the eyes of the apostles Peter, Paul, and James. And in what is called the Acts of the Apostles, we're going to see some pretty amazing things happen in this book, aren't we?

Brett Meador: Yeah, I'm really excited about the book of Acts. I love this book, and it's one of the reasons I think the book of Acts is so important for churches. You watch the church go from a small group of believers to something that literally turns the world upside down.

It's amazing because they didn't have big buildings or budgets or social media influence. I think the reason the church was booming was because they were filled with the Holy Spirit. You see ordinary people doing extraordinary things because God was working in them, and that same power, that same spirit is still at work in the church today. I think that's why it really will be good for us to go through the book of Acts together.

Guest (Male): It sure will. Thank you, Brett. And now with that brief introduction, let's jump into this first message in the book of Acts. Here again is Pastor Brett Meador.

Brett Meador: What should the Church of Jesus Christ look like? And when you think about it, how different churches are one from the other. Where does all that tradition, policy, behavior, attire, buildings, where does all that come from?

I've been told by people, "Brett, you're not a real church." I'm like, "Why?" "Because you don't have a pulpit." Do I need a pulpit? Or can I be a real church and use a stool? That's a good question. Or are you a real church if the leader of the church, the pastor, the priest, or whatever sits in a throne? Is that what a real church looks like?

I think we have to be really careful and say, where do we get what we're supposed to? This is where we're going in the book of Acts. We're going to actually look and see, what does a real church look like? And I think it's worth considering. What about, do you even need a building? What about a good home church? What if you just meet in a house with friends? Is that church?

We're going to see what the Bible says about that. The answer to this one is yes and no. Well, what do you mean by that? That's what the book of Acts is going to teach us. Home churches are really awesome, but there's parameters the book of Acts gives us. But, "Brett, if you're a real church, you need a building, right? Like a church building."

Well, that's what some people believe. In fact, you need to have a real fancy building like the Vatican, St. Peter's Basilica, a very fancy church. Does that make the church more holy if it's got fanciness? And some of you are like, "No, I like to think of church as my Chevy pickup." How many of you know the Chevy pickup in my church song? You country people might know that song. "Church is in my Chevy."

No. As it turns out, it's not a building. It's not even a place. It's the people of God. Church is something that God says, "These are my people." And, "I'm the head of the church," Jesus would say, "and the people are my body, the body of Christ." And it's something you're not supposed to neglect or ignore or just claim that, "My church is in a Chevy." No. If there's no other people in your Chevy, you're not a church because church needs people.

That's important for you to know this. And the Bible says don't forsake the assembling of yourselves together as is the custom of some. So as it turns out, church is important. But what's great about this is the book of Acts is going to tell us all the answers. I think the book of Acts is a comprehensive, all-complete how-to church, what church should look like, the rules around church.

If you couple that with the epistles of Paul and all the epistles of the Apostles, you'll actually find out this is what the church is supposed to do. Where did we get some of these ideas, like pointy hats? Whose idea was that? Well, it's nowhere to be found in the Bible. Wearing a pointy hat with fancy diamonds and studs and stuff in it, that's not even biblical. That's just tradition.

See, here's where we have a bit of a rub. Where maybe tradition is more important than the Bible. Others say, "No, church tradition is equal to the Bible." But here is what I believe, and the Bible warns us about this. The only real authority is the Bible. Church tradition, well, that'll get you into trouble every single time.

Consider Jesus. Who did Jesus turn tables over, and when did Jesus get sort of righteously angry? It was with religious dudes that loved their traditions, but it had nothing to do with the scriptures of that day, which was the Old Testament law and the prophets. They weren't going by the law and the prophets. They were going by man's dumb traditions.

Things like the Sabbath day. They'd missed the point altogether. The Sabbath day was supposed to be a day to keep holy, a day of rest, and they made the Sabbath day this burdensome, brutal set of laws and rules. And Jesus says, "You guys have lost it." He said, "Man was not made for the Sabbath, but Sabbath was made for man."

Implication was it was meant to be a blessing and you guys made it into a big bummer with your dumb rules. And they said, "You break the Sabbath," they said to Jesus. And they accused him of not keeping what was holy and right. But all that to say, I think it's become a barrier, just like the Sabbath day traditions of man. You can't wear your false teeth on the Sabbath day. That was just a dumb tradition of men, and it came from First Bag of Balonians.

Just like wearing a robe and pointy hats makes you a real church. First Bag of Balonians there, too. And what's so interesting about this discussion is as we look at the book of Acts, we're going to see the beautiful model of what the church actually looked like and how it operated. And I believe we've got plenty to do. We don't have to come up with new dumb stuff to try to make it more important or get a sense of the church is more legitimate.

We don't have to add to anything. If we do what the book of Acts tells us and stay to the earliest of the models. The reason that's important is because the church went off course very quickly. Do you remember when Jesus gave the revelation to John on the Island of Patmos? In chapter two and three of Revelation, Jesus said to seven churches, he wrote letters. Seven letters to seven churches of Asia Minor.

And when he wrote those letters, he said of five of the seven, he had things he said, "I'm against you." What made Jesus against his own church that he's the head of? Jesus said, "Unless you change these problems, I'm going to take your candlestick off the candelabra," if you would. In other words, you're no longer going to even function as a church because you've lost it.

What kind of stuff did they lose? Well, for example, the first one, the church at Ephesus. He says, "I know your works and your labor. I know that you've tried them that say they're of the faith but really are not." He commends them for some stuff. But then he says, "But I have this against you, that you have left your first love."

In other words, they were religious, doing good deeds, but they didn't even love Jesus. And the Lord says, "You've dropped the thing that's most important." And he says, "Unless you repent, I'm going to remove your candlestick." And on and on it went with those seven churches of Asia Minor. Pergamum, for example. What's Pergamum?

Well, it's a place where the name tells you a lot. Pergamum, the word "gamos" is like "gamy", like polygamy, monogamy. Does that seem familiar? It has to do with marriage. And "per" is like where the word "perverted" comes from, the prefix there. So Pergamum means "perverted marriage." What was going on in Pergamum?

Well, as it turns out, Jesus said, "You've taken the doctrine of Balaam, and that is that of mixture where you're mixing up worldliness and godlessness with your Christianity." And because of this, I'm against you, allowing the world to be in your church. You see, the point that I'm making is even within the first century, the church was already off course.

So how do we know that we're not off course? I believe the book of Acts is the greatest way to make sure we're doing what the Bible says. And that's the goal. So what I'd like to do is simply do kind of an introduction to the book of Acts. And I'd like to start with just reading the first few verses, because it's a nice little introduction that we're given here that sort of springboards the conversation.

So Acts chapter 1, verse 1. It says, "The former treatise I have made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, until the day in which he was taken up," that's ascension, "after that he through the Holy Ghost had given commandments to those to the apostles whom he had chosen, to whom also he showed himself alive," that's the resurrection, "after his passion," that's his death, "by many infallible proofs, being seen of them 40 days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God."

We begin here with quite an introduction to the book. First of all, let's talk about the title of the book: Acts. Why is it called Acts? It's the Acts of the Apostles. Many of your Bibles say that right at the top: The Acts of the Apostles. Which apostles? Well, mostly Peter and Paul. Those are the main players in the book of Acts, but the other ones are there, too.

We're going to see the apostles, we're going to see John, and we're going to see James. He's going to be a thing in the book of Acts. And so it is the Acts of all the apostles, but the two key players are Peter and Paul. The author. Who's the author of the book of Acts? Well, that's kind of fun. It's Dr. Luke. The same guy that wrote the Gospel of Luke wrote the book of Acts.

In fact, scholars like to call the book of Acts "Second Luke." You know how we have First and Second Timothy, First and Second Chronicles, First and Second Corinthians? The Gospel of Luke is the First Luke, and the book of Acts is Second Luke. It's just Luke writing a continuation. The narrative continues after his writing of the Gospel.

Now this is important. We go back to our study in Luke. He writes differently than the other Gospel writers. Luke writes with an investigative journalist's way of confirming the accounts of the Gospel of Jesus, born in Bethlehem all the way to death on the cross and even resurrection. That's the defense that he makes in the Gospel of Luke.

But then from the book of Acts, he goes from the resurrection all the way through the early church new beginnings of the Church of Jesus Christ. And it's like a culmination of an investigation of an account of the story of Jesus and his church, the beginnings of the church. Now, also interesting, did you know Luke was a real scholar?

Like Paul the Apostle. In fact, those that study Greek language, and not even biblical scholars, but those that know Greek, there's nobody on the planet throughout history that used Greek with such eloquence as Paul the Apostle and Dr. Luke. They were both sort of brilliant, scholarly writers. They used the highest form of Greek out there.

And the reason that's important is to know that he wasn't just some dummy telling a story, and there's real evidence that he was quite scholarly and every other Greek work pales in comparison. So what's the reason he wrote the book of Acts? Well, he gives that to us there in verse 1 talking about the Gospel of Luke. He says of all that Jesus began both to do and teach.

He's making sort of a record of that. And he's going to do that for the Gospel of Luke, but he's also going to do that for the church in the book of Acts. He's going to make a record and talk about the infallible proofs. Did you see that in verse 3? Jesus was resurrected after he died by many infallible proofs. The resurrection is one of the most provable facts in all of history.

So really, Acts is a continuation of Luke, but really all the four Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, funnel into the book of Acts. Now, you say, "So what is a treatise?" The King James Version says this is a treatise. Well, the word treatise is the Greek word "logos," which is sort of the word.

He's saying the former writing of words that I gave you, that's the Gospel of Luke, he wrote about the things Jesus began to do and teach. But he's saying this writing is going to be about what the Holy Spirit did through the apostles after that. The story of the apostles and how the Holy Spirit does this. And he's talking to a guy named Theophilus.

Who in the world is Theophilus? The quickest answer is we don't have any idea. But what's even more interesting, it's not just the book of Acts. It's also the Gospel of Luke he wrote to Theophilus. In fact, it's Luke chapter 1, verse 3. Luke writes in the beginning of his book there. He says, "It seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus, that thou mightest know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed."

Again, like in Acts, he says, "I'm writing that infallible proof." Same thing in the Gospel of Luke. He says, "I want you to know the certainty of the things that have happened." Because he says, "I have a perfect understanding of what happened." In other words, he's saying, "I know all the details." And it's a very careful, thoughtful iteration of the Gospel.

That's what he says. And he calls this guy Theophilus "most excellent Theophilus." Now, that's a hint to us as to who Theophilus is. I told you we don't know who he is. But it is kind of fun to guess. The first thing you should know, the word Theophilus, the name, "Theos-Philos." "Theos" is God, and "philos" is like where it comes from "phileo," which means love.

So it's the love of God. But actually, the word Theophilus technically means "loved by God" and also carries the idea of "friend of God" because it's a brotherly love in the philos or phileo kind of love. Now, with that, when some Bible students say, "Well, we see Theophilus loved by God," he's talking to the Church of Jesus Christ.

So some argue that Theophilus is not a real person but is more of a notion that Luke is writing to the church. Now, whether that's true or not, I don't know, but it is kind of true and I'll tell you why. Because the Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts was written for the beloved of God, his church, for you and me.

We read the book of Luke and the book of Acts, it was written and it made the canon of scripture. Thus, it's for you and me to learn from. So that is a correct theory in the sense that you and I are called loved by God, which is kind of amazing. But still, most scholars agree that Theophilus was probably a literal dude.

And one of the hints, when you're called "most excellent," that's a Roman thing. Only Romans in the Bible were called "most excellent." In fact, it's a title used referring to someone of honor and rank in the Roman Empire, a Roman official, for example. Paul used "most excellent" twice: once when he talked about Felix in Acts 23:26, and Festus, that's Acts 26:25.

Felix and Festus were both Roman officials, and they were both called by Paul "most excellent Felix," "most excellent." It gives us the idea that this Theophilus guy is maybe some kind of Roman official minimally. Others take it even further and say maybe he was a lawyer in the Roman Empire getting ready to defend Paul with Caesar Nero.

And there's a whole construct of Theophilus was the attorney that was helping Paul in Rome. But again, it's kind of more speculation. And it goes on and on. There's two Jewish High Priests during the first century. There was a guy named Theophilus ben Ananus. He was the High Priest in Jerusalem from AD 37 to AD 41.

Maybe that's the Theophilus Luke was writing to. But we really don't know, and maybe it doesn't matter as much. But it does seem Luke is writing with an intent on being very specific and being very exact, which is kind of fun when it comes to an account of Jesus, his life, his death, his burial, his resurrection. That's the book of Luke.

But the book of Acts is a very detailed, almost like court-ready document to describe what happened in the early church. That's why Acts is going to be very specific. And we're going to see what the church looked like. One of the things I'd like to remind us, those of us that know we're saved by grace through faith, not of yourselves, it's a gift from God.

One of the things we do, "Oh man, I'm so glad I'm saved by grace." And we know that we're not saved by our works, and that's a good thing. But one of the things we often do is say, "Well, because I'm saved by grace through faith, I don't need to do good works because I'm going to go out and sin my sin it up."

Paul said, "Should we continue in sin that grace may abound?" He says, "God forbid." But there's this tendency, especially in the modern day church, to say, "Man, I'm saved by grace so I can still do bad stuff and no big deal." But one of the things the book of Acts will convict us as we read it is the early church, yes, they were saved by grace through faith, but they also did a lot of good stuff.

We're going to see the Christian church doing good things of compassion and kindness and ordinary people doing extraordinary things, and it's going to stir our hearts, at least I hope it does. And so this book of Acts is going to remind us what happened after they were saved, after the early Christians were saved. They give us sort of the model of what Christians look like and how the Holy Spirit moves in his church.

So if I put it this way, what are the four things that we'll gain by reading the book of Acts? There's probably more than this. I'm just going to give you my favorite four. And that is, we're going to see number one in the book of Acts, the progress of Christianity, which is a profound and amazing story.

Really, if you think of the likelihood of some guy from Galilee, some carpenter's son, and he's killed on a cross by the Romans in Jerusalem. What's the likelihood of that becoming the most important major religion in the world? That's very unlikely unless he really is who he claimed to be. But the book of Acts starts with 120 people in an upper room that were believers in Jesus. That's where we start.

Within 100 years, there'd be more than two million Christians on the earth. And you have to understand, in Bible times, there weren't that many people on the earth. There was only 100 million people lived on the earth during the time of the first century. There's eight billion people that live now. So two million people in much of the known world there in the Roman Empire becoming Christians? The progress of Christianity, you might say, was like a wildfire.

It spread like a wildfire, which is kind of interesting. Now some of you might say, "Well, Brett, that's easy. It was a new message." We go to tell people about Jesus, and they're like, "Yeah, yeah, we know about Jesus." But back then they could say, "Do you know Jesus?" And they're like, "Who's Jesus?" "Well, let me tell you."

It was easy to be an evangelist back in the first century, you might think. But was it easy being an evangelist in the first century? If you accepted Jesus as your Savior in this first century, it's going to probably cost you your life. You might be brutally tortured and killed for becoming a Christian. And yet, isn't it amazing?

In the climate of total persecution, ten Roman emperors that came and went wanting to slaughter as many Christians as they could. Nero was already dipping Christians alive in hot boiling wax and then dipping them over and over killing them. And then he'd hang them on street lamp posts and burn them like candles.

And he'd ride nakedly in his chariot shrieking with delight saying, "Christians are the light of the world, ha-ha-ha," as he rode. That's a tough day at the office right there if you're a Christian. That's the kind of stuff if you became a Christian. And yet, even in the climate of persecution, the church flourished and the people were serious about Jesus.

I wonder if one of the things as we get closer to the end times is if there's going to be, as more and more persecution comes, the church is going to either get more serious or they're going to bail. Have you ever wondered which churches are going to bail when things get hot and troublesome? And which churches and which people are going to stay tried and true and not waver in their faith, even if it costs them?

What you'll see in the book of Acts is a church that was bold in their witness, unafraid, and sticking to their belief in Christ. And because of that, Christianity spread like wildfire. Sadly today the church, the Christian church, is shrinking. Why is Christianity losing ground? The book of Acts is going to tell us. It's going to answer those questions for us.

So this is why the progress of Christianity is important, because the story is not over. You and I are supposed to be the continuation of the book of Acts. I hope that the book of Acts will stir our hearts and make us realize we've got a job to do. And the book of Acts will do that for us.

So the progress of Christianity. Number two reason why the book of Acts is going to be a blessing to us is the practice of Christianity. It's going to show us: what does it look like to be a practicing Christian? Now, you can either practice good things or bad things. You can become really good at being bad, or you can become really good at being good.

What are you practicing? I'm reminded of Jesus's words talking about practicing in John 8:34. Jesus answered them, "Truly, truly, I say unto you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin." Boy, I hope you're not practicing sin. The Bible gives us warning scriptures like those who continually practice the active present indicative.

The idea is if you're trying to be better at sinful things. And there's a list there that gives you witchcraft, anger, greed, homosexuality. There's a whole list. Like if you're into all that stuff and you're trying to get better and better at that stuff, Bible says you will not inherit the kingdom of heaven. That's pretty heavy.

And that's what Jesus is saying: those who practice sin, trying to get better at it, becomes a slave to sin. But the book of Acts is going to teach us that there was a group of people practicing Christianity. How to become better Christians. And the Bible tells us what that even looks like.

Philippians talks about it this way in chapter four, verse nine: "What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me," Paul said, "practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you." If you're a practicing Christian, the promise of the Word is you're going to have a peace within you that's inexplicable and even supernatural.

Announcer: Pastor Brett Meador pausing in our initial study of the book of Acts, just partway through a list of blessings we can expect to gain as we pursue this study series in Acts in Today's Word. And let me tell you a little bit more about Brett Meador.

He's the senior pastor of Athey Creek Church just outside of Portland, Oregon. Brett's been the pastor of Athey Creek for over 30 years. We invite you to listen each day for more from Pastor Brett. If you've missed any portion of our study, you can find all of his messages online at todayswordradio.com. That's todayswordradio.com.

Well, that's all the time we have. Next time, Pastor Brett will continue in Acts as we highlight the incredible history of how Christianity took root and spread across the whole world. Today's Word with Pastor Brett Meador is an outreach of Athey Creek Church in West Linn, Oregon.