SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/17/2017
9:22 AM
My Worship Time Focus: First Introduction to Acts
I have wanted to study the book of Acts for some time now
and so today we begin our journey through a book that is what we call a bride
book, a book that connects the events that happened between the four gospels
and the letters that were written after the church began. I believe that it is safe to say that the
book of Acts is an action packed book. I
remember one time many years ago when our family was on vacation and we were
reading through the book of Acts one chapter at a time and we got towards the
end of the book of Acts where Paul had been arrested in Jerusalem and a mob was
about to kill him, and there the chapter ends.
My daughter said “Dad we can’t stop here,” and so we went ahead and read
the next chapter to find out the fate of Paul.
The book of Acts begins where the book of Luke ends as
Luke is writing to a man named Theophilus who was probably a Roman official who
wanted to know more about the Christian faith and so Dr. Luke first wrote to
him about our Lord when He was on earth and so in the book of Acts he continues
that story with the resurrection of Jesus Christ in the first chapter of Acts
and then in chapter two he writes about the beginning of the Church.
You could say that the book of Acts is the Acts of the
Apostles, or you could say that the book of Acts is the acts of the Holy Spirit
in the church. You could also say that also
that the book of Acts was the continuation of the word of the Lord Jesus Christ
through His Spirit and His church.
Acts begins in Jerusalem and ends in Rome and in between
we see what is a divided book, a book divided between what Peter does in the
first 12 chapters and this has to do with the Jewish believers in the early
church. After chapter 12 Paul takes over
and the book then is all about Paul’s dealings with Gentile believers his work
to build the church. The church today is
made up of mostly Gentile believers however God always has a remnant of Jewish
believers in His church.
I want to make note of chapter fifteen for just a moment
here as it is one of the most important chapters in the book of Acts. Paul was off on different missionary journeys
and many Gentile believers were coming to know the Lord. The problem arises with some Jewish believers
who said that the Gentile believers had to be circumcised and follow the Law of
Moses. If this problem had not have been
solved, and the basis of the problem is as found in the 15th chapter
of Acts then the church could have ended right there. Chapter fifteen is a good example of how to
have a business meeting in a church.
I want to mention a couple more things before I end the
SD and the first is that I will likely do another SD on the introduction to
Acts once my books come in. The next
thing I want to say and the Lord just reminded me of it and that is that in my
evening devotions I am almost done with the book of Colossians and then I am planning
to go through the book of Philemon as it is only one chapter. After that I want to begin a study on the
book of Ephesians as I already have that commentary. The book of Ephesians is a book about the
church, and it is a very important book for everyone to study. I have wondered if I should not do that study
in the morning and Acts in the evening but have decided to do Acts in the
morning and Ephesians in the evening. I
am more awake in the morning as I am a morning person. With this said I want to say that we will be
looking at two very important books on the church, Acts where the early church
began and continued until it got to Rome, and Ephesians how the church should operate
so this is exciting to me to study these two books at the same time.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question “Paul.”
Today’s Bible
question: “What became of the serpent at
the burning bush?”
Answer in our next SD.
6/17/2017 9:47 AM
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