Acts 1:1–14

Family Bible Study
University Relations, Samford University; Southwestern Seminary graduate

You Have a Mission
Acts 1:1–14
In his commentary on Acts, Frank Stagg turns to the last verse of Acts to find the one word that gives the interpretive clue to understand the entire book. The word “unhindered” served Stagg as he sought to chart how the gospel of Jesus Christ moved forward from life to life and from place to place, surmounting obstacle after obstacle to move from Jerusalem, through Judea, to Samaria and to the ends of the earth. What a beautiful truth that the gospel’s power has a strength to move in an unhindered way to reach new and more people for salvation in Christ.

A strong argument can be made that one feature of the American culture is its consumer-oriented values. American families look for the bargains and the values in the way they shop and where they shop. People are bombarded with advertisements and sales from every direction and through every means of communication. Our mailboxes are the constant recipients of the latest offer of low-interest money available to spend on yet more stuff. The church is not spared from having to prove what it has to offer — its value to people. Families come to church with the attitude that asks, “What can this church do for me and my family?” Or “What kind of programs does this church offer?” We live in a competitive market even in our churches.

The message of the gospel does bring a gift of eternal life to everyone who receives Jesus, but that message also places a demand on us to look beyond ourselves to serve others for God’s Kingdom. The gospel is about believers being transformed by the love of God to the point of moving out into the world in mission with Christ and fellow believers.

Luke opens Acts by connecting it with the Gospel of Luke and its complete story of Jesus’ life and work. Luke affirms again that a congregation on mission with God in this world must have a message to share. The message we share with people who want value in their church relationships is the story of the life of Jesus Christ who lived a totally compassionate life of serving the needs of others to the point that He gave His life as a sacrifice for these people. Any mission begins with a message. The message of Jesus gives the contemporary church a solid place to stand in this consumer-oriented world. 

Luke moves from the message of the gospel to the method of how the church is to move out to reach the world. After refocusing the apostles’ attention from concerns about when the kingdom of Israel would be restored, Jesus gave them the method to follow as they moved forward on mission. The apostles were to remain in Jerusalem until they were endowed with the power of the Holy Spirit, and then they were to move out into Jerusalem, then to Judea, Samaria and the remotest parts of the world. One of the ways to read Acts is to follow the spread of the gospel and of the church through these geographical locations. But the spread of this gospel was more than just geographical; it was demographic as it moved through and beyond racial, social and gender barriers to reach and include the different peoples of the ancient world. 

The contemporary church must still be about reaching the different people groups of our world today. One church in the Atlanta area serves 13 different ethnic congregations in its primary location and facilities. The “remotest part of the world” has come to our neighborhoods and communities. The method is still the same as it was in Acts — take the message of Jesus Christ from our churches out into our communities, to the newcomers around the corner and then to the furthest people we can imagine.

Luke speaks finally of the means employed to move forward with the message of Jesus Christ. The apostles gathered together and were in “one accord.” There was harmony among them. Then they prayed, no doubt, for strength and wisdom as they waited for the Lord to move among them. The message and the method of missions are moved forward as we connect with the Lord’s strength and wisdom. And the remainder of Acts tells us what we can expect when the Lord acts. He moves us out to go forward “unhinderedly” to the remotest part of the earth.