Acts 1 – Our Kingdom Calling

Have you ever found yourself in a place that you just couldn’t see the hand of the Lord working on your behalf? Or maybe the way the circumstances were playing out did not meet your hopes or expectations? You are in very good company!

This week we are beginning our journey through the book of Acts. Acts is the powerful account of how the early church, filled with the power and the authority of the Holy Spirit, changed the course of human history and ushered in the advance of the Kingdom of God here on Earth. But in the opening moments of the book, we catch a glimpse of the final exchange between Jesus and His disciples before he ascends to heaven, and one final question is lingering in the hearts and mind of those whom Jesus is leaving His mission:

Acts 1:6 Then they gathered around him and asked him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?”

It’s a very human question to ask. In Israel’s history as a nation, they had been through their fair share of subjugation and oppression, being carried off into captivity and exile more than once. Belief among the Jewish people, and even among the followers of Jesus, was that the Messiah was going to bring “deliverance” from the occupying forces. They hoped and believed that the Messiah would free them from temporal oppression and that the troubles they had long endured as a nation would be toppled by the coming Kingdom of the God they worshiped, and who had chosen them as His people. It is a reasonable question from a hurting and oppressed people who had just witnessed their Messiah conquer death and the grave, surely he could conquer the Romans.  

Jesus’s response must have been confounding, at least in part, to His disciples:

Acts 1:7-87 – He said to them: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

We, as believers, know that a day is coming when “every knee will bow, and tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord”, but for that moment, it is not for us to know, instead Jesus directs out to the nations to spread the Gospel and free ALL people from the oppression of sin and dominion of darkness. The Kingdom of God and the advancement of the Gospel surpasses the political deliverance of Israel, and every form of temporal oppression we might face. As the book of Acts unfolds, we will see this reality settle into the hearts and minds of the disciples as they give and endure absolutely everything for the sake of the Kingdom of God, and walk in supernatural power and authority, seeing what starts as less than 150 followers, completely transform the world for all time.  

We have been facing great difficulties as a nation.

The world around us groans and aches for deliverance and redemption. And from what we see consistently in the scriptures, God does not seem to take away our troubles and challenges here and now, much as we might wish that he would. But my guess is that the disciples, who faced persecution, imprisonment, harassment, and even martyrdom, would not trade their troubles for the joy and privilege of advancing the Kingdom of God here on earth.

Today, I invite you to stop and ponder that, and in the light of all that we are facing, let’s turn our eyes and our focus to our Kingdom calling, and the steady gaze of Jesus, and let all else that tries to demand our hearts and our attention fade into the background noise.

After all, the greatest answer to our struggles here and now has always been, and will always be, the good news of Jesus and His Kingdom come.