Four Lessons from the Book of Acts |

This year we studied the book of Acts in Community Bible Study (find one near you: here). To say the Lord has used these words penned by Luke, inspired by His Spirit to profoundly impact me, yet again wouldn’t do them justice.

In preparation for “share day”, I sought to review the year’s lectures and notes. With so much meat, and such little time, I didn’t get my thoughts together enough to be brave enough to stand up and share. Sometimes it’s easier for me to write rather than speak, and I know many of you can relate.

Maybe it’s by Baptist roots or past experience as an educator, but I have a tendency to organize things into acronyms, mostly to help me remember them more. I often came up with ridiculous acronyms to help my Calculus students remember challenging concepts. (And even do so in motherhood: see my article on TANTRUMS for a “mom” example.)

With so many things to see, savor and ponder, it can be hard to summarize twenty-eight chapters into a couple thousand words, but I’ll attempt to imperfectly shed light on a few gems that the Lord allowed to shine brightly for me.

A: Awe-Inspiring and Amazed

“And awe came upon every soul, and many signs and wonders were being done through the apostles.” Acts 2:43

I know the book is titled Acts of the Apostles in most Bibles, but our teaching leader said, Acts of the Holy-Spirit would be a better name, and I couldn’t agree more! In Acts we meet some rockstar followers of Jesus, namely Peter and Paul, and some others as well. But admittedly, they are nothing- mere men apart from God. They constantly give glory to Him in all things.

One immense conclusion I’ve come to from reading this text is that God is awesome, terrifying, awe-inspiring. He is not like us. He is so infinitely other. He is powerful and mighty, yet full of grace. He is Provider, Encourager, Healer, Judge. We see such miraculous works of His power: tongues of fire, miraculous speech, lame men healed, building shaken, sudden death of Ananias and Sapphire (if that doesn’t make you fear the Living God, I don’t know what will), prisoners set free by angels and earthquakes, Philip teleports, a light and voice is shone at Saul’s conversion (Acts 9), Saul is blinded and helped, men healed of paralysis, Dorcas and Eutychus raised from the dead (Acts 9, 20), people healed by handkerchiefs and shadows, Paul unaffected by a viper’s snake bite, and that list isn’t even an exhaustive one.

So often so many of our sin-struggles would be resolved if only we held the right view of God- one of Awe.

From Paul David Tripp’s Book Awe:

“I came to see that I was wired for awe, that awe of something sits at the bottom of everything I say and do. But I wasn’t just wired for awe. I was wired for awe of God. No other awe satisfies the soul. No other awe can give my heart the peace, rest, and security that it seeks. I came to see that I needed to trace awe of God down to the most mundane of human decisions and activities.”

Lord Jesus, increase our Awe of you.

C: Called

God calls uneducated and untrained men- fishermen, lay people, ones who had denied him (Peter). He also chose the “religious and self righteous” Saul who became Paul. He called, he changed, he used these men who gave their lives wholly to Him, to be used by Him to take His message to the ends of the earth.

“Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus.” Acts 4:13

He has called each of us who know His voice, too. He has called us to be faithful, to be about his mission, to not offer temporary fixes, but our one true hope: Jesus.

“But Peter said, “I have no silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk!” Acts 3:6

They healed and they shared truth everywhere they went. Our hearts our constantly looking for someone or something to hope for- a new season: college, adult hood, marriage, babies, a season of parenting to be over, a new home, a nice vacation, a party, a full calendar… (for more about where our true hope lies, read this post: If Only)

One afternoon my boys (2 and 3 at the time) were playing with sidewalk chalk on the back patio. Around lunch time, I asked them to clean up the chalk. I came back to check and they both proudly smiled at me, “Mama! We did it! No more chalk on the patio!” My pleasure at their quick obedience quickly changed to skepticism when I didn’t see the chalk in the designated bucket. Upon closer inspection, I saw they had thrown all of their chalk into the yard. What was “clean” was really just a transfer of mess from one space (the patio) to another (the yard). How often do we do this in our life- “Jesus I will give you this part of my life, but not this part.” Or I’ll just get this one area under control- I’m doing great, see! Oh, but he knows what our hearts truly hope in. Is our one true hope in Him- in His life, death and resurrection? (1 Corinthians 15). Or, are our hopes just shifting from one bucket to another: one desire fulfilled quickly becomes another longing- another place where we perceive we are lacking- we are never satisfied with gifts, but only the Giver himself (Isaiah 55).

T: Transformed

This is perhaps the most life-giving application. God, who does not change, changed Peter. He changed Paul. And He is in the business of changing you and me, too.

There is great hope! Our struggles can become past-tense.

The Peter we meet in Mark, so afraid during the storm as Jesus slept peacefully on the boat, was one of the men who in panic exclaimed, “Teacher, don’t you care about us? We are going to drown!” (Mark 4:38-40) became the Peter of Acts, asleep soundly in prison the night before he was awaiting his probable execution (Acts 12:6). God intervened through the prayer of believers and he was miraculously released. This fearful Peter was the full-of-faith Peter.

The cowardly Peter who denied knowing Jesus three times becomes the Peter standing boldly at Pentecost (Acts 2).

The Saul who stood approving the death of the faithful Christ-follower, Stephen becomes the Paul who is willing to die for the cause of Christ (Acts 6). This Paul went from persecutor to Praise-giver. (Acts 9) If God can change Paul, none of us are too removed from his grace.

The other day I told a friend “I battled an eating disorder years ago” and moved on. The truth is for a decade of my life, food was a constant thought and battle. God allowed me to see something in that moment- what had been ten long years of daily struggle, wondering if I would ever be free (2 Corinthians 12:9) is now condensed to one simple sentence: I had -past tense- HAD and eating disorder. I had a wrong relationship with food and God so graciously and miraculously changed my mind, and for ten long years I truly doubted I would ever be free. This gives me hope that the constant anxiety I battle today perhaps won’t always be an ever-present companion. God is in the business of transforming us, for His glory and our good.

S: Surrender

Surrender carrying all the things, and the temptation to do it all. Just as the disciples decided to delegate (Acts 6), we must delegate, too.

As my teaching leader said, “God is most glorified when we are most helpless.” What freedom comes when we admit we simply cannot do it all. I encourage others with this truth so often, but I am so hard on myself, thinking somehow I am the exception to this rule.

Yesterday I was attempting to carry Ethan (16 months) in from his most favorite spot in all the world, outside. He got so mad when I grabbed him, as I was shutting the door, he arched his back throwing the entire weight of his body out of my arms. Thankfully, I didn’t drop him, but he hit his head on the door, and many tears ensued. What a picture of what happens for us spiritually when we refuse to surrender to the Lord’s way- like a toddler insistent on his way, we stiffen up, or go like a sack of potatoes, refusing to be moved, and yet many times hurting ourselves in the process.

The larger picture in the book of Acts is surrender in the form of reckless abandonment, as one of my group members so wisely noted. These men who followed Christ, gave all. Though they were shipwrecked, imprisoned, hungry, and tired, they did not complain. Behind bars, they lifted their voices in praise to the One who made them.

We, too must surrender from “self-directed life to a God-directed life“. Life is short. People are fickle. One minute the crowd is claiming the apostles are gods and the next they want to kill them. There is only one Name worth living for, and it isn’t our own.

For me personally, the Lord has called me to surrender my storms, to surrender this season where I so often feel like motherhood is so hard – many of which were a catalyst for beginning this blog a year ago (you can read more about that here).

From our teaching leader:

“The earthquake wasn’t sent to set Paul free but the jailer free.”

Paul is in chains, and an earthquake comes, his chains fall off. He could run away, but he chooses to stay. The jailer would have been killed if Paul would have fled. Paul uses this as an opportunity to share with him about Jesus, and he believes.

Later, when Paul is caught in a treacherous storm, the teaching leader noted, that sometimes “God doesn’t send storms to correct us, but because he wants us to be his witnesses to others who are in the storm with us.”

I am so guilty of magnifying my circumstances over magnifying God. I hyper focus on an issue, and think, Lord- what are you trying to teach me? And why do I have to walk through this? But, what if it isn’t about me at all?

Paul was happy to pour out his life as a drink offering, at any cost. He had a sole purpose and mission in life- to preach Christ crucified. Every message of his involved the Gospel, and shouldn’t this be our aim, as well? Though every circumstance, he never tired from saying, “Jesus is alive! I’ve met him.”

In 2 Kings 17, the people “feared the Lord but also served their own gods.” The greatest lie of our culture is that we can do both: serve ourselves and Him, chase after the things of the world and the things of the kingdom. When we read in Paul’s last letter, 2 Timothy: Demas has deserted me because he loves the things of this life, we must take it as a warning. Lord, please help us love you more than the things of this world.

What does it look like to lay our lives down for His purposes today, in America, in 2019? I don’t know the details for each of us- God is a personal God. But I do know that it involves us surrendering and saying, “Lord, not my will, but your will be done.”

My prayer for all of us it that we would be faithful to carry out what He has called us to in the small, unseen places, faithful to walk with Him daily, focusing on being with Himrather than doing for Him. We press on with joy. He is alone is worthy.

“Lord, I give up all my own plans and purpose, all my own desires and hopes, and accept Thy will for my life. I give myself, my life, my all utterly to Thee to be Thine forever. Fill me and seal me with Thy Holy Spirit. Use me as Thou wilt, send me where Thou wilt, work out Thy whole will in my life at any cost, now and forever. ” – a prayer by Betty Scott Stam, a missionary to China

I’ll end with my life verse, the one I chose twelve years ago as I graduated college, the one that’s written in the front of the Bible pictured below:

“But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.” Acts 20:24