Day 1
Introduction: Similar to any good sports team, before they set off with their season, they must first evaluate the goal they are attempting to achieve. If the goal is not first set, then the games that are played or the races that are run are in vain, running aimlessly. A football team sets a goal to get the football across the end zone more times than the opposing team, and then do that over and over again till they walk home with a trophy. The team must first know the trophy is the goal, and that goal fuels the team. Between the time the goal is made and the trophy is received, there are countless hours of coaching, practicing plays, weight lifting, and rehab. I bet there are some people who are part of the church that have no idea what the goal of the church is. But Jesus is about to give the church their ongoing goal, all the while, giving us the theme for the book of Acts as we walk through it.
Acts 1:6-11
So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord will you at this time restore the kingdom of Israel?” He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and
a cloud took him up of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”
Think about it: Jesus is talking with his disciples in this passage, and all of his disciples, minus one, abandon Jesus before he goes to the cross. These same men that didn’t have the courage or boldness to stand next to their Savior in his persecution, are going to be sent out across the known world to bring people to faith in Jesus Christ. Jesus sets a goal for them, one that they probably don’t even think they have the boldness to do: to be Jesus’s witnesses to the end of the earth. Acts 1:8 is also the road map for the rest of Acts—the gospel will first be proclaimed in Jerusalem, then to Judea, Samaria, and to the end of the known world. This goal still stands true for the church today as there are still people who don’t know who Jesus is—friends at school, neighbors just up the street, people groups in Papua New Guinea. There is great delight watching the global Church come together to accomplish this one goal: that men and women around the world would come to know their Creator and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Take away: The church’s goal is to witness for Jesus Christ in schools, Billings, Montana, America, and the ends of the earth.