Acts 1:12-26 | Mission Unstoppable

Amen.

Church, let's pray.

Lord, we praise your name today.

You are our Lord, you are our God.

You are the one who has conquered death in the grave, and in you we have victory.

Lord, we come before you today acknowledging our dependence on you.

Lord, may we, like the psalmist says in Psalm 131, may we wait on you, may we calm and quiet our souls.

Lord, if you were to mark our iniquities, who can stand?

Lord, we have forgiveness in the name of Jesus Christ so that you may be feared.

Lord, we wait for you.

Our souls wait, and in your word we hope.

Teach us to wait patiently, teach us to wait obediently.

Lord, may we not occupy ourselves with things that are too great, too marvelous for us.

May we not lift up our hearts or raise our eyes too high, but in humility come before you and acknowledge that you are the source of our knowledge, that you are the source of our wisdom, you are the source of our life.

Lord, you are the one who gives us everything we need.

You are the one who orders our steps.

So may we calm and quiet our souls like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child has our soul within us.

O people of God, hope in the Lord from this time forth and forevermore.

May we find our hope in you and in you alone.

We pray in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Church, I'd like to encourage you to remain standing if you're able to do so for the reading of God's Word.

Today we'll be reading from Acts to chapter 1, beginning in verse 12 to the end of the chapter.

Acts 1, 12 to 26.

Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day's journey away.

And when they had entered, they went up to the upper room where they were staying.

Peter and John, and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alpheus, and Simon the zealot, and Judas, the son of James.

All of these, with one accord, were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women, and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.

In those days, Peter stood up among the brothers.

The company of the persons was in all about 120, and said, Brothers, the scriptures had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke beforehand by the mouth of David concerning Judas, who became a guide to those who arrested Jesus.

For he was numbered among us and was allotted his share in this ministry.

Now, this man acquired a field with the reward of his wickedness, and falling headlong, he burst open in the middle, and all his bowels gushed out.

And it became known to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the field was called in their own language Echildama, that is, the field of blood.

For it is written in the book of Psalms, may his camp become desolate, and let there be no one to dwell in it, and let another take his office.

So, one of the men who have accompanied us during all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day when he was taken up from us, one of these men must become with us a witness to his resurrection.

And they put forward two Joseph, called Barsabbas, who was also called Justice, and Matthias.

And they prayed and said, You Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which one of these two you have chosen to take the place in this ministry in apostleship, from which Judas turned aside to go to his own place, and they cast lots for them.

And the lot fell on Matthias, and he was numbered with the eleven apostles.

Church, this is the word of the Lord for us this morning.

May God write his eternal truths in our hearts.

With that, you may be seated.

Well, good morning, church.

My name is Tyler Masters.

I am one of the pastors here at Doxa, uh, and so thankful that you have decided to join us for worship today.

Probably wondering, are we gonna have another message about women with Pastor Tyler up there?

Technically, no.

Although women do make a cameo appearance in this passage.

Uh today we're gonna continue our study in the book of Acts, which we just started a couple weeks ago.

And already, I I think you can see the relevance to what we're reading, to where we are today as a church.

And I hope that we can see this as we go along and that we are encouraged as we continue to go forward in the mission that the Lord has given us.

But if you're like me, you're looking around and you believe that Jesus Christ, He is Lord, He is King, He's sovereign over all, but you try to reconcile that with all the brokenness and the pain and the suffering that's happening around us, in your own life, even.

And I know a lot of people who are struggling with so many different issues in their life, whether it's health, a diagnosis they weren't expecting, or just too early in life to even expect that to happen, death in the family, struggle financially, the marriage is broken or falling apart.

And you're you're looking around and wondering, well, isn't God in control?

Isn't Jesus sitting on the throne?

What is it that we're dealing with?

What are we looking at?

How do we reconcile all that?

So we're living in a period of time within the redemptive history that we see within Scripture, a time that we call the already and not yet.

The nerd term for that is the inaugurated eschatology.

What that means is that we are considering what the kingdom of God is, and as we are looking at the kingdom of God, we can see that in one sense it has already come in Jesus Christ.

That Jesus inaugurated the kingdom of God when he was here on earth, and that now we are waiting for the consummation of that kingdom when Jesus returns a second time.

And so we are somewhere in between that, that the promises are already true, and we can live as though those promises are true, and yet at the same time, we're seeing still the effects of sin in this broken world.

And so when we're thinking about the kingdom of God, it's good to talk about the definition and define what we're talking about.

So here's just a basic, simple definition I'll give you here on the kingdom of God.

The kingdom of God is God's active rule manifested in human history through Jesus Christ with the purpose of redeeming his people from sin and the power of Satan.

And so, as we look at this theme of the kingdom of God in the book of Acts, we're not looking at it so that we can engage in some kind of debate and argue theology.

We want to look at this within the context of the church, the church in the first century, but then also the implications for us now, as we are still continuing in this already not yet.

And so, as we're dealing with all of the pain and the suffering in our life, and we're asking, didn't Jesus conquer death in the grave?

Isn't he in control?

Why is it that what I see doesn't line up with what I believe?

And we have to deal with that tension in our life.

And so believing that Jesus has already inaugurated the kingdom of God, it is here, it is with us.

Yet we look forward to that day when he will consummate it, which we call our blessed hope.

And we can go forward with confidence, knowing he will accomplish his purposes.

And so, with that, here's the title of today's message Mission unstoppable.

Mission unstoppable.

Because he will accomplish his purposes.

And so as we find ourselves living between that tension of the already and not yet, we are we know, first of all, we've already talked about this, that we are in what's called the last days.

The last days already began.

With the ascension of Jesus Christ, the last days began.

And so as we look at this, we can say, yes, definitively, Jesus already has conquered death and the grave.

Yes, Jesus is in control.

He is sitting on the throne, he is bringing spiritual life to the dead, he is bringing healing to the sick souls that are contaminated with sin.

He is redeeming his people now, and one day he will return and it will be consummated, and we will see that in all of its glory.

And we need to go forward with that hope, and we can wait on him and we can confidently obey him, knowing we already have victory in him.

So here's the big idea for today.

Jesus is accomplishing his purposes.

Therefore, we can confidently wait on him, knowing that nothing can thwart his plan.

Jesus is accomplishing his purposes.

Therefore, we can confidently wait on him, knowing that nothing can thwart his plan.

Having been a missionary for so many years, the book of Acts comes up a lot, and I have seen this book used and abused and applied in so many unhealthy ways.

Part of the reason I believe that happens is because we approach the book initially with the wrong question.

We go backward.

Often we ask, how?

How did they do it?

How are we going to extract all of our missionary strategies out of this book?

How did the church act in the first century?

How did they proclaim the gospel?

How did they do it?

So we must therefore emulate it.

But we ask the how before asking the what.

But we shouldn't even be asking the what before we ask the why.

We need to go back to why.

That's the question we should be answering or asking when we're coming to the book of Acts.

Why is the Holy Spirit, through Luke, giving us the accounts that he has given us?

And if we approach it with this question, why did he put this in here?

Why this story?

This is a very interesting story that we're looking at, an account.

I know people don't like the word story.

I'm not implying it's it's made up.

It's not.

This is a very real historical account.

But why does he give this to us?

It's the only detailed account we have in the Bible of the time period between Jesus' ascension and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

So nothing is random here.

Luke isn't just throwing in this story because doesn't this sound neat?

Isn't this cool what was happening in between?

That's not his point.

There really is a very real, important point that Luke is making and putting this account in here for us, something that we need to learn from.

Now he's already given us his bottom line.

Back in volume one, the Gospel of Luke, he tells us that he is writing this to Theophilus so that he may have certainty concerning the things he had been taught.

And so with that, there's a certainty that we're supposed to have, a confidence in what we believe and what we're holding on to, especially right now, 2,000 years into the already and not yet, saying, No, you can be confident that this is true.

What you are holding on to has substance.

He's also writing as a Gentile at a period of time where Christianity had spread.

It started as this little Jewish sect, but then it grew to predominantly Gentile, non-Jewish people who are worshipers of Jesus Christ.

And so part of the question that Luke is answering in the book of Acts is how did we get from this little Jewish movement to a predominantly Gentile church that we have today?

And so these are important things as we're coming into this story to know that Luke is addressing this and he's doing this very systematically.

And we're going to refer back to chapter one quite a bit as we go through the book of Acts because this is giving us the framework for everything that is going on in the book and knowing how we can apply it today.

And so we already heard last week that the Gospel of Luke, volume one, was Jesus' ministry here on earth.

And that Luke, volume two, the book of Acts, is now Jesus' continued work from heaven.

And we're going to see how he's doing that.

And just because he is not physically present with us, he is still working in and through his church.

He is still victorious.

This is what he told Peter in Matthew 16, 18.

He said, I will build my church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.

And so the disciples right here find themselves in an already not yet situation.

In fact, an even more already not yet situation than us, because the Holy Spirit had not yet been poured out on them.

And so as we're looking at them, we we can learn how does one wait well?

What do we do in this period of time when we are waiting to see the fulfillment of what Christ has already promised us?

And we can see that Jesus, as he was leaving, was reassuring his disciples.

Now, before his death, he promised them, I will not leave you as orphans.

He knew his crucifixion would devastate them.

They would scatter, they would feel all hope was lost.

So then after the resurrection, he comes back and he spends 40 days with them, reassuring them he is with them and he will continue to be with them.

In spite of the deep sorrow and that sense of separation, he is with them.

But this time they believe it.

And so as he ascends up into heaven, Jesus had already told them what to do.

So before Jesus leaves, he says, Here's my next command, immediate next step.

Go back to Jerusalem.

You know that city where they crucified me and they hate you?

Go back to that city, and I want you to wait on me.

Now, they don't just go and sit up in this room for 10 days.

It tells us at the end of Luke that they would go in and out of the temple and they would worship and praise God.

So they're not just passively waiting, they are worshiping God.

But here's what's interesting is this time they obeyed.

Before Jesus says, go to Jerusalem, and they end up going out to Galilee and fishing.

This time Jesus says, Go back to Jerusalem, which is not really that far away.

Get in that room, and I want you to wait on the promise I'm going to send you.

And what we see immediately here is obedience.

Obedience, because that is the fruit of their faith.

And so the first thing that I want us to consider here is what were they doing when they were waiting on Christ?

What do we do when we're waiting on Christ to see him fulfill his promises?

So point number one is this the commitment to prayer.

Verses 12 to 14 says they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day's journey away.

And when they had entered, they went up to the upper room where they were staying.

So this is possibly the same upper room where they had the Last Supper with the Lord.

Doesn't tell us, but they find a place to go.

They stay.

The important thing is they are obeying.

And then Luke gives us a list of names right here: Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew, Matthew, James, Simon, and Judas, the son of James.

Now, why is he giving us these names?

This is a beautiful story of redemption here.

There are eleven names.

These are the eleven apostles.

The ones who forsook Christ and scattered have now been reconciled and redeemed and brought back together.

But there's also an eschatological significance to this.

And if you if you remember back to Luke chapter 6, Jesus called out intentionally six, or he called out intentionally 12 disciples in chapter 6.

Luke 6 · chapter mention

Twelve disciples.

And so we're going to see here that Luke is drawing our attention to the number of the apostles whom Jesus had chosen.

He mentioned 11, but there were originally 12.

Now all these 11 here reconciled to Christ, they're back there, they're obedient, they are ready for the mission, they're ready in their minds to go forth with the gospel and make disciples of all nations, but something was lacking.

And see, they understood that there were profound symbolic, prophetic significance to that number 12.

And we talked about this.

If you go back to the message in Luke chapter 6, verses 12 to 19, in the choosing of the 12, you'll see this is intentional symbolism that Jesus is the greater Moses.

Luke 6:12–19

And there is an echo of this from Exodus 24, where Moses goes up into the mountain and he receives the commands of God, this covenant commands of God.

And right after receiving those commands, he comes down to the bottom of the mountain, and the very first thing he does is sets up twelve pillars according to the twelve tribes of Israel.

Immediately, the first thing, we received the covenant, we received the command.

Now we're going to come down and we're going to establish the twelve pillars.

In Luke 6, that's exactly what Jesus does.

He goes up into the mountain, he prays to the Father.

When he comes down from the mountain, he immediately appoints twelve.

And this is sending a very loud and clear message to all the Jewish people.

Now remember, they had been scattered throughout the world for about 600 years.

Israel and Judah had been in exile and scattered.

He's saying, I am now restoring the true people of God.

And these men are the foundation of that.

And we'll read about that in Ephesians 2 that the foundation of the church are the prophets and the apostles, Jesus Christ being the cornerstone.

And so what he's doing is he's reconstituting the true Israel.

And so they understood that because he had promised them they would sit on twelve thrones and that they would rule over the true Israel.

And so we see that Luke is describing that these pillars that seem to have fallen are now brought back up.

These 11 out of 12 pillars are there.

And then he tells us why they were gathered together.

So as they are gathered together, they are confident in the Lord, and we're going to get back to this idea of the 12 apostles, but it's important for us to understand what they were doing.

So once they are already restructured, they are already established, it says in verse 14, all these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer together with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.

Immediately we see that as they are obeying Christ, they are all in one accord.

There's unity within this little church, within this small group of believers.

And what they're doing at this point is they're not going out and trying to fulfill that great commission in their own power.

They know that's what they're going to do, but they were told to wait for the power of the Holy Spirit.

And so what they do is they devote themselves to prayer.

Obediently waiting, actively waiting on the Lord.

They weren't praying so that the Holy Spirit would come.

That's not at all what they're doing.

They are recognizing the Lord will fulfill his promises.

They're not worried about that, but they are giving him praise and they were acknowledging their dependence on him.

That this commission, this job that we had to take the gospel to the ends of the earth is way too big for us.

It has to be him doing it.

And so this should be the posture of our heart as well, as we're talking about fulfilling the mission of the church.

Expectant waiting and trusting in the Lord for Him to both enlighten us through His Word and then also empower us through His Spirit.

But then Luke at this point introduces what will be a recurring theme in the book of Acts.

So this is going to come up over and over and over again.

This is the second point.

The continuity of Scripture.

The continuity of Scripture.

So we're going to go forward.

What is our confidence?

What are we proclaiming, and what is the authority for what we're proclaiming?

Verses 15 to 20 tell us about the continuity of Scripture.

He says in verse 15, in those days Peter stood up among the brothers.

The company of persons was in all about 120.

Now, Peter, of all people who denied Christ three times, again, another redemption story here.

He not only is reconciled and brought back in, but he's essentially the spokesperson for the church.

He's the guy that everybody's looking to.

He's the one leading at this point.

And so he stands up, fully restored by Christ.

And in verse 16, Peter said, Brothers, the scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke beforehand by the mouth of David concerning Judas, who became a guide to those who arrested Jesus.

Jesus is standing up, and he's not sorry, not Jesus.

Peter.

That's who he is.

Peter is standing up in the midst of this group, and he has a word for them, a word of reassurance to them.

And Luke is recording this for reassurance to us.

Because remember, Judas had just betrayed Christ.

It was six weeks before this.

We sometimes forget how close of a period of time this was.

Judas, one of their own, one that they knew, that they loved, that they trusted, trusted so much that he was the one who managed all their finances.

He ended up betraying Christ.

And so, in part, as they're as they're considering this, Peter's saying, look, this thing that happened was not a mistake.

It wasn't a mistake that Jesus made.

And it's easier for us to think that, like, well, didn't Jesus know who he was picking?

The answer is absolutely yes.

And Jesus even said that when he picked his disciples, he said, Did I not choose you twelve?

And one of you is a devil.

He knew it.

Peter is saying what we're looking at here is not failure within the plan of Christ.

What we're looking at here is something that was absolutely necessary to fulfill the divine plan of God.

He says the scriptures had to be fulfilled.

It was absolutely necessary that this happened.

And Judas was the one who, in his own pride and in his own greed, and in his own sin chose his own way and betrayed Jesus Christ.

Now, Peter, as he's standing up, this is interesting because if you go back to like Peter in uh in the Gospels, he like has this habit, and a lot of the disciples are this way, of not really understanding how to interpret the Old Testament.

He's pretty bad about interpretation.

He kind of gets within the ballpark and then totally gets it wrong.

But here we see he is spot on.

You say, well, how is that?

How did what what happened with Peter?

Remember, Jesus was walking with these guys for 40 days and he was teaching them about the kingdom of God.

If you go back to Luke 24, 44, it says Jesus is talking to his disciples, these are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.

That all the scriptures point to him.

And if you're interpreting the Old Testament and not seeing how it connects to Christ, you're not interpreting it right.

Peter was getting it.

He understood it.

And this is probably something that Jesus pointed out to him, and maybe all of them knew it, and he was just reminding everybody in that group what Jesus had already told them, that in the Psalms, the Psalms that were prophesying about him, they also foretold of one who would betray the Messiah.

It had to be fulfilled.

And so as they're they're they're considering what just took place concerning Judas in verse 16, who became a guide to those who arrested Jesus.

Now, again, there are a couple of reasons why he's probably bringing up Judas right here.

One is the shock, and to think, how could this happen?

How can we already, within this really tiny church and within this small movement, already have traitors, people who are already working on behalf of the enemy?

And so it brings up the question: how could Jesus have chosen such a wicked person to be one of his apostles in the first place?

Was this a victory for the enemy?

As Satan was trying to infiltrate the church.

And we see when Peter's talking about this, there's an emphatic answer of no.

This was not a victory for the enemy.

The enemy thought it was a victory, but it was not a victory for Satan or the kingdom of darkness.

The point in what he's talking about here is that Judas' betrayal and persecution of Christ was the beginning of even more opposition and oppression that the church would face.

And he was giving reassurance, just like that one failed miserably, all other attempts to stop the church from growing and the kingdom of the gospel or the gospel of the kingdom from spreading to the world, all other attempts will fail.

Good friend of mine, Jake Tobby, in his book, Acts and Exposition, puts it this way, and I really like this.

He says, Judas represented the enemy's attempt to infiltrate the kingdom, assassinate the king, and stifle the kingdom in its infancy.

And the resounding message of Acts is that attempt was a colossal failure.

You see, the Lord is not threatened by the enemy.

He's not threatened by infiltrators within the church.

He's not threatened by people betraying and walking away from him.

He's not threatened by that.

He is in absolute control.

He is going to accomplish his purposes.

And Peter reassures the church of this and reassures us in this passage of Scripture.

It's also a warning for those who would rise up against the church, those who would rise up against the plan of God, that their fate would end up being like that of Judas, because as we continue to read here, that the enemies of God are responsible.

Yes, the scriptures had to be fulfilled, and yet at the same time, it's that antinomy, Judas was 100% responsible for his actions, and he faced divine judgment.

And so will all who reject the gospel.

So here in verses 18 and 19, this isn't Peter talking.

This is Luke kind of giving us an aside.

He's giving us a little bit of a history of the tradition of what happened with Judas, but he's emphasizing his point here.

He's saying, Now this man, talking about Judas, acquired a field with the reward of his wickedness, and falling headlong, he burst open in the middle, and all his bowels gushed out.

And it became known to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the field was called in their own language Akildama.

That is, field of blood.

Now, the first thing we notice is this is a pretty graphic, gruesome account of Judas's demise.

Some of you also who are familiar with the Gospels may say, well, wait, didn't Judas throw the money back to the religious leaders and go and hang himself?

Yes, and I believe that there is a way to reconcile the stories, but I don't think that that's what Luke is trying to do here.

Yes, probably threw the money back, hanged himself, possibly the branch broke, the rope broke, fell down at some point, and his bowels gushed out onto that field, that the religious leaders took the money, purchased the field in the name of Judas because it was his money and they weren't going to touch it.

And it became known as the field of blood for two reasons.

One, because it was blood money that was that was used to betray Jesus and have him crucified.

And two, it tells us here because Judas' own blood was spilled there.

But the point here that Luke is pointing out is this idea of divine retribution, divine judgment.

As we look at all the injustice around us and all the wickedness that's happening, we draw comfort from knowing God is just and that the wicked will receive the just reward that is coming from him.

And so, one, it is a warning to those opposing the work of Christ, but it also is an encouragement to the believers that we will not fail, that those who oppose us will not be victorious.

The primary reason, though, we're going to get to this and going back to the twelve.

The primary reason for addressing Judas, though, for Peter, is that his apostasy left a significant vacancy within the original twelve.

It says in verse 17, for he was numbered among us and was allotted his share in this ministry.

This role as one of the twelve apostles was very special and very unique, but it was also absolutely essential to the mission of the church that there be twelve apostles before the pouring out of the Holy Spirit.

So Peter continues his speech again, emphasizing that scriptures must be fulfilled.

He says in verse 20, for it is written in the book of Psalms, may his camp become desolate, and let there be no one to dwell in it.

He says that had to be fulfilled, that he would fall away from us.

However, he goes to Psalm 109 and says, Let another take his office.

There must be someone to take the place of Judas before the church begins to go out in the mission that Christ had called them to, before the Holy Spirit is poured out.

Which leads to the third point, the completion of the twelve.

We see here the necessity for the completion of the twelve apostles in verse 21 to 23.

In order for the scripture to be fulfilled, for the apostles to go forward with their mission, the circle of the twelve had to be complete.

So they needed a replacement for Judas.

And so then we see that Peter gives requirements for this office.

This is an extremely restrictive office, one that does not exist today.

And we'll see just a minute why that would be.

Verse 21 to 22, Peter goes on to explain.

So Peter says with confidence because of the continuity of Scripture, we're going to see over and over that Scripture is fulfilled.

It is fulfilled all throughout Acts.

In order for this to happen, and before the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, we understand that this circle of the twelve has to be complete.

So the next step in preparing for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit is to replace Judas.

And so he gives very strict requirements here.

He says, this office is a one-time office, and we find out it's not repeatable.

When James dies in chapter 12, James is one of the 12, they do not replace him.

It wasn't the death of Judas that caused the vacancy, it was the apostasy of Judas that created that vacancy.

And so they do not ever replace any of these 12 after this event.

And so here are the requirements.

He said, first of all, one of the men, he actually has to be a man.

You say, well, why does that matter?

Well, the women were there with them, and there were some women who accompanied them from the very beginning, must be a man.

Second of all, must have had accompanied the disciples from the beginning of Jesus' ministry, which he defines as John's baptism.

And it must have been, this man must have been an eyewitness of Jesus' resurrection, and this man must have been chosen by Jesus.

Now, there is this teaching out there that I had heard in the past, and thankfully not many people are saying this.

Some of them say, well, they made a mistake here.

They should have waited because Paul was supposed to be that twelfth apostle.

It wasn't a mistake, and no, he wasn't.

Paul is a special case.

He doesn't even fit these requirements.

He wasn't one of the disciples from the very beginning.

He wasn't an eyewitness of the resurrection.

Now he did see the resurrected Jesus Christ in his own conversion, he did, and he was chosen by him specially to be an apostle, but that's why we're going to see his testimony come up over and over and over again, because we're going to see that it's confirmed he is an apostle, but he's not one of these original twelve.

This group does not expand.

This group stays here because this group is a testimony to all the Jewish people.

Remember that that the gospel is going to begin in Jerusalem, go to Judea, Samaria, and then to the uttermost parts of the earth.

It's going to start there.

And this is a testimony saying, anyone who is a part of true Israel, he's not a Jew who is born a Jew, according to Romans, but that one which is now born again into Christ, that is the true Jew.

He is saying now, the true Israel begins here and is gathered here under these twelve men.

This is the true Israel.

This is the kingdom of God coming together.

And so we see David Peterson in his commentary says, There could be no witness to the ends of the earth until the Messiah's claim on the whole house of Israel had been reiterated.

So it is, first of all, the restored Israel represented by the twelve that receives the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

Going back to the purpose of Jesus choosing the twelve, he says, now this is symbolic of the restored Israel.

And we're going to find out that restored Israel doesn't make up just of ethnic Jewish people.

It's made up of anyone who is in Jesus Christ who is the true Israel.

Being joined to him now makes you part of that true Israel.

And he says that had to start then with these twelve.

This is the foundation of the church, Jesus Christ being that cornerstone.

And so in completing the circle of twelve, it increased the credibility of God's promise of the future role of the twelve as leaders of the new Israel.

And this is that one-time event, this one office that is there that is not to be replaced by anyone else.

And so we see that out of the 120 people present, which by the way, out of the, there's a group of 120 there, Peter rising up speaking to them, that's not all the disciples that existed at the time.

Jesus appeared to about 500.

So there's at least 500.

This is a smaller group of 120, but out of that 120, only two men met those requirements.

It says in verse 23, they put forward two, Joseph called Barsabbas, who was also called Justice and Matthias.

So then finally, Luke demonstrates the apostles' dependence on Christ to continue his work.

And this is this is the bottom line of what he's getting to.

It says in verse 24, they prayed and said, You Lord, know the hearts of all.

Show which one of these two you have chosen to take the place in this ministry in apostleship from which Judas turned aside to go to his own place.

So here's the fourth and final point the confidence in Christ.

The confidence in Christ.

So what they did first, in realizing this had to happen to fulfill scripture, that there needed to be twelve to represent the true Israel.

There needed to be a replacement, and they knew the requirements already.

Jesus already gave them all the requirements.

So they used the knowledge and wisdom that had already been given to them to narrow it down to two people.

But then they also acknowledge that there are some inner qualities that they could never know, and that only God would know.

But specifically, what's happening here, they are expressing their dependence on God, but they are specifically asking for Jesus to choose his twelfth apostle.

In fact, they don't think they're not asking him to choose him.

It says which one of these two you have chosen.

They believe Jesus had already chosen the twelfth apostle, and that he simply needed to reveal that to them.

And so what do they do?

They cast lots.

So that's that's kind of weird.

Yeah, because we don't do that today.

In fact, interesting note, uh, this is the last occurrence of casting lots that we see in Scripture.

Uh, does it correlate with the coming of the Holy Spirit?

Probably, but I'm not going to make a big argument about that.

But we see they're casting lots here.

This is something that was done in the Old Testament all the time.

When the priests, when they were discerning a case and they absolutely could not discern the will of God, they used all the resources they had to leave it up to God.

They would cast lots and allow the lot to decide what was to be determined in that moment.

It's Proverbs 16, 33.

The lot is cast into the lap, but it's every decision is from the Lord.

And so what Peter is doing as the representative of the church, he says, we've got to fill this 12th spot.

We know the requirements, but we know also Jesus has chosen this person, and so we are not the ones going to elect him.

This is not a vote.

We don't put them up and say, which one of these guys do you guys like the best?

You're like Justice or Matthias.

They don't do that.

Because the only person who has the right to choose the apostle to fill this spot is Jesus Christ Himself.

And so they appeal to him.

Exactly.

They are praying to him, and they're asking him, choose the, tell us which one you have already chosen, and we will trust you with that choice.

And so that in the end, if anyone were to say, Well, who chose Matthias?

Like, why did he get to be an apostle and not justice?

They could emphatically say, Jesus chose him.

Because they're completely dependent on him.

They are confident in Christ to choose the right person to fill the spot.

You say, Well, we don't hear anything about Matthias for the rest of Scripture.

Yeah, you don't hear anything about six of the other apostles either.

That doesn't prove any kind of point.

What Luke is showing us here is that this circle of twelve had to be complete before the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

And it says then that it was Matthias.

In verse 26, the lot fell on Matthias, and he was numbered with the eleven apostles.

And so with that, we see that the foundation of the church is set.

With Matthias in as a 12th apostle, setting the stage then for the coming of the Holy Spirit, we're going to see in a couple weeks.

The cornerstone of the church is Jesus Christ.

That foundation being the apostles is there.

They're going to go forward in power.

But we need to understand that in this waiting time before that outpouring of the Holy Spirit, the apostles were gathered together.

They were one and they were confident that Jesus Christ was on his throne, that he was sovereign, he was working, and they were appealing to him for him to complete his work.

And so by appointing another apostle to take Judas' place, they made clear the statement that the king was not dead and the kingdom was not falling apart.

In spite of the attempted rebellion, it had failed, and Jesus is now building his church.

Jesus is accomplishing his purposes no matter how impossible the situation seems.

So how do we apply that?

Going back to this idea of us being in the already, not yet.

We're struggling with the realities around us.

We're struggling with the illness, we're struggling with the diagnosis, we're struggling with the relationships.

It all just seems to be falling apart around us.

It doesn't seem like the gospel really is spreading.

We we can tend toward this hopelessness if we are looking to ourselves and looking to how we can fix the problem.

But first of all, we need to not confuse the silence of God with the absence of God.

Jesus Christ is here.

So do not give up hope.

So the first thing we do is we wait on him.

We patiently wait and say, Lord, I don't see how this is working out, but I know that you are in control.

I don't know what tomorrow holds, but I know that you hold tomorrow.

And with that, I know that you are in control, regardless of what I am feeling.

And then we need to commit ourselves to prayer and say, Lord, we depend on you.

Come together, united in prayer, in small groups, in your homes, praying, say, Lord, we cannot accomplish the mission that you have given us.

We should not try to attempt to accomplish the Great Commission in our own strength and wisdom.

We will fail if it's in our own power.

It must be through Him.

It must be Him empowering us and going before us.

And so we commit ourselves to prayer as a church as we are thinking about going forward in the Great Commission.

And then we trust the Word of God to do the work.

It will not return void.

So saturate yourself in it.

Know it, memorize it, speak it and share it, and then go with confidence.

Because the Lord has entrusted this gospel of reconciliation to us to take to the ends of the earth.

But as we go, we need to remember that Jesus is the one building his church, and nothing, not even hell itself, can stop it.

Now we see within this story a tale of two men.

We see Peter and we see Judas, both of them having denied Christ in their own way.

But the end is very different.

Judas chose, and instead of receiving the gift that Christ had given, he chose to go his own way into eternal condemnation.

Peter, however, this is a sorrow that leads to repentance, is a godly sorrow, repented and turned to Christ and is reconciled, and that is offered to you today.

If you are not in him, if you don't know him, be reconciled to him.

This gospel is for you.

So that then we could say with confidence, knowing that the Lord is our Savior and that he is accomplishing his purposes in his people, that we don't fear death, we don't fear hell, we have confidence in him, and we can say, as the psalmist says in Psalm 27, I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

Wait for the Lord, be strong and let your heart take courage.

Wait for the Lord.

Our focus has to stay on Christ.

When his purposes seem delayed or disrupted, we don't need to panic.

Pray.

Trust him, abide in him.

Let's remain confident in the providence of God and praise the Lord for the victory he has already given us in Jesus Christ.

Let's pray, Lord.

Thank you for your love.

Thank you for the promise of victory we have in Christ.

Thank you for the fact that Jesus is building his church, and the gates of hell will not prevail.

Pray we go forward with confidence, knowing that you are the one who is at work.

That nothing can thwart your plan.

Be glorified now as we worship you and remember the price by which we have been regained.

We pray in Jesus' name.

Amen.