The former treatise I made, O Theophilus, concerning all that Jesus began both to do and to teach,
until the day in which He was received up, after that He had given commandment through the Holy Spirit unto the apostles whom He had chosen:
to whom He also showed Himself alive after His passion by many proofs, appearing unto them by the space of forty days, and speaking the things concerning the kingdom of God:
and, being assembled together with them, He charged them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, said He, ye heard from Me:
for John indeed baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized in the Holy Spirit not many days hence.
And when they were come in, they went up into the upper chamber, where they were abiding; both Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas the son of James.
These all with one accord continued stedfastly in prayer, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brethren.
And when the day of Pentecost was now come, they were all together in one place.
And suddenly there came from heaven a sound as of the rushing of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting.
And there appeared unto them tongues parting asunder, like as of fire; and it sat upon each one of them.
And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.
In the past, we have fellowshipped together in a very general way concerning the full gospel. We find that it takes four evangelists to present to us a full picture of our Lord Jesus. It is the same one Lord Jesus, and yet He is of such fullness that it takes four evangelists to present Him to us.
In the Gospel according to Matthew, our Lord Jesus is presented as the King. He comes to establish His kingdom on earth, and we are in His kingdom if we obey Him.
In the Gospel according to Mark, Christ is presented as the Servant of the Lord, the model Servant. He came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many. He is both the King of kings and the Servant of all servants.
In the Gospel according to Luke, Christ is presented as the Son of Man. He is the Man, the true Man, the Man after God’s heart, the new Man, the new mankind, after whom we are all to be conformed.
Lastly, in the Gospel according to John, Christ is presented as the Son of God. He is God. He is our very life, and He is all and in all to us.
Now, after we have fellowshipped together on the Gospels—that is, after we have seen the Lord—then I think we can go on and begin to read the Book of Acts, and probably later the Epistles.
We should never begin with the Book of Acts, nor should we begin with the Epistles. We should always begin with the Gospels. The reason is that we have to see the Lord. If we see the Lord, everything will follow and fall into line. But if we do not see the Lord, and try to see other things first, or try to know other doctrines first, then we will go off somewhere.
So I think it is very basic for us to understand this: the order in Scripture is very meaningful. God wants us to see His Son, our Lord Jesus; and after we have seen Him, then we are given to see something more.
The Book of Acts is written by Luke the evangelist. He himself tells us that he had first written one treatise, and now this is his second treatise.
In other words, in the Gospel according to Luke, he tells us that the Lord Jesus began to do and to teach. But now, in the second treatise, he continues with what the Lord Jesus is doing and teaching.
The Gospel of Luke is the beginning of the teaching and doing of our Lord Jesus. Our Lord Jesus began to do and to speak, but He has not finished His doing and speaking yet. The continuation of His speaking and doing is found in the Book of Acts.
It is rather unfortunate that, in our Bibles, this book is called The Acts of the Apostles. In the original manuscripts there was no such title. It has traditionally been called The Acts of the Apostles.
When you think of it as the acts of the apostles, naturally you think of the doings of the apostles. In a sense, if you read the Book of Acts superficially, you do find that it is the acts of the apostles. In the first twelve chapters, it is mainly the acts of the Apostle Peter; in the second part of the book, it is predominantly the acts of the Apostle Paul. The other apostles are mentioned only briefly.
But this is only superficial. Luke still tells us that this is not the intention of his second treatise. The intention of writing the second treatise is to show us how the Lord Jesus continues to do and to teach. Strictly speaking, it is not the doing and teaching of the apostles; it is still the doing and teaching of our Lord Jesus.
In the Gospel according to Luke, He began to do and to speak. Now, in the Book of Acts, He continues to do and to speak. The only difference is that, in the Gospel according to Luke, He began to do and speak in His one person. In that one person, the Word became flesh, called Jesus. He began to do things, and He began to speak many words.
But in the Book of Acts, He is still speaking, but not in His own individual person. He speaks and does through a company of people.
In the Gospel according to Luke, He does things and speaks words in the body of Jesus. But in the Book of Acts, He speaks and does through a corporate Body of Christ. In the Gospel according to Luke, it is Christ who does and teaches. In the Book of Acts, it is the Christ who is doing and speaking.
In the Bible, you have “Christ” and “the Christ.” When “Christ” is used, it refers to Him as a person. But when “the Christ” is used, it is in connection with His people—that is, the corporate Body of Christ.
As you find in 1 Corinthians 12, the body is one and has many members. Though there are many members, yet there is one body; so also is the Christ. It is still Christ: Christ in His person and Christ in His corporate Body.
For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of the body, being many, are one body; so also is Christ.
—1 Corinthians 12:12
Outwardly there may be some difference, but in reality it is the same Christ, the same Lord, who is speaking and doing. Strictly speaking, the Book of Acts is not the acts of the apostles. The Book of Acts is the acts of our Lord Jesus, by His Spirit, through the church.
That is the Book of Acts. There you find that He continues to do and to speak, but it is in a corporate Body.
Our Lord Jesus was on earth roughly a little over thirty years—thirty-three years, or perhaps thirty-three and a half years. During those years, He said many words, and they were all very precious.
When you open the Book of Acts, you find that the period covered by Acts is approximately thirty years. It begins with the ascension of our Lord, and it ends with the imprisonment of Paul in Rome. Roughly, it continues to about A.D. 62 or 63. So it also covers about thirty years.
The first thirty years we find in the Gospel according to Luke. The second thirty years we find in the Book of Acts. In the first thirty years, He began to speak; in the next thirty years, He continues to do and to speak.
Having said these things as a foundation, I think we would like to go on a little tonight. I do not know how far we will go, but we will go on and see.
We are living in the very last of the last days. For this reason, I believe it is very essential for us to look back to the beginning. When you are approaching the end, that is the time when you look back to the beginning.
This is the only way to see whether you end up with the beginning or end up somewhere else. I believe it is time for God’s people really to go back to Acts, to see how it all began, when the Lord first formed His Body and, through that Body, continued to do and to speak.
After about two thousand years, I wonder how close or how far away we are from the beginning. I wonder how we are going to end up—whether it will be like a circle and end up at the beginning.
I do believe this is the way God wants to end up. He is the beginning and He is the end. There is no beginning and no end apart from Him. This is the way that you find things should return.
To me, it is most essential for us today really to go back to the beginning and allow the Holy Spirit to show us how everything began. How did the church begin? How did it enable Jesus, the risen Lord, to continue to speak and to do?
As we are approaching the end, surely we want Him to finish His doing and finish His speaking. But if we want Him to finish His doing and speaking—and remember, it is now through a corporate Body—we have to see whether that Body will allow Him to do so.
This is the only way He can speak. This is the only way He can do. This is what He intends: to do and to speak through a corporate Body. It is therefore very important for us to see that He can still speak and finish His speaking; He can still do and finish His doing.
You know, very often we are all individuals. Whether you pronounce yourself as an individualist or not, as a matter of fact, we are all individualists. Why? Because when sin came into this world, it divided and separated one from another. That makes us all individuals.
Even Adam and Eve were separated. Sin separated us not only from God, but also from one another. We are all individuals, and even when we come to the Lord, even when we come to the things of God, we remain as individuals.
It is true that in your relationship with the Lord, you have to be personal. Nobody else can believe for you. They can help you to believe, but they cannot believe for you.
But strangely, as you look at yourself, you will find that your whole approach to God is on an individual basis, which is very different from God’s approach to man.
Sooner or later, I believe God will have to shift you from your individual approach and begin to show you God’s corporate approach. In other words, God has to show you that it is more than a matter of your individual relationship with the Lord. Yes, that relationship is basic, but it is not enough.
The Lord Jesus cannot continue to do and speak what He began to do and speak when He was on earth through individuals. He could begin to do and speak through one individual—that is, Himself. But aside from Himself, there has not been, and there is not, any one individual or many individuals who can continue His doing.
It has to be through a corporate Body. The Lord will gradually shift your attention from the individual to the corporate, from the selfish to the divine. Only as He shifts you to His position, and you look at things from His position, will you begin to realize how grand and how glorious is His design.
It is therefore very important for us to know the Book of Acts.
The Book of Acts begins with the resurrection of our Lord Jesus. After our Lord Jesus was raised from the dead, He showed Himself living to His disciples. He spoke to them of the things concerning the kingdom of God.
He appeared to them for a period of forty days. He told them that they should return to Jerusalem and wait until they received power from on high—that is, until they were baptized with the Holy Spirit. Then they would be witnesses from Jerusalem, through all Judea and Samaria, unto the uttermost part of the earth.
For forty days our Lord Jesus appeared to them after His resurrection. After the forty days were over, He was taken to heaven. The disciples returned to Jerusalem, and there they waited for ten days, until the day of Pentecost.
Let us use a type from Leviticus in order to help us understand. If you read Leviticus 23, you will find the feasts of God. Aside from the Sabbath, which comes once a week, there are six feasts of the Lord.
The first feast is the feast of Passover. It is in memory of how God delivered Israel out of death. On that night, when the angel of destruction passed through all the land of Egypt, he would go into every house and destroy the firstborn.
But God commanded the children of Israel to prepare a lamb for each house. They were to put the blood upon the doorposts and the lintel, and all were to gather within the house. They were to roast the lamb and eat its flesh, ready to go out of Egypt. When the angel of destruction passed by and saw the blood, he passed over, because blood had already been shed.
That was the way the children of Israel were delivered out of death and also out of Egypt. Brothers and sisters, I believe you all understand the spiritual meaning of Passover. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 5 that our Passover is Christ.
Christ is our Passover Lamb. We were all condemned together. We were all sinners; we were all condemned to death; we would all have been destroyed. But thank God, our Lord Jesus was the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
Because we believe in Him, we have sprinkled His blood upon our hearts. Thus destruction has passed over us. Those who believe in the Lord Jesus have had judgment pass over them. They are no longer to die, but they have eternal life.
We feed upon the Lord as our food, and by His strength we walk out of this world. We are no longer of this world. We are in the world, but we do not belong to this world; we belong to Christ.
Passover speaks of the death of our Lord Jesus. At Passover, our Lord Jesus was crucified. The Passover lamb that God had given to the children of Israel through generations was fulfilled in Christ.
Immediately following Passover, or in connection with Passover, is the feast of unleavened bread for seven days. Paul explains to us that Christ is our Passover. Since we have had our Passover, we are now in the feast of unleavened bread.
Seven days signify perfection. Since we believe in the Lord Jesus, we are in the feast of unleavened bread. We should remember the Lord, worship the Lord, and serve the Lord, not with leavened bread, not with malice or wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
Our whole life, after we believe in the Lord Jesus, is a continuous feast of unleavened bread. There should be no leaven in our house—nothing evil, neither in teaching or doctrine, nor in conduct or behavior. We should serve and worship the Lord with a spirit of sincerity and truthfulness.
Then, on the third day after Passover, there is the feast of firstfruits. Passover and the feast of unleavened bread belong together, and on the third day there is the feast of firstfruits.
The children of Israel were to take a sheaf of the firstfruits of barley. Barley was harvested first in Palestine; it was the first produce. Before the harvest of barley, there would be the firstfruits of barley. The firstfruits are always the best, and they are the guarantee of the harvest.
The children of Israel would cut a sheaf of the firstfruits and wave it before the Lord—presenting and offering it to God.
This feast speaks of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus. In 1 Corinthians 15, when Paul speaks to us concerning the resurrection, he says that Christ is our firstfruits, and afterward comes the harvest.
But now hath Christ been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of them that are asleep.
—1 Corinthians 15:20
Our Lord Jesus died, but on the third day He was raised. Thus, the feast of firstfruits speaks of the resurrection of our Lord.
After the firstfruits, there are seven weeks, called the Feast of Weeks. After you count seven weeks, then on the fiftieth day comes Pentecost, the feast of Pentecost.
As a type of Pentecost, the harvest is brought in. The priest prepares two loaves of fine flour, baked with leaven, and presents them before the Lord. Notice this: they are made with leaven.
It is not a sheaf; it is fine flour. It is not merely a sheaf of barley. The flour is made into dough and baked into bread. Two is the number of witness and testimony.
The two loaves speak of the church. Except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abides alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Out of these many grains, we are ground and made into dough and baked, so that we may be presented before God.
Of all the offerings to God, there should be no leaven except in these two loaves. Christ was tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. But however perfect we are, there is always the presence of sin in our nature. That is the leaven there.
But thank God, even if there is leaven, it is counteracted by the burnt offering, the sin offering, and the other offerings. Thus, Passover speaks of the death of our Lord; the feast of firstfruits speaks of the resurrection of the Lord; and Pentecost speaks of the birth of the church, that mystical corporate Body through which the risen Lord is able to continue His doing.
Between firstfruits and Pentecost, there are fifty days. These fifty days are very, very meaningful.
We do not see very much described in the Bible concerning these fifty days, but all we know is that they are divided into two parts: forty days and ten days. For forty days after the resurrection, our Lord appeared to His disciples. Then, after He was ascended, the disciples gathered together with one accord in Jerusalem for ten days.
What happened during those forty days? What happened during those ten days? Brothers and sisters, even though we do not find much in the Bible, the little that is there is enough—more than enough.
If you read very carefully, you will find that those forty days were most important.
Why was it that, after our Lord Jesus was resurrected from the dead, He did not simply appear to all the brethren and ascend immediately? Would that not have been the best thing to do? Why should He remain, as it were, officially for forty days on earth?
Had He not spent thirty-three years on earth? Had He not finished His work of salvation? Now everything was all right; everything was finished. He could simply have gathered His disciples on the Mount of Olives, shown Himself to them, said goodbye, and promised, “I will come again.” Why should He spend forty days on earth?
Is there any special reason for that? Is there anything He had to do during those forty days? So far as His work of redemption on the cross is concerned, it is finished, thank God. But there was unfinished business with His disciples.
During those forty days, He appeared to them living. Underline the word living.
These disciples knew the Lord while He was in His earthly body. They had been with the Lord for three years or more in union. They knew that the Lord had been crucified and buried. But now the Lord appeared to them living.
What is the difference between the Lord who was alive before He died and the Lord who was living after He died? The Lord was alive before He died, yes, but that life was only in that one body. When He appeared to them living after resurrection, this resurrection life was able to be imparted to them. That is the difference.
For three years, these disciples followed the Lord. They watched Him, observed Him, and heard Him. They thought, “Beautiful, wonderful, glorious! Such a life had never been on earth before—a heavenly life walking on earth. Nothing higher than that, nothing more glorious than that.”
How they must have admired Him: “Oh, if only we could live as You live.” But the more they followed the Lord, the more they felt that they were far away from Him. It was a hope, yet hopelessly beyond them.
Finally, when the Shepherd was smitten, the sheep were scattered.
The picture I see is the picture in Jeremiah 18. The potter takes up clay, puts it upon the wheel, begins to turn the wheel, puts his loving hand upon the clay, and tries to make it a vessel. But it is marred.
Is it because the potter is not skillful enough? No. It is because there is something in the clay that resists the hand of the potter. It is not right.
Does the potter throw that clay away? No. He remakes the clay and makes it into a new vessel.
These disciples followed the Lord for three years. They were in the hands of the Lord, as it were. The Lord was trying to form them into a vessel. But when the Lord was crucified, they were all scattered.
In spite of all that they had heard and all that they had experienced, it did not seem to bring them up to anything. But did the Lord throw them away? No. In resurrection, He gathered them again. He made them into a new vessel.
The difference is this: what was in their hands before was their own life. We can never make a new vessel out of our own life. But He has raised us up, breathing into us His new life. That is to say, we do not live by our own life anymore; now we live by His risen life.
Because we live by His risen life, that life in us is able to make us into His vessel.
During those forty days, these were difficult days for the disciples. Two disciples were walking from Jerusalem to Emmaus. They were talking together, and they were very discouraged. They really loved the Lord, but the Lord had been crucified and had died.
Some women said that the tomb was empty, that the Lord was risen, and that they had seen Him. But these two disciples had not seen the Lord. So they were downcast. They left Jerusalem and walked toward Emmaus.
The Lord appeared as a fellow traveler and walked with them. He asked them what they were discussing. They said, “Do You not know the news in Jerusalem? Everybody knows it. This Jesus, whom we considered to be God’s prophet, is dead. And the strangest thing is that some women think He is alive.”
The Lord began to expound the Scriptures to them. As He opened the Word to them, their hearts burned within them. They did not know where this man had gained such knowledge.
When they arrived at Emmaus, the Lord appeared to continue on His way. They persuaded Him, “Stay with us. We like to have You with us.” So He stayed with them. As they sat down to eat, He took bread, blessed it, and gave it to them. Then they recognized Him: “The Lord!”
But as soon as they saw the Lord, He disappeared.
I think that is one of the strangest things that ever happened. If the Lord wants to appear to you, of course He wants you to know Him. But when you begin to know Him, He disappears. Then why does He appear to you?
Yet this did not happen only once. During those forty days, He suddenly appeared and He suddenly disappeared. He appeared when they were not ready, and He disappeared when they recognized Him.
Even Mary Magdalene, the first one who saw the Lord, was weeping outside His tomb. Peter and John had gone home, but Mary Magdalene would not leave. She heard a man ask, “Woman, why weepest thou? Whom seekest thou?” She thought He was the gardener and said, “Sir, if thou hast borne Him hence, tell me where thou hast laid Him, and I will take Him away.”
Then He said, “Mary.” Immediately she recognized Him: “Rabboni!” She turned to grasp His feet, as she had done before. But the Lord said, “Touch Me not.”
Mary had touched the Lord many times before. Probably she had washed the Lord’s feet many times. Yet now the Lord said, “Do not touch Me.”
The disciples were in a room with the doors shut. Everything was shut because they were frightened. Suddenly the Lord appeared to them and said, “Peace be unto you.” Then He asked, “Have ye here anything to eat?”
Peter could not wait. The Lord had appeared, and then He was gone. Peter waited and waited, expecting Him to appear again. Finally Peter said, “Let us go fishing. We cannot just wait here until He suddenly appears and then disappears. Let us do something.”
Dear brothers and sisters, do you understand why, during those forty days, He appeared and disappeared, appeared again and disappeared again?
There is a most important reason. Their former relationship with the Lord had been physical. They had heard Him and touched Him. Their relationship was very close: the Lord was with them, and they were with the Lord. They were always together, and they found that relationship most satisfying.
But the Lord was saying, “From now on, your relationship with Me is no longer a physical one. You no longer know Me according to the flesh. You must now know Me in the Spirit.”
“I appear to you to draw you away from the flesh; and as soon as you recognize Me in the Spirit, I disappear, because this will be My relationship with you.”
How important this is now. How often I have heard believers say—and I have said it myself—“Oh, if only I had lived two thousand years ago! If only I had been born a Jew in Galilee! If only I had been born at the same time Jesus was on earth! If only I could have followed Him and touched Him! If I had, I would not be as I am today. I would be much more spiritual.”
But the Lord said, “It is expedient for you that I go away.” If we had been disciples then, we might have said, “No, do not go. There is nothing better than this.” But the Lord says, “It is more profitable for you that I go. If I do not go, the Holy Spirit will not come.”
“I can be with you, but I cannot be in you. There is something far better than My being with you: I can be in you.”
Why do we want to maintain our relationship with Him on an earthly or physical basis, however satisfying it may be? There is a better relationship: a relationship in the Spirit.
When we see the better, we may not want the best. So He has to take the better away that we may want the best.
During those forty days, our Lord Jesus was drawing them out of themselves into His life, and drawing them out from the physical realm. The Lord was teaching them a lesson they had never learned before.
In other words, the Lord was putting them on resurrection ground, in the realm of the Spirit. Only when they were able to enter into resurrection ground and the realm of the Spirit was He able to form them into His Body.
During those forty days, He spoke to them of things concerning the kingdom of God. When I read the Bible, I say, “Lord, why do You not tell me what You talked about? You talked about the kingdom of God. That is most important. I would like to know what You said.”
The Lord must have said many wonderful things about the kingdom of God. He said much about the kingdom of God during His three years on earth. But now, during those forty days, it seems as if He talked about nothing but the kingdom of God. Yet there is no record—only “the kingdom of God.” That is all.
I think our Lord Jesus was the best Teacher in the world. If you want to speak, it is better if you can demonstrate. I cannot draw; if I want to draw a dog, it becomes a cat. So I dare not do much drawing. But demonstration is important.
The Lord did not merely tell them what the kingdom of God was. He demonstrated it. He suddenly appeared; He suddenly disappeared. He suddenly appeared; He suddenly disappeared. That is the kingdom of God.
The kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. The kingdom of God is found on resurrection ground. The kingdom of God is in the Spirit. There is the reality of the kingdom of God.
During those forty days, our Lord Jesus was actually lifting them up to a higher level. On the basis of His death, the Lord was raising them up to resurrection ground. It took forty days to prepare them for their new relationship with Him.
On the day of resurrection, He appeared to them, breathed into them, and said, “Receive ye the Holy Spirit.” Having received the Holy Spirit, they were able to enter into the spiritual realm and be maintained in a spiritual relationship with the Lord.
Forty is the number of trial and testing. It must have been a great testing to the disciples, but I think it must have been a great trial to the Lord too. All His time with the disciples, even before His death, was a trial to the Lord. How they misunderstood Him all the time.
There is one word in the Bible which describes the feeling of the Lord during those forty days, and also during His three years with the disciples: travail.
He shall see of the travail of His soul, and shall be satisfied.
—Isaiah 53:11
This refers to His death. Because of His death, He has given birth to all of us. But those forty days were a continuation of this travail for us, that we might be lifted out of ourselves into His life, out of the flesh into the Spirit, and out of the old creation into the new creation, so that He might form us into His mystical corporate Body.
Those forty days were the travail of our Lord.
Then the Lord ascended, and the disciples returned to Jerusalem. There they were for ten days. Ten is the number of responsibility.
How many were present when the Lord ascended from the Mount of Olives? Probably there were about five hundred brethren, because 1 Corinthians 15 says that, at one time, the Lord appeared to more than five hundred brethren.
Most commentators feel that this may refer to the time of His ascension. But, strictly speaking, only one hundred and twenty remained in the upper room in Jerusalem. Most of the people seem to have returned to Galilee. But these one hundred and twenty were together, and they gave themselves to continual prayer with one accord.
There is nothing that tests your flesh more than prayer. There is nothing that tries your flesh more than praying together. There is nothing harder than giving yourselves together to continual prayer with one accord.
It is much easier to go out and do something. It is much easier to do something together. But to give yourselves to prayer with one accord—that is very difficult, very difficult.
Why did they come together to pray? The Lord had told them to return to Jerusalem and wait until they received power from on high. How did they wait? Did they just sit there and wait passively?
No. The Lord said, “Wait until ye receive the power from on high.” The Lord expected them to wait actively, not passively. So they gave themselves to prayer. They knew there was only one thing they could do, and that thing was to pray.
Brothers and sisters, what kind of prayer was that prayer?
God has a principle in all His work concerning the new creation. In the old creation, when God created the heavens and the earth, He did it all alone. He did not ask for your help.
But in the work of the new creation, God has established a principle, and that principle is binding: He will not do anything unless He gets the cooperation from man.
Remember this: God is almighty in heaven, but His power is restricted by man on earth. Not because man has great power to limit Him, but because God has set down a principle. It is His good pleasure.
So far as the new creation is concerned, He will not do anything until He finds a response from the earth asking Him to do what He wants to do.
That is the reason why you find in Matthew 18:
Verily I say unto you, What things soever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and what things soever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
—Matthew 18:18
The earth responds to heaven. It is heaven that wants to bind, but heaven gives you the burden. You take up that burden and say, “Lord, we want it bound.” Then heaven says, “All right, I will bind it.”
After giving up His physical body on the cross, the risen Lord was to take upon Himself a corporate Body to continue His speaking and His doing. That was what He wanted. He travailed for that.
But He would not, and He could not, do it alone. He was bound by the principle He had established. He told the brethren, “Go and wait.” They understood. They went back to Jerusalem, not merely to sit there and wait as if it would come automatically. It never would. That is not God’s way in the new creation.
They had fellowship with the afflictions of Christ concerning the Body. They came together. It was a most difficult and trying thing to the flesh, but in view of what the Lord wanted—the Lord wanted a Body—they wanted it too.
They were willing to come together and give themselves to continual prayer with one accord. What was it? It was travail. They travailed for the birth of the church.
They, as it were, fellowshipped with the Lord in His travail. It was on the basis of the travail of the Lord that they were able to travail. It was by His life within them that they were able to travail with the Lord.
Remember that this has nothing to do with atonement. In atonement, our Lord is all-sufficient. He bore our sins all by Himself. We receive the good of it, but we do not share in it.
But so far as the new creation is concerned, the one hundred and twenty gave themselves to continual prayer. It was travail in prayer. It was prayer with a purpose. They wanted what Christ wanted.
If all the five hundred brethren had gone home, what would have happened? It is almost unimaginable. Suppose the Lord had risen to heaven and could find no Body on earth. He could not speak, He could not do, and He could not be manifested. What would He have wanted to say? What would He have wanted to do?
But thank God, even though the majority of the brethren seemed to scatter, one hundred and twenty would wait. They gave themselves to continual prayer, to travail for the birth of that Body of Christ.
Dear brothers and sisters, during those ten days they were not only praying; they were making adjustments. You cannot pray together without making adjustments.
A lot of adjustments had to be made. The Bible only mentions one thing: they filled the vacancy of Judas. But from our experience, we can understand that there must have been many adjustments to be made with the Lord and with one another.
Then, on the day of Pentecost, the day was accomplished. Suddenly there came from heaven a sound as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the house. Tongues as of fire came upon each one. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in tongues, speaking the mighty works of God.
Brothers and sisters, what do you think? The birth of the church is as great a miracle as when Christ was born to Mary.
One is personal, the other is corporate. One is the foundation, the other is the superstructure. One is the beginning, the other is the continuation. Christ and His church are all one. It is the same Christ who is speaking and who is doing.
Through the Lord’s corporate Body, He can now continue to speak and to do.
Dear brothers and sisters, what we need today is to know what God wants and to travail for that. This is working together with God. Out of this travail, that which God wants will come.
This is the birth of the church: the beginning of that Body of Christ. You see how He could speak and how He could do through that Body, just as He was able to do when He was in His physical body, Jesus of Nazareth.
This is the Book of Acts.
I think this is probably enough for tonight. What I pray to the Lord is just this: the Lord needs a Body. The church is the Body of Christ; it is the continuation of Christ.
It is through that Body that He is to speak and to do, as He used to speak and to do. But it will not come in convenience if there is lack on our part. He needs our cooperation.
Our heavenly Father, how we praise and thank Thee for sending Thy Son, our Lord Jesus, into this world to take upon Himself human flesh. In that body, He began to speak and to do.
O our heavenly Father, how we praise and thank Thee that, as our Lord Jesus has accomplished the work of redemption, He is risen from the dead and is now seated at Thy right hand, waiting until Thine enemies are made Thy footstool.
But He has sent the Holy Spirit, that we may be baptized into one Body, that He may be able to continue to do and to speak.
O Lord, what a privilege, but what a responsibility. We humble ourselves before Thee. We ask Thee to show us Thy mind. We ask Thee to enable us to travail with Thyself for the Body’s sake.
We ask all this in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.