Acts 4

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically from the audio and may contain small errors.

Today we are going to be continuing on our story, our origin story, following the birth of local churches in Acts, in the book of Acts. Today we're gonna be in Acts four. In Acts four, and today, as we look in Acts four, we're gonna see pretty quickly that they are going to face some serious opposition. Some serious opposition. You and I spend the majority of our time avoiding opposition.

We don't really go looking for opposition. It's not how we like to spend a Saturday or a family vacation. Okay? But we avoid it, and we avoid it in lots of different ways. So if there's a problem with somebody that we have, we have a problem with it, we just ignore them, or we try to not be in a situation where it's just us two. If somebody disagrees with our perspective, instead of engaging in that disagreement, we change topics, right? We avoid that opposition. And if we have a friend who is just ruining their lives and they're kind of in unrepentant sin, a lot of times we do the easy thing and we just cut off contact, right? We avoid that confrontation, we avoid that opposition. And because so many of us do this, because so many of us run to the path of least resistance or no resistance, we find that people don't really know how to handle, myself included,

we don't know how to handle opposition, even mild opposition to what we're doing, especially when it comes to spiritual kind of things like progress. So whenever we are trying to do something for the Lord and we see opposition, oh, God must not be in it. Whenever we're trying to do something for the Lord and we see opposition, we take that as a sign that we're doing it wrong or that we're doing it too soon or that we're not really thinking it through or that maybe, maybe if we're experiencing too much opposition, maybe we should just turn back. Maybe we shouldn't take advantage of what's there. And it's especially true when that opposition comes from the majority, right? So it's not just, in other words, it's not just one person telling you that you shouldn't do what you're doing. It's not just one person resisting whatever you're kind of walking in. It is, that opposition is the majority of people

and really, this is what we find in Acts four, really for the first time. We need to remember last chapter, Steve Beckwith's priest last week talking us through Romans, excuse me, through, not Romans, through Acts three and he talked about, if you remember, he talked about a big temple mount, right? A big temple mount and we're talking like 30 plus acres of big, okay? Big temple mount. We are sitting on five acres here, parking lot, field behind us, church building, that's five. So six plus, seven plus of these.

And at the big temple mount, this is where the church was meeting and Peter and John were entering the temple and they healed a guy. His name was Ben Leaper, at least that's what Steve said. I couldn't find his name and it's totally his name, yeah. Ben Leaper, excellent pun and dad joke, by the way, excellent. Now upon this miracle, upon this man that we will call Ben Leaper, upon him being healed, there is a crowd that gathers, okay? Peter sees this opportunity, says he sees it and Steve asks us to ask, which is a great question all the time. You see a, you see a it or you see a this or you see a therefore in scripture, you need to know what is it talking about? Look for what it's talking about. When Peter sees it, when Peter sees the opportunity, he begins to preach boldly. That's where we left off last week. This situation, the reason we talk about this because it spills over into Acts four, okay?

And you could see it in the beginning of Acts four versus one through two. It begins, and as they were speaking to the people, so this is Peter and John preaching boldly, okay? As they were speaking to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came upon them greatly annoyed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead. Okay, so this is the priest, this is the captain of the garden, this is the Sadducees. This is pretty much the fullness of religious and governmental power, right? This is everybody. This would be like the mayor, the rep, the senator, the governor, everybody's mad at them. They're all mad. They've come together and they're like, what's going on, what is this? We can't let this continue. Verse three, and they arrested them, Peter and John, and put them in custody until the next day,

for it was already evening. So up until this point, if you're following the story of Acts, chapters one through four, where we are now, up until this point, they have experienced no real opposition besides some hecklers in Acts two, yelling that they were drunk. Okay, that's it. That's the only opposition they've experienced, and it wasn't a big deal. And now, now, this is for real. This is the full weight of governmental authority detaining their leaders. Okay, during COVID, in the state of California,

they ordered churches to basically not meet, to close their doors. And there were a few churches that would not comply, even some with the threat of governmental action. And look, whatever your stance is on the mandate or COVID, that's not the point. The point is that I would imagine, I think that you can too, it would be extremely difficult for any of us to disobey civil authority. Extremely difficult. And you can talk big about having your 20 acres and your shotgun, and you'll be fine in the zombie apocalypse, okay? You can, go ahead, you can tell me all day about it. You can talk real big. But when the majority of people, including governmental authorities, are telling you that what you're doing is wrong and that you should stop, that'll take some gumption. That'll stop you in your tracks, brother. That is not an easy thing to do.

They are going against the flow of the majority. This is the priest, the captain, the guard, the sages, the reason I know it's difficult for us to do this is because for many of us, it does not take governmental pressure for us to not share the gospel. What stops us from sharing the gospel is often fear of what other people might think of us. It's not anybody threatening to put you in jail, right? Last week we talked about being bold, right?

And Steve helped us understand, there's something kind of in us that needs to just sense the barrier and then just walk through it, man. Be bold, take the risk, right? And if we're gonna talk about being bold, and I really wanna, I think the text continues to talk about this, about being bold, and what we see play out in Acts 4. But if we're going to be bold, then maybe we need to think about how we consider opportunity. Or excuse me, opposition. Maybe that we should, instead of running from opposition, maybe we need to have a mind where we are welcoming opposition.

Where we should welcome opposition. Now this is loaded, and if taken out of context, it could mean that I say, hey, go find trouble, run headlong into it, play the victim, and post it on social media. It'll be great, okay? That's not what I mean, okay? World's full of those people, full of them. Right, left, you know, blue, red, purple. Everybody is doing, that's very, very popular to do, and that's not what I mean. And that's not how we should consider opposition. That's not what I mean when I say we should welcome opposition. What do I mean? Well, Acts 4 is gonna show us why we should welcome opposition. We're gonna see just three things that the Holy Spirit authorizes opposition, that the Holy Spirit opens unique avenues through opposition, avenues that don't pop up anywhere else, and also that the Holy Spirit wants to share ministry with us in the middle of opposition.

Okay, and we're gonna talk through each one of those. Holy Spirit authorizes, Holy Spirit opens unique avenues, and then the Holy Spirit wants to share ministry amidst opposition. So we're gonna start with authorizing. Look at verse four. Acts 4, four, it says, but many of those who had heard the word believed, and the number of men came to about 5,000. This is right after their leaders are jailed. Okay, and so usually when you tell a group of people, hey, this new thing that you believe, this new community that you're experiencing, both your figureheads are in jail now, that tends to dampen the momentum, okay? It just does, but here it does not. The Holy Spirit actually uses this opposition as a catalyst. In Acts 2, the last time we got a number count was 3,000 souls. Here, we're talking about the men coming to about 5,000. So maybe we can double that, okay?

So we've gone from three, let's just call it seven, seven and a half, 7.5, okay, 7,500. We've more than doubled, for sure. And you can see there, even in verse four, you can see that the Holy Spirit, there's kind of a sign, like something's happening that the Holy Spirit's using this opposition to spur this group of people on. And you see this idea that opposition is a catalyst. You see this all over the Bible, okay? You see that the idea that the Holy Spirit can use opposition as a catalyst is all over the Bible. Proverbs 17-3, I'm just gonna hit a few, Proverbs 17-3, it says, the crucible is for silver, the furnace is for gold, and the Lord tests hearts. How does he do that?

Opposition, it's the furnace. The Lord sits the temperature under your feet to an uncomfortable degree to test your heart. Hebrews 12 talks about how the Lord disciplines those he loves as son. How does he discipline them? So you just pat them on the back and tell them they're doing a good job? No, opposition is in view. There's frustration, there's things that we encounter that we don't know how to figure out, things that seem to stop us in our tracks. We want to walk forward, make some progress on our spiritual journey, and there's a big old barrier, and we don't know how to get around it. That is how the Lord teaches us. That's how we test our hearts, that's how we discipline us. 1 Peter 1, 6 and 7 also says that God, specifically, God gives us trials to test our faith, period.

Doesn't, it doesn't, you know, try to massage that too hard. The most famous example would be from Romans 5, 3 through 4, and trust me, we're gonna stick to Acts, but I just wanna show you this. In Romans 5, 3 through 4, it says, not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings. Why, because we like pain? No. We rejoice in our sufferings because we know something different. We know that suffering produces endurance. Endurance produces character, character produces hope. So when you suffer a huge setback, when you experience major opposition in your life, and you don't bail, so this is a hypothetical situation, you experience opposition, you don't bail. You stay engaged, you stay patient through it, okay? You work through it, and as you work through it, as you just stay engaged, right, it doesn't mean that you're like solving your own problem, but like you don't bail.

You pray, you ask the Lord to help you kinda through this, and you begin to see some progress. I mean, just a breadcrumb, but you just see a little bit, and then you see a little bit more, and then you see a little bit more. That process of seeing good, as you are just staying with it, that process changes you at your core. It makes you a different person, and you become convinced of different things. You see opportunity now where you only saw obstacles before. An example would be if you have, maybe you have a huge setback in a friendship that you have. Huge setback, big betrayal, loss of trust. You don't really know if you can be friends after this. It's a big deal, it's a heartbreaker. Maybe you're at fault, maybe they're at fault, maybe both. We've been there, but instead of walking away, you say, okay, you know what, friend? You and I, we're gonna work through this.

We're gonna push on through, so you go through this process of restoration, and you know what? In that restoration, you got bad weeks, and you got good weeks, and sometimes you got bad weeks and a good day, and then a couple more bad weeks, but it's up and down. It's not something where it's just rainbows and sunshine. It's hard, but you're staying engaged, and they're staying engaged. You're pushing through, you're working through it. As you push through to the other side, it's not just that you make it, it's that your relationship is something totally different now. It's much stronger, it's much more resilient. You become convinced that this person is now your friend truly in a new way, at a new level. This is why we talk about blood being thicker than water. This is what we're acknowledging. When you have siblings, you go through very difficult times together.

I realize at some point you don't have a choice, because you're just siblings, but there's a difference in between siblings staying engaged and siblings not staying engaged, and when you do, man, you experience a substance in your relationship that you just don't have, if you don't stick it out. This is what it means, whenever the Bible's talking about, suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope. It's that it changes you into a hopeful person. Do you hear that this morning? It changes you into somebody who can hope, and when you meet opposition, it's not like you think, oh, this is great. Man, bust out the party pack. I got some opposition today. Yee-haw. That's not what I mean. I just mean that when you look at it, you don't lose hope. You don't face opposition and go, I don't know if I can follow Jesus anymore. I don't know.

I don't know how this is gonna work out. It's really hard. And look, I don't mean to lighten the opposition that you go through. You and I, we experience some real things, really deep, frustrating things that can shake us at our core. So I don't even wanna make light of that. I wanna say what you're going through is not important. No, it is, it's totally important. In fact, it's so important that how you think about it really does determine what you're gonna do with it. What scripture's telling us in Acts 4 is that we should welcome opposition. And I wanna say this. When we talk about the Holy Spirit authorizing this,

that the Holy Spirit's authorizing this opposition, that whole process that I just talked about with your friend, I want you to see that you can't manufacture this. In other words, if you're saying, for example, I want my relationship with my wife to be stronger, so you know what I'm gonna do? I'm just gonna make her really mad. Thank you for that laughter. That was crazy talk is what it is.

Somebody said, well, why, Drew? Why do you wanna make your wife mad? Well, because I want a relationship to be stronger. So after they wrestle me to the ground and like slap me across the face a few times, and they can disabuse me of that notion, it's not something that you can create. You should not manufacture that drama. It will blow up in your face, okay? And maybe here's some encouragement. Opposition's gonna come all on its own. You don't need to do anything to encourage it, right? Like you don't need to manufacture it, but you actually can't. It's actually impossible. If you wanted to manufacture some problems in your life so that you could overcome them, it's actually impossible. Because you know it's a game you're playing with yourself and there's no real stakes involved. But when the Lord brings some opposition to you and you're like, I don't even know

how I'm gonna get around this, that's some real stakes. That's you and your life. And you look at the mirror going, what am I gonna do with this? And there's no manufacturing that. The Holy Spirit authorizes that kind of opposition to discipline us, to test our hearts, to refine us. This is what the Holy Spirit does in our lives and this is what the Holy Spirit is doing in Acts 4. He authorizes opposition. And with that opposition, when the Holy Spirit brings that opposition, there are unique avenues that appear. There are things that appear there, things that you can walk in that do not happen in other circumstances. And we're gonna see it here. We're gonna start in Acts 4, 8, 8 and 9. So they arrest Peter and John. They bring them before the big council, right? And they're all there, all the government authorities who can ruin their lives. And Peter, it says, then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit,

said to them, rulers of the people and elders, if we are being examined today, concerning a good deed done to a crippled man, Ben Leaper, we know his name. By what means this man has been healed, and I'm gonna stop him mid-sentence right here. The rulers have just asked him, by whose power did you do this? Peter's answering that. And the Holy Spirit is specifically enabling this moment right here, okay? Because the rulers didn't have to, they didn't have to bring them before themselves and say, by whose power are you doing this? That was a complete setup. That's the Holy Spirit, like creating that unique avenue, you know, where they're just standing before, and the council is like, ah, what questions should we ask them? Oh, who's really at work here? Peter's like, oh, I'm so glad you asked. Let me tell you, let me testify. And this is what he says in verse 10. It says, let it be known to all of you

and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, by him this man is standing before you well. The Holy Spirit has just demonstrated the power of God by raising this man, not raising him from the dead, but making him able to walk, Ben Leaper, able to leap. And Peter is simply testifying to this. Peter's not making this up. He hasn't manufactured the healing of this guy. He hasn't, nothing's, Peter's just walking in, he's just pointing to it going, oh, okay, I mean, the Holy Spirit did that. It's just, you don't want me to say this. This is staring at you in the face, buddy. I can't, I can't, you're looking at him too. It demands some kind of explanation. Acts four, 11 and 12, it says, this Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in no one else,

for there is no other name under heaven, given among men by which we must be saved. And so in the midst of opposition, we see that the Holy Spirit is creating these unique avenues of dependence upon him, right? Opening up these unique avenues, but it's specifically about dependence upon him. In other words, it's not just that you get to the edge of the Red Sea, and then you have to part it or something. And it's not even that you have to kind of manufacture your way through or anything like that. It's that when the Holy Spirit brings you to that situation, okay, that the Holy Spirit's gonna open that avenue for you and it will be clear. Jesus spoke to his disciples about this in Luke 21, 13 through 15. Jesus, through his disciples, says, this will be your opportunity to bear witness. Settle it, therefore, in your minds, not to meditate beforehand how to answer.

Okay, so specifically Jesus saying don't plan, okay? Don't freak out. Don't overthink this, for I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict. When opposition comes, Jesus says don't run. Don't run. Don't freak out. Don't worry about, oh, I might get arrested. Don't worry about, oh, I don't know what they're gonna think about me. Don't run. Welcome it.

Welcome it. When opposition comes, don't run, welcome it. In the midst of opposition, there's a chance to depend on the Holy Spirit for something that only the Holy Spirit can do. When the opposition comes, the Holy Spirit's gonna give you words. And after Peter finished speaking, in verse 13, Acts 4, 13, it says, now when they saw, they being the council, the religious council, when they saw the boldness of Peter, and John, there's that word again, boldness. It's there. When they saw their boldness and perceived that they were uneducated common men. Now let's just stop there for just a minute, okay? This is not a compliment. This is not, the council who's looking at Peter and John, they see them as stupid fishermen.

This is a really nice way to put it, but that's what the council viewed them as. How many times are you in a position where you're gonna share the gospel, but you're gonna think to yourself, oh, I don't know enough. I'm not a pastor, I'm not a missionary, I'm not, I don't know enough. They're gonna ask me a question, I don't know the answer. Look, what's going on right here in Acts 4, 13 should obliterate that thinking entirely. That what's happening here in Acts 4 is that, whenever Jesus is saying, look, I'm gonna bring you before people, you don't need to freak out, I'm gonna give you those words, you need to say those words. What he's talking about, the Holy Spirit, that's happening right here in Acts 4. I just wanna ask you, do you have times in your own life, something that you can point to personally? It's not that there needs to be an audience for that,

necessarily, but can you look at a point back in your life where you can say, that was the Holy Spirit at work? That was something the Holy Spirit did. It doesn't have to be miraculous. It doesn't have to be like your toe that got cut off, got magically put back on. It's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about something that's happening in your life where you look at that and you go, look, that was the Holy Spirit. I couldn't have even engineered all of this to come together the way it came together, but here it is. And here's my avenue, and I'm just kinda walking in it. And you can almost play the stupid card, right? You're like, I'm here being obedient to the Holy Spirit. I don't know what's next. I don't know the plan. I don't know, I don't have some master. I'm not playing, I'm not the puppet master here. I'm just kinda walking in it. Holy Spirit's in charge.

I'm just kinda walking in it. We should welcome the opposition that the Holy Spirit is authorizing me because the Holy Spirit wants to minister through us, wants to teach us to depend on Him in real time. There's a difference in between saying, I'm gonna depend on the Holy Spirit, but I'm gonna give myself enough lead time just in case the Holy Spirit doesn't come through, right? There's a difference between that and then saying, I don't really know what's gonna happen, but now I'm here in the moment and the Holy Spirit has to come through, either that or I'm sunk. Look, I'm not advocating against planning, okay?

If anybody that knows me knows that I'm not gonna advocate against planning, planning's a good idea, okay? Planning's good, there's a place for it that's good. It's good long-term. Proverbs helps us understand that too. There's a way, though, that you can try to plan that eliminates the Holy Spirit or the need for the Holy Spirit. There's a way to plan out God interfering in your life at all, okay? Here's the attraction of it. It's real safe. It's real predictable, okay? It is. It's nice. It feels good and warm and comfy, but pretty soon it'll feel like a coffin. It'll just be a really comfortable one. So you have to understand that there's just these moments in your life where the Lord's gonna call you to do something and you just gotta kinda just step right out into whatever is there, not knowing what's there. You have to do it.

And if you think that following Jesus, you're like, well, that's for risk takers, that's for missionaries, that's for pastors, that's for other people. No, no, no, no, no, no. We're all Peter in the boat. We're all Peter in the boat where Jesus is saying, no, no, come out, come out, walk on the water, come to me. We're all there. We're all Peter in prison. We're all Peter before the council, not knowing what he's gonna say. We should welcome opposition because the Holy Spirit wants to open up this new path for us to walk in, to teach us to depend on him. One last reason why we should welcome opposition.

Go down to Acts 4:24, so skip a few verses. And Peter and John have returned to the church and they've told the church everything. And this is really interesting. It's not super obvious and so I wanna take the time to notice it. Acts 4:24 says, and when they heard it, this is the church, when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, sovereign Lord who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them. Okay, pause, this is the whole church together and it sounds like a prayer at first. Okay, when you're reading this, sovereign Lord, give us a stare, daily bread, it's gonna begin to sound like a prayer, but then it takes a turn. Next two verses. This is still the whole church. It says, who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit, why did the Gentiles rage and the people's plot in vain,

the kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his anointed. Let's just take a second and enjoy this moment right here, okay? This is, this is what is happening. And you have to remember, a couple weeks ago, we talked about Peter in Acts 1, okay? Peter in Acts 1 starts to do something new that the disciples never did, okay? So right after Jesus ascends to heaven and the disciples are all chilling together, Peter stands up among them and what does he do? He starts quoting Psalms. He starts quoting the Old Testament and he's saying, look, the Old Testament said this and now I understand kind of what it's talking about. That needs to direct where we're going now that needs to, and so they elect a new disciple off of that. What's happening here? In Acts 4, it ain't Peter standing up. It's the whole church. It's the whole church quoting Psalms.

It's the whole church quoting Psalms 2 and then understanding, okay, what's just happened with these rulers, these counsel, these priests, these governmental authorities kind of launching this thing against us, they told us about this in Psalms 2. This is Old Testament coming to life right here. And it's not, and here's the significant part, it's not Peter doing it. It's the whole church. The whole church is doing this. Everybody's preaching just like we talked about in Acts 2 when they were quoting Joel 2. Sorry, that's kind of a lot, but everybody's praying, everybody's prophesying, everybody's dreaming, everybody's doing it. It's not just for the select few people in the Old Testament, it's for the church. Look at verses 29 and 30, it says, and now, Lord, this is still the church preaching the Old Testament, it's still going, now, Lord, look upon their threats

and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness while you stretch out your hand to heal and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant, Jesus. What is their prayer? Their prayer is, Lord, we welcome the opposition. We welcome it. We know it's part of the process. We're not worried, we're not scared. You've been setting this up since the Old Testament. You've had this planned out since eternity passed. You're not sweating this, you're not scared by this. You're not wondering, oh, I didn't see that, I didn't realize the council was going to arrest Peter and John, what do I do now? No, the Lord's on his throne going, yeah, I know, it's exactly what was gonna happen, I'm excited about this. Here's gonna be a really cool moment where these people are gonna depend on the Holy Spirit and man, there's gonna be some really cool growth

and the church is gonna explode through this, it's gonna be so good. Lord God in heaven just plotting out that good for his glory and our good, just plotting it out, just making it happen, pushing it along and we're seeing it right here. The whole church saying we welcome the opportunity. What's happening? What's happening? It's the Holy Spirit wanting to share ministry. We talk about sharing ministry kind of often on here and it's probably been a while since I've said it, but we believe at our church that the Holy Spirit does not come through one person to all of you. That's not in the Bible. If you got anybody, and I mean anybody, I don't care how good looking they are, I don't care how effective their prayer life is, I don't care how good of a preacher they are, I don't care. If they're telling you, hey, the only way you can understand this is through me, run.

Turn off the TV. Pick a different YouTube channel, run. Because what we see even in the very, very beginnings of Acts four, in our origin story, and the thing that defines us as Christians and how we come together as a church is that we are not, the church isn't even dependent on Peter. By Acts four, that's not that long. As you, the Holy Spirit sharing ministry, right, opposition, Holy Spirit uses opposition to create environments where other people need to step up. The Holy Spirit does this. The Holy Spirit creates environments, opportunities where other people have to step up. They have to. We're doing, tonight we're doing a family meeting, it's gonna be a good time. And one of the things that we're doing is, well, two of the things that we're doing, we're gonna be commissioning Dan and Amy Hay, and we're gonna be voting on Daniel Oster as a pastor candidate.

I'm excited about both of those, but I want you to understand very clearly that both of those are an example of sharing ministry. It's a nod by our church more than that. It's a reality being expressed by our church that I'm not the only pastor here, and in some ways it's good that we have another pastor here. There were people that were in the OUBSU or OUBCM, excuse me, before Dan and Amy got there. Dan and Amy served there, then left, and other people came in their place and did great things. And now that they're coming back, there's gonna be some more kind of great things that are happening. But when you have the opportunity of sharing ministry, then you don't think to yourself, oh, okay, now that I've done these really great things in the name of Jesus, now I've got to be kind of, I've got to lord it over. I've got to make sure that I hold it to myself. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

You have simply been brought along in your spiritual journey to steward this little patch of kingdom right here, okay? Just steward that, whatever, whatever relationships you're over, whatever ministry you do, whatever, that's just you to steward until you're in heaven. And then when you're gone, somebody else is gonna come through and steward that. In a very real sense, this pastorate is not mine, actually, to share. This thing belongs to Jesus. And I'm just, look, I'm just, I wanna be here for a really long time, but I can't control how long I live, okay? There's actually a lot of things I can't control. But if it's up to me, bury me in the backyard, okay? I wanna be here forever. I'm excited about that, okay? But in a real sense, I've gotta understand, I'm just stewarding this thing, because I'm gonna hand it off to somebody else when I can't do anymore. That's a reality that I can't just kind of

turn a blind eye like, oh, I just, you know, I can't, oh, I can't even picture that. I can't picture not being, no, man, I better picture it. I better plan on it. I better be excited about it, because that's what the Lord's excited about. That's what the Lord's doing. So let's be excited about that. Drew is leaving one day. No, I'm kidding, but I'm not, right? Like, I am, I'm leaving one day. Not soon, I'm not trying to scare you. I'm just trying to help you understand the reality that all of us are just passing through. Every single one of us, even charter members of churches that have been there 80 years, they're just passing through. God rest his soul, Ray Law was here since the 90s, you know, and he just passed in the end of 23. I mean, he's pushing 20-something years, 30-something years here at South Burleson. Charter member, and when he's passed, it's not like we go, well, I guess nobody can do

what Ray did. No, man, we need to remember that. We need to share ministry in that as the Lord brings up these things. Look, as we follow the story in Acts, this is probably helpful, just as we keep going. As we follow the story in Acts, it goes outward geographically, but it also goes outward relationally. Let me explain what I mean. So it goes outward geographically. So in Acts 1:8, Jesus says, you'll be my witnesses in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth, okay? So that's kinda like Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, the ends of the earth, okay? Concentric circles. It would be like saying, you're gonna be my witnesses in DFW, in Texas, in America, and the whole world. Okay, that's kinda how that translates, okay? So everybody's really fond of saying that Acts does that geographically, but it also does it relationally. And let me tell you what I mean,

because it begins with Jesus physically on earth in Acts 1, and then he ascends. He's gone by like verse 11. And then it moves to Peter in Jerusalem, and we're gonna see later that everybody scatters from Jerusalem. And then it moves on to Stephen. Doesn't stay on Stephen long. We're gonna see why in a couple of months. Then it moves on to Philip. Then it moves back to Peter. Then it moves to Paul. Then Paul and Silas. Then Paul and Barnabas. Many other people. It doesn't stay on anybody. It just keeps going out relationally.

The story in Acts, it's our story, and it just keeps going outward. The Old Testament preaching that is shared by Peter to the whole church, from that church, it is shared with others, and I, you and I, are all a personal recipient of that happening in Acts 4. If it just stayed with Peter, well, Peter was gonna die one day. It went to the whole church. And eventually to me and you, so we can share with other people.

And none of this sharing happens without opposition being kind of the catalyst. Without the Holy Spirit bringing these kind of these avenues through opposition, where we can depend on him, where we can grow in new ways. And it is no wonder that we go from Acts 1 to Acts 4, and we go from Peter preaching to the church preaching. We go from Peter, really, at this point, Peter's preached a big old sermon in 3. He kind of preached to the council here in 4. He's gonna preach one more big time in Acts 10. And then after that, you're gonna hear just one or two more mentions, but by Acts 15, that's the last time Peter is mentioned, mentioned in the book of Acts. The book of Acts has 28 chapters. So roughly halfway through, the guy in Acts 1 that you thought, oh, okay, we're definitely gonna center on Peter here. Peter's gonna be kind of the main character. No, it ain't Peter.

It ain't Jesus in bodily form. It ain't Stephen, it ain't Philip, it ain't Paul, it ain't Barnabas. It's not any of the, it's the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit, the main character of Acts, right, it's not just the Acts of the Apoll, it's the Acts of the Holy Spirit. What you see is that it goes out. And it's so significant to me, and it should be to you that Peter himself, Peter, I mean like the dude, the guy, the disciple, all the other disciples are kind of looking at Peter like, what do we do next, bro? What's happening? What's here? And the Holy Spirit used that, it's fine. There's nothing wrong with it. However, Peter isn't even mentioned anymore. There will be a time when you and I will be mentioned a lot less than we are right now. I don't mean to be so dour today, but it is coming. You and I are gonna be mentioned a lot less. And here's just your questions,

and I just wanna leave you with these questions. I'm gonna invite the worship team to come up. I just wanna leave you with these questions. As your name is mentioned a lot less, what's gonna remain of your legacy? What will be remembered? What will stand? Did you follow the Holy Spirit into opposition? Did you do what the Holy Spirit was asking you to do the moment he was asking you to do it? Are you listening enough to know that? Look, we call this time in our service a time of response, right?