All right, here we are
Luke/Acts for Beginners, lesson number 13. This is the last lesson
in the Luke portion of this series. Next week, we will begin
the book of Acts portion of the series. The title of this particular lesson, The Consummation, it's
part two of this section and we'll be covering Luke 23:26-24:53. So let's begin by looking
back at our outline that we have been following
throughout this course. The beginning, Jesus' start in ministry, Jesus in Galilee, the next section covers the time of His ministry
in the northern part of the country. Jesus facing Jerusalem,
the events and the dialogue and the teaching that takes
place as He is heading towards Jerusalem, Jesus
entering Jerusalem, again, the events that
take place in and around Jerusalem and the
consummation, his suffering, His cross and His burial and resurrection. Now I mentioned the fact that we followed a geographical outline of Jesus' ministry because Luke in wanting
to establish a historical narrative of Jesus' life and ministry for his reader, Theophilus,
remember this is a letter addressed to one person,
Theophilus, he does this by framing events in Jesus'
like using two factors. One is time. The time of year or the
time of a certain festival or a time in history depending
on who ruled politically or who led religiously. He names who was the
high priest at what time. And all of these things can
be verified historically and then he also frames his
gospel according to place, where thing happen, so the
various incidents are grouped based on where Jesus was at the time, so this is how our outline
has been developed. Unlike Matthew and Mark and later John, who each had a theological
theme into which their accounts are poured, for example, in Matthew, Matthew
writes about Jesus as the Jewish Messiah and Mark writes about Jesus as the Divine One. In the book of John,
Jesus, both God and Man. So, Luke's goal is to
set Jesus, the Son of God into a historical context
and for this you need to first establish the
actual time and the places, you know, the when and the where, all of these events of Jesus'
life and ministry took place. Now, as far as our study of
Luke's gospel is concerned, we're reviewing the last
3 of the 10 final events of His passion. And we said that passion
is the short form term that we use that covers all of the events surrounding Jesus' suffering
death and resurrection. So the 10 events of the
passion, Gethsemane, His betrayal and arrest, Peter's denial, His trial before Annas and
Caiaphas, the high priests, His first trial before
Pilate, then He is sent before Herod, second trial
before Pilate, and the things we will cover today,
His torture and cross, His death and His burial and after this, of course, the resurrection. So on our last lesson, we
reviewed Pilate's failed attempts to save Jesus and his
cowardly acquiescence to the Jewish leaders
and mob to have Jesus, a man he knew was innocent,
he knew he was innocent, but he had Him executed anyways. So in this our final lesson in the series, let's examine the last three events in our Lord's passion of the cross and the glorious conclusion
to Luke's gospel, so let's begin, we'll begin
at exactly, number eight in the passion, His torture and the cross. Let's read verse 26. When they led Him away, they seized a man, Simon of Cyrene, coming
in from the country, and placed on him the cross
to carry behind Jesus. And following Him was a
large crowd of the people, and of women who were
mourning and lamenting Him. But Jesus turning to them
said, Daughters of Jerusalem, stop weeping for me,
but weep for yourselves and for your children. For behold, the days are
coming when they will say blessed are the barren and
the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed. Then they will begin
to say to the mountains fall on us and to the hills cover us. For if they do these things
when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry? Two others also, who were
criminals, were being led away to be put to death with Him. - So, Luke forgoes any
description of the scouraging and the psychological
torture administered by the Roman soldiers prior to Jesus' execution. This torture, however,
takes its toll as the Romans press Simon, a Jew, to carry the cross for the exhausted Jesus. Now in another gospel,
in the gospel of Mark, Mark names two of Simon's
sons who later became prominent members of the church, that's in Mark 15:21. The women, it says,
you know the women were mourning and lamenting. This means that they were
expressing the traditional bewailing for a person
who was as good as dead and judging by His answer to their cries, these were not His disciples
because He tells them to stop mourning for Him and begin mourning for themselves. This prophetic reference
to the terrible suffering and destruction that'll
take place in 70 AD when the Romans will come
in and they'll destroy the city and they'll kill everyone. When he says the green
wood, well, the green wood is Jesus in his sinlessness and the dry is the Jewish nation in its guilt. Basically what he's saying
is if this is what happens to the innocent, you him,
torture, if this is what happens to the innocent,
imagine what will happen to the guilty. So Luke mentions the
two criminals, thieves, that Pilate chose to execute with Jesus as a show of contempt for the Jews. In other words, this is
what I think of your King. He's not even worthy to
be crucified by Himself. I'll crucify Him and a couple
of thieves next to Him. They're all the same to me. Next section would be the
crucifixion and death, Luke 33-49. I want you to note that Luke's description of this event is made up entirely
of reactions, not actions. Verse 33, so keep that in mind. What Luke writes when he
writes about the crucifixion itself, it's all about
how people reacted to it. Let's go through it, verse 33. "When they came to the
placed called The Skull, there they crucified
Him and the criminals, one on the right and
the other on the left." So the opening verse sets the scene in the briefest way possible. Jesus is crucified with the thieves, crucified to His right and left. Perhaps Luke knew that his Gentile reader was familiar with this
Roman style of execution and needed no explanation. Let's begin at verse 34. Well, in verse 34, we see Jesus' reaction to His own crucifixion. It says, "But Jesus was
saying 'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.' And they cast lots dividing up His garments among themselves." So Jesus will speak several times, but His first reaction to
all that has happened to Him is to plead to God for
mercy and forgiveness for those who have put Him on this cross. Now we tend to read this and kind of, we go over it, well, of
course, Jesus would do this. After all, He's the Son
of God, He's full of love and mercy and we don't
think that later on, God answered this prayer. Because a few weeks later,
Peter and the Apostles would be offering God's
forgiveness for all sin to these very same people
as he preached the gospel from the Pilgrim Gate at
the temple in Jerusalem in Acts chapter 2, verse 14 to 42. The thousands of people
who were there listening to Peter preach, many
of those were, you know, part of this crowd. Who knows how many in
this crowd at the cross were among the 3,000
baptized on Pentecost Sunday. And so the clothing and the
effects of the condemned man were the property of the soldiers who were tasked with the execution and they divided it accordingly. So we see Jesus' reaction. Next Luke talks about the
people's reaction, verse 35a. It says, "and the people
stood by looking on." Now Luke will mention the
crowd of general population later on, but for now, he
says they are mainly quiet. I mean now that the
awful outcome and reality of what they were shouting
for and what they were demanding in the heat of the moment, being stirred up by the religious leaders, the result of all of that
now stands before them and they're reduced to silence. Not so funny now, not so exciting now. After all, crucified and slowly dying in excruciating pain before their eyes was not a murderer or a
thief, they knew that, but the teacher from Galilee, a Jew like themselves put to death before
them by pagan soldiers. They had nothing to say now, now that the awful result
of what they demanded just a few hours before was before them in all of its awful spectacle. Next, Luke talks about the Jewish leaders and their reaction verse 35b. "And even the rulers were sneering at Him saying, 'He saved others,
let Him save himself if this is the Christ
of God, His Chosen One'" and so the ones who actually spoke did so in cruelty, actually mocking a dying man. They use His crucifixion
as the final proof of their claim that He was an imposter. See, we told you so, this is pretty much what they're saying. If He's the Messiah, the Christ of God, let Him save Himself from this execution. The fact that He is not doing so and cannot do this (in
their minds) also proves that his claims of saving
other people are also false. In other words, if He can't save Himself, all this talk about Him saving you, well that's nonsense as well. Now the blasphemy is not only against the Son of God, but
also against the Father that they insult as well. Next, Luke turns his attention
to the Roman soldiers and their reaction verse 36 to 38. "The soldiers also mocked
Him, coming up to Him offering Him sour wine and saying, 'if You are the King of the
Jews, save Yourself.' Now there was also an
inscription above Him, 'THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS.'" So the soldiers' insults
are directed less at Jesus as an individual and more
at the Jewish people. I mean, if you were a Roman soldier, being stationed in Judea was not exactly the best assignment. This was not a great
career move if you happened to be stationed in Judea. You were far from Rome and civilization. You were among a rebellious people with a fanatical devotion to
their very strange religion. Their attitude was, we
dare You to come down from the cross. The inscription said this
is the King of the Jews, but the sentiment behind
the inscription said this is what we think of and what we do to anyone who declares that
he is the King of the Jews or king of anything for that matter. This is how we treat the King of Jews, with contempt, with cruelty, with force. It was a brutal show
of force and a warning to other would-be troublemakers. You know, usually the
Romans, they left the people who were crucified, they just left them on the cross, not just for a day or two, they just left them there for weeks until the body was decomposing. A cruel reminder to the
people who would walk by every day seeing these crosses, who was in charge and
what would happen to you if you bucked the system. Luke now talks about or writes about the two thieves and their
reaction in verse 39 and 40. "One of the criminal who were hanged there was hurling abuse at Him,
saying, 'Are You not the Christ? Save Yourself and us!' But the other answered
and rebuking Him said, 'Do you not even fear
God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? We indeed are suffering justly, for we are receiving what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong." And he was saying, 'Jesus remember me when You come in Your kingdom!' And He said to him,
'Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise." And so Luke spends time
describing the reaction of the two convicted thieves hung on either side of Jesus. Both Matthew and Mark say that Jesus was being reviled by
both thieves at first. So, at first both of
the thieves were hurling insults at Him. Now we get an idea of what was being said since Luke preserves some of the dialogue. One thief incorporates what
the Jewish leaders said by goading Jesus to save Himself
and both of them as well, if He is the Messiah. You know we often think
that the other thief did nothing special in coming to Christ. He just, you know, at the very last moment of his life, he says hey, look, it's like a big hail Mary pass, look,
you know, if you're the Son of God, remember me. I want to make it in as well. However, think for a
moment what that thief had to, what to go through his mind. He had to first of all
rebuke his fellow criminal and contradict the soldiers
and the Jewish leaders publicly in defending Jesus. And then, you know, abase
himself, submit himself and ask for mercy. I mean, he was a thief,
but somewhere and somehow he knew of the kingdom to come. As a Jew, he probably was
referring to the kingdom at the end of the world and he wanted to be part of that. It's interesting to
note that Jesus promised that he would be in Paradise, in Heaven, with Jesus that day. Interesting point here. That very day, this is not
only a forgiveness of sin, but it's also a prophecy. Normally it took three or four days to die of the crucifixion, but because
of the approaching Sabbath, the Jews had Pilate to
instruct his soldiers to break the legs of the men on the cross to hasten their death. Imagine that for a moment. Here are the religious leaders. They want to be able to
lead the nation in prayer for a high holy day to a loving God and in order to do this, they
recommend or they suggest or they insist that the governor torture these poor men on the cross in order to expedite their deaths. The reason for the broken legs, with broken legs, the crucified could not support themselves. They would sink down,
they couldn't push up and in doing so they
have trouble breathing, so eventually they suffocated. That was the cause of death
when they broke their legs. Now the thief had no way of
knowing that he would die and thus be with Jesus
on that particular day, making Jesus' words both
an absolution of sin as well as a prophecy. He said today you'll be with Me, meaning you're gonna
die today and that was not the expectation or the
history of crucifixions. Now the old argument,
the thief on the cross was saved without being
baptized, so baptism is not necessary for salvation. I have to touch on this
particular notion here. Because this is the excuse
that a lot of people use to refuse to be
baptized or to, you know, relegate baptism as simply a ritual that has no meaning, has no command. The way to answer that is the following. When Jesus healed the paralytic, and also forgave his sins, and I have to go
over to Mark chapter 2 here, Jesus said, "But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins - he
said to the paralytic," you're healed, you know,
take up your mat and walk. Now while among the people, while on earth, Jesus
forgave people's sins by the exercise of His will. I mean he's the Son of God. He has the authority to
say your sins are forgiven, knowing what is to come in the future. And so this is what
He's doing for the thief on the cross as He did for the paralytic. He forgave his sins. Obviously he was on the cross. He was in the process of dying, but He was still alive
and He was still on earth and He still had the
authority to forgive sins to whom, you know, He chose. Now, after His resurrection
and just before His ascent into Heaven,
He left His Apostles with final instructions
concerning salvation now that He would no longer be on earth. You know, while He was on
earth, He could do that. Now He's leaving and
He leaves His Apostles the message of the gospel and so we read familiar passages. Matthew 28, "And Jesus
came up," this is after His resurrection now, "And
Jesus came up and spoke to them saying all authority
has been given to Me in Heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make
disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit." Another passage in Mark
16, "And He said to them go into all the world
and preach the gospel to all creation. He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved
shall be condemned." And then in Acts 2:38,
"Peter said to them, 'Repent and each you be baptized
in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your
sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." So, we see here Jesus
gives to the Apostles the authority to preach the gospel and now forgiveness of sin comes how? It comes by faith in Jesus,
repentance and baptism. It's also fitting that
Jesus' final act of ministry is the result of His
demeanor while suffering on the cross. He was forgiving His enemies. This had a great impact on the thief that was crucified beside him, crucified beside him
and so that touches him and draws him to Jesus and Jesus offers one more soul the opportunity to be saved and to be with Him in Heaven. All right, a little digression there when we're asked about
the thief on the cross. You know, the shorter
answer is while Jesus was on earth He directly
forgave people's sins. He could do that and He did
it on several occasions. After His resurrection and ascension, He left instructions with
His Apostles on how sins were now to be forgiven,
how people now were to come to Him in faith, repentance and baptism. All right, let's move
back to Luke and some of the reactions, let's take a look at the centurion's reaction. Luke 23:44 and 45. It says, "It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness fell over
the whole land until the ninth hour, because
the sun was obscured and the veil of the
temple was torn in two. And Jesus crying out
with a loud voice said, 'Father, into your hands
I commit my spirit.' Having said this, He breathed His last. Now when the centurion
saw what had happened, he began praising God, saying, 'Certainly this man was innocent.'" So Luke only describes two of the signs that occurred at Jesus' death. The first was darkness from noon to 3 p.m. This was a sign of
divine judgment for what has taken place. Execution of the Son of God. He's the light of the world, right? And so when He's executed, what happens? The light for a time,
the light in the world is extinguished and also
the tearing of the veil. Inside the temple itself,
there was a heavy veil that separated the inner
room, the holy of holies, that's where the Ark of the Covenant was, from the outer room, the holy place. Now the Ark of the Covenant was inside the holy of holies where
only the high priest would enter once per
year to offer sacrifice in order to make atonement for his sins and the sins of the people
and the separation was there, you know, the curtain separating the two, the fact that only the
high priest could go in and only once a year. The message there was that
there was a separation between God and the people. Only one person could go before God and he could only go
once per year before God and he could only go after fulfilling certain very important conditions. So the message was to the people, you cannot come. An ordinary man, sinner,
cannot come before God, but when the veil was torn in two, the significance here was
that there would no longer be a restriction to the throne of grace. The way was now open. Everyone now could come before
God to receive forgiveness. In Matthew 27, 50 to 53, Matthew notes that there was also an
earthquake and after His resurrection, many other believers were raised from the dead and appeared to people in Jerusalem. Luke reports that after
witnessing the scene, the centurion in charge of the detail is himself converted. Mark quotes him as saying, 'truly this man was the Son of God.' So when you put, you know,
Luke and Mark together, you get the full story of this centurion. So the Jews were silent
and the Jewish leaders were cruel and mocking,
but the actual crucifixion brought two sinful souls to salvation, the thief who died with
Jesus and the centurion who executed both of them. Luke moves on to talk now
about the Jewish crowds. "And all the crowds who came
together for this spectacle, when they observed what had
happened, began to return beating their breasts."
So the people who had not accepted Him now mourned His passing. Luke notes that they
came out to see a show. He uses the word spectacle. You know, a circus, come on, hey, they're crucifying somebody,
let's get out there, let's take a look, but they were much less enthusiastic after actually
witnessing the cruelty and the brutality of Jesus' execution. You know we have this term nowadays, you see something, you
see an accident, you see something ugly, you can't unsee it. It's in your brain, right. Well, they could not unsee this. There's a difference between, you know, Hollywood in the movies, that
type of violence and death. Whoa, whoa, people got blown up. Did you see that guy,
he got shot 50 times. You know, it's not real, right? But if you're driving by and you happen to see an accident, you
actually see the accident, you actually see a broken
body, someone bleeding, someone perhaps dying. That's a completely different experience. It's shocking. And so they were shocked
by what they had seen. And then there are the
believers and disciples who were there, verse 49, and he says, "And all his acquaintances and the women who accompanied him from Galilee were standing at a distance,
seeing these things." Here, there's no comment as to their feelings
or expressed thoughts, only that they were
witnesses of the death. Note that Luke does not
include the names or references to any of the Apostles. All right, so we move on,
that's the crucifixion. We move on to the burial
of Jesus verses 50 to 56, not gonna read that here. Luke only mentions Joseph of Arimathea, a member of the Sanhedron
who had not agreed to their accusations of Jesus as the one who buried Jesus. And he makes reference
to the women who noted his place of burial with plans to return, you know to properly
take care of the burial, you know, after the Sabbath. Luke may have limited
this information sensing that Theophilus, his reader, a gentile, would probably have very little interest in Jewish burial rights. We move on now to the resurrection itself. That's the passion, that's 10, you know, with the burial is the end of the section that we call the passion. Luke now talks about the resurrection, so let's read his account. "But on the first day of
the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb
bringing the spices which they had prepared. And they
found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when
they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed
about this, behold, two men suddenly stood near
them in dazzling clothing; and as the women were
terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, 'Why do you seek the
living One among the dead? He is not here, but He has risen. Remember how He spoke to you
while He was still in Galilee, saying that the Son of
Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful
men, and be crucified and the third day rise
again' And they remembered His words, and returned
from the tomb and reported all these things to the
eleven and to all the rest. Now they were Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary, the mother of James; also the other women
with them were telling these things to the apostles. But these words appeared
to them as nonsense, and they would not believe them. But Peter got up and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen wrappings only; and he went away to his home marveling
at what had happened." Now, there are many old renditions of Jesus' resurrection, some of them showing
the soldiers frightened or an angel rolling away the stone so that Jesus can get out. You know, I mean, sincere paintings, imaginings of that moment, of that event, but let's take a look
at the actual sequences as they Bible explains them. First, early Sunday
morning, Jesus resurrects and leaves the tomb. No one is aware of this. None of the gospels describe this. They only describe the
things that happened after to prove that it had actually taken place. Next, there was an
earthquake which coincided with the descent of an
angel who rolled away the stone not to let Jesus out. He rolled away the stone to show that it was already empty and the
angel sat on the stone. Next event. The soldiers guarding the tomb fainted. They didn't faint because they saw Jesus. Jesus didn't appear to pagans. They fainted because of the angels. Next even reported, the
women find the tomb empty, which is where Luke picks up his story. He only starts there, he doesn't describe the things that happened before. The angels then speak to the women. Luke adds that there were two angels, confirming that Jesus spoke of this, His resurrection happening, at which point they go tell the Apostles
what they have seen. Where else are they gonna go? Luke also reports that there is disbelief amongst the Apostles, but nevertheless, Peter and John rush to the
tomb to see for themselves. He says Peter goes, but
the other gospel writer says Peter and John together went. So after these events take
place, the gospel writers and Paul later on will record
a number of appearances by the risen Jesus. Mary Magdalene for example
in Mark 26, John 20. Other women He appeared to in Matthew 28. Peter in Luke 24 verse
34, He appears to Peter and two disciples on the road to Emmaus in Mark 16 and Luke 24. Now let's talk a little
bit about this episode where He appears to these two disciples who are on their way to Emmaus. We no longer know where
this city is located, about five to seven miles from Jerusalem. These were two disciples on their way home discussing what they have
recently witnessed in Jerusalem and while they're walking and talking, Jesus joins them but they are prevented from recognizing Him. They tell Jesus that they
were hoping that Jesus would have been the Messiah, but now that He has been
tortured and killed, you know, they're not so sure. They hoped the Messiah
would be like David, you know, a great warrior king. In the Old Testament,
however, Isaiah in Isaiah 53, the prophet Isaiah presented the Messiah not as a warrior king, but as a figure of suffering and servanthood. Actually in our day and
time, many Jews see this as a personification of
their nation as a whole, even to this day. You ask them who's the Messiah. They'll say, well, you know, many of them will say well the Jewish
nation is the Messiah, the suffering that it has
incurred over the years. Of course you ask them other descriptions of the Messiah, that
He was meek and lowly, that doesn't quite fit the
character of the Jewish nation that was always stubborn and rebellious, so the analogy doesn't
work all the way through. Anyways, Jesus explains
to these two disciples that the Messiah would have two profiles. First, He would be the suffering servant. Jesus' suffering was not
a failure or a mistake, but a complete fulfillment of the Messiah's mission
according to the prophets, especially Isaiah. And number two, a glorious Savior. As David defeated Israel's enemies, Jesus with His death
and resurrection defeats mankind's greatest enemy which is death. So as darkness approached,
Jesus went into their home to share a meal and as He
broke and blessed the bread, Luke writes that their eyes were opened and they recognized Him
at which point He vanished from their sight. So Luke goes on to describe their joy and their return to
Jerusalem that very night to tell the Apostles of their experience, so now the Apostles, the
disciples from Emmaus and other disciples are together and Luke completes the appearance of Jesus to the Emmaus disciples
or rather he compares the appearance of Jesus
to the Emmaus disciples to his next appearance
to these same disciples now that they have returned to Jerusalem. So they've walked with Him
a good part of the day, they've eaten with Him,
they recognize who He was, they turn around and run back to Jerusalem to find the Apostles,
they're with the Apostles telling them their
experience and while they're telling them about their experience, Jesus appears to all of these people. So let's just read that. It says, "While they were
telling these things, He Himself stood in their
midst and said to them, 'Peace be to you.' But they were startled and
frightened and thought that they were seeing a spirit. And He said to them,
'Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See My hands and My feet,
that it is I Myself; touch me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as
you see that I have.' And when He had said this,
He showed them His hands and His feet. While they could not believe it because of their joy and
amazement he said to them, 'Have you anything here to eat?' They gave Him a piece of
broiled fish; and He took it and ate it before them." So the Lord confirms the
witness of these two, as well as the witness of the women by now appearing to the Apostles
while they are together and we find out from Mark
and John that only Thomas was not there at the time. And, you know, have you
ever had the opportunity to say, 'I told you so.' Imagine the two disciples who came back and told the Apostles that
they had seen the Lord. What an 'I told you so' they had to say once Jesus appeared among them. Anyways, in verses 44
to 49, Jesus provides for the Apostles the
teaching and the information that He had given to the
two disciples from Emmaus. Luke also provides a
short summary of the great commission, more fully stated
in Matthew 28 and Mark 16. At this appearance, Luke sets up a bridge for the next letter that he's gonna write to his reader, Theophilus called the Acts of the Apostles and he does this by instructing the Apostles
to remain in Jerusalem until they receive power from on high. So there's the... Jesus,
he reports, Luke reports that Jesus says to the
Apostles, stay in Jerusalem. The natural thing for them to want to do after His ascension would be
to go back home to Galilee, but Jesus says no, stay in Jerusalem until you receive power. And so in the way Luke
writes this, he establishes, you know, the setting for his next book or his next letter, which is called the Acts of the Apostles. And so he doesn't explain
any further and he leaves his reader anxious to
see what this might mean. There are other appearances by Jesus, but not recorded by Luke and these are the appearance to Thomas,
John records that, The appearance to the Apostles when they were together in Galilee,
Matthew 28 and Mark 16, the Apostles at the Sea
of Galilee, you know when they went out to
fish, John chapter 21 and then non-gospel appearances. Paul talks about Jesus
appearing to 500 disciples that were together at one time, to His earthly brother
James and, of course, to Saul or Paul after His ascension. And then there's the story of the Apostles at Jesus' ascension. In other words, He appeared
to them just before He ascended into Heaven. I want to read that short verse. It says, "And He led them
out as far as Bethany," see, once again, he
didn't have to say that. But if somebody says to you where did it happen, the ascension? Well, it happened near
the town of Bethany. We know where Bethany is. Always situating the
spiritual and the miraculous and grounding it in history and geography. "And He led them out as far as Bethany, and He lifted up His
hands and blessed them. And while He was blessing
them, He parted from them and was carried up into heaven. And they, after worshiping
Him, returned to Jerusalem with great joy and were continually in the temple praising God." So Luke, as he has done
throughout his gospel, as I said before, mentions the place of the ascension, Bethany,
not far from Jerusalem. Their natural inclination
when the Lord was gone, as I mentioned, was to return
home to family and friends, but Jesus commands them
actually to stay in Jerusalem. Luke notes that after Jesus ascends, they return to Jerusalem
where He previously instructed them to remain until they were empowered by the Holy Spirit to carry out their great commission
of preaching the gospel to every tribe and every tongue. So in this way, Luke neatly
closes out his account of Jesus' life and death and resurrection and His ascension and
he also sets the stage for the story of how the Apostles, (notably Peter and Paul) though the power of the Holy Spirit will
establish the church that 2000 years later we
are a part of to this day. So if you're gonna, you
know, jump in with us for the next lessons, the
next series of lessons which will cover the book of Acts, then I encourage you to begin
reading the book of Acts. Your reading assignment
Acts 1:1 to Acts 2:47. Jam packed with a lot of information. We have a lot, we're gonna
have information overload for our next lesson, so I hope that you'll be with us for that. Well, thank you for your attention. That's the end of our lesson today. The end of our teaching
series on the book of Luke, next week we begin the book of Acts. Thank you very much, God bless you.
