Acts 1:1-11 | Pre-Flight Instructions

How does the beginning of the book of Acts set the trajectory for the growth of the early church, and what does it reveal about God’s plan for our lives?

In this sermon on Acts 1:1–11, Lead Pastor Neil McClendon shares "pre-flight instructions" for journeying through the book of Acts. Pastor Neil highlights the essential balance between Jesus’ doing and teaching, the historically verifiable reality of the resurrection, and the inauguration of God’s kingdom. Discover how God places His "yes" over broken, imperfect lives to tell His story, and find lasting hope in the promise of Christ’s return.

In this episode, we cover:

• The Balance of Life and Ministry: Why healthy faith requires both learning truth and putting it into action.
• The Verifiable Resurrection: How the resurrection demonstrates Christ's victory over death and validates His divine authority.
• Kingdom Expectations vs. Power: Understanding why Jesus prioritizes spiritual power for His witnesses over political positions.
• Telling God's Story Through People: How God chooses flawed individuals—like Peter, James, and Thomas—to advance His gospel to the ends of the earth.

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Transcript

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This podcast is brought to you by Grand Parkway Baptist Church, helping people to know, enjoy, and glorify God. For more information about Grand Parkway, visit GrandProquay.org.

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Amen. Amen. Let's pray together, church. You clap for that. Amen. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, thank you. You have the last word. The Bible tells us you had the first word, but you also have the last word. Now, in the meantime, people are going to speak words over us that we don't like because they don't fit. They don't describe us. They're going to talk about us behind our back. They're going to stab us in our back. They're going to refer to us on social media. And they know that we know that it's us they're talking about, but they're going to speak words over us. But we just say to all that, you have the last word. You get the last word, God. You had the first word, you spoke the world into existence in Genesis, and you're going to have the last word. Now we get to live between those two realities in the meantime. So, Holy Spirit, say something today that has our name on it, Lord. Speak to us from your word and by your spirit, we pray in Jesus' name. And everyone said, Amen. Amen. You can have a seat. Welcome to Grand Parkway. If you're a guest today, you're here on a good day. Today we're kicking off preaching through the book of Acts. And so if you've got a Bible, take it and open up to Acts chapter one. Acts is right after the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and the book of Acts. If you don't have a Bible, don't sweat it. Everything I say will come up on the screen up here. Today's the first day of what we call the flip. We used to have our Bible studies and student ministry and the bridge ministry at nine o'clock, and then they would be in this service. We flipped them because we want to balance out our services because used to, this service was packed to the brim. Remember that? Well, now we've created some space for you to invite and bring your friends. Amen? Get busy, people, okay? Because that first service was full this morning, all right? Uh it's a great problem to have, all right? We'll welcome that. And so I want to talk to you this morning about pre-flight instructions. Pre-flight instructions from the book of Acts. There's things that you don't listen to, like if you've ever flown on a plane, you get on the plane, all you're you all you're trying to do is get a good seat, but Southwest, you don't want a middle seat, you want an aisle or the window, so you get there, you get on. The five tenants does their little thing with the seatbelt. They say white lights lead to red lights and blah, blah, blah. You don't really think about that, at least I didn't uh at all. I used to travel, I was on the road 195 days a year, preaching and speaking all over the country, until I got on a southwest flight here at Houston Hobby, headed for Little Rock, Arkansas. And four hours into the flight, we still were not there. We got caught between two thunder cells and was pushing us up off the northeast, and the turbulence was so bad. They had they had drink service. I had a Diet Coke with 48 cubes of ice, two drops of Diet Coke, and so on. I sipped those, and I'm sitting there crunching on my ice. All of a sudden, the plane fell so far, so fast, that I see my cup hit the ceiling. And just as a reflex, I just reached up and grabbed that little thing and said, Let me just see what happens here. Where does the oxygen mass come from? And where is the lifeboat? Okay, that's all I wanted to know. I'd never, I was reaching under the seat, looking for the life vest. I was gonna put that bad boy on. They're like, we're almost to the east coast. We may hit water, okay? And so the lady next to me, she had a hold of my pants on the inside of my thigh. And I just took her hand, I said, ma'am, I'm married, okay? Stop. And all of a sudden, the pre-flight instructions took on a whole new meaning when I just kind of thought, now, what do you mean, pre-flight instructions, as it relates to this? Because I'm gonna lay down some things you're gonna see in the book of Acts as we kind of journey through this, okay? Now, you may be thinking, Oh, dude, you're gonna preach through an entire book of the Bible. This is like a religious lecture. No, it's like an invitation. And on every page, God's gonna invite you, you're gonna see incredible things. You're gonna see people get healed, you're gonna see the miraculous, you're gonna see people die, people get raised back to life, you're gonna see all kinds of stuff. You're gonna see people get in a fight. All the rednecks are what page is that on? Uh yeah, you're gonna see all of that, okay? So let me just give you some introductory thoughts on Acts. These are some themes, some things that you see through the book of Acts. This is kind of sets the stage. First of all, the focus moves from Peter to Paul as the spokesman. Uh Peter's been doing the bulk of the talking. Now, this guy named Paul, and we'll get to in chapter nine, who's not a very good person, and God changes his heart. So if you're not a very good person today, you're in a great place because God has the power to change you into who the Bible says you can be. And so here's the second thing. Up to this point, Christianity has been moving to Jerusalem, the religious center, the Mecca, the hub of religious activity. Jesus set his face like flint to get to Jerusalem. Now that he's at Jerusalem, all of a sudden the gospel of Christianity begins to spread to all these other places, to the geopolitical centers of the world at the time, namely, and it ends up ultimately in a place called Rome. Thirdly, uh, Jesus came to the Jews and they did not receive him. He came to his own, they received him not. And now the gospel pivots to the Gentiles. You may be thinking, okay, what in the world? Uh, Jews were religious people by birth. They're like, hey, we're God's chosen, frozen people. Too bad for you. You're not a Jew. Gentiles are people that weren't religious by nature. Like I am a Gentile. I did not grow up in a church-going family. Okay. So if you grow up in a church, I mean a family that didn't go to church, you may be thinking, hey, I don't really know all the stories. I don't know all this stuff. Like there's a lady in our church that said, I got the Jesus storybook Bible for my daughter, and I read it for me because I don't know the stories. I said, That's great. Okay. So if you're here, the book of Acts says it this way. It says the promise is for you, religious people, and for all those who are far off. So if you're far off today, I don't want you to check out. I want you to know that the book of Acts has something to say to you as well. Here's the fourth thing we'll see that miracles establish a platform for the gospel. Miracles, God heals somebody and then they preach the gospel. We'll get to this in just a minute. But if you're not careful, you'll just try to skim through the Bible and pick out the sensational parts and say, I want that to happen today. Look at me. This is what we don't tell you enough. A lot of Christianity is learning to be bored and not sinning. Aren't you glad you shaved your legs for me to tell you that? Now, am I saying it's boring? Absolutely not. Not at all. I'm saying that not every day is a journal entry. Like when I first started going to church, we used to sing out these books called hymnals. Remember those? And we used to sing a hymn that said, Every day with Jesus is sweeter than the day before. And I was a Christian about 10 days and I thought, this is not a true statement. Yes, here's the last thing you'll see in the book of Acts that God is intentional in everything he does. God is intentional in everything he does. At one point, this guy named Paul is going to a city and he says, it's written in the Bible, I don't know why I'm going here. I just know God wants me to go here. And so you're going to understand that sometimes God's going to lead you to do some things and you don't understand it until you get there. Okay? And so I want to read the first 11 verses of Acts chapter 1, and I'm just going to lay down some pre-flight instructions because this is kind of the birth of the church or the spread of Christianity, is recorded in the book of Acts. This is what the Bible says. In the first book on Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach until the day when he was taken up, after he had been given commands to the Holy Spirit, to the apostles whom he had chosen. He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. And while staying with them, he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which he has said, You heard from me, for John baptized with water, but you'll be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. So when they had come together, they asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? He said to them, It's not for you to know the times or the seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you'll be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. And when he had said those things, as they were looking on him, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into the heavens as he went, behold, two men stood by him, by them in white robes, and said, Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven. Now you may be thinking, why are you calling this pre-flight instructions? Because we're going to set down some some kind of grounding realities that you're going to see all through the book of Acts. There's four or five I want to point to in these verses I just read. And the first one is this Jesus' life and ministry was balanced. His life and ministry was balanced. He says right there in verse one, he says, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and to teach. To do and to teach. I have written all that Jesus began to do and teach. And so you see this balance. You say, Why is that a big deal? Because if you focus just on what Jesus did, it leads to sensationalism, which eventually erodes into cynicism. Because you've got to have this intense experience and you're breaking through to the next level and discovering your new destiny or whatever. And eventually you're just like, ah, I'm just overstimulating. I don't think I can take anymore. However, if you focus just on what he taught, it leads to intellectualism, and this eventually erodes into pride. Do you know anybody that knows a lot about the Bible, but they're not very enjoyable to have lunch with? Some of you are looking around like, is he in here right now? Yes. You know what I mean? People know a lot about the Bible, but you're like, dude, I don't want to spend a half a day bay fishing with that guy. I would throw him overboard. No. See, so here's the balance. All that Jesus began to do and teach. Learning is for living. What you learn is to be put into practice in your life. Like right now, we have a thing going on called March gladness. Uh, don't tell the NCAA, but March gladness is for the whole month of March. We just want to be, we we want to the night Psalm 92.4 says, Of the Lord, says to the Lord, oh Lord, your deeds, your works have made me glad. We want to engage in things that make other people glad. We want, when it comes to giving, not just to our church, but to the culture and people around us. Like this past week, I gave away six tickets to the Lord Dagle concert at the rodeo. I had two, and I and I gave them to a lady. I I thought it was the mom, it was the daughter. I sent an email, and the daughter, I just saw the last name. I was like, Oh, yeah, I know them. And then I was like, Oh, this is their daughter. So I texted the dad and said, I think I just obligated you to go to the rodeo tomorrow night. He said, It wasn't me. I got baseball with my son. That's on my wife. And so I saw them and she's like, Yeah, I've got multiple kids. Thanks. And so I was like, Well, enjoy, pick one. Life's not fair, good lesson to teach your kids. I walk away and another guy walks up to me. He doesn't know it all. He walked up to me and goes, Hey, I got four club level seats to blow in Dagle tomorrow night. Could you get could you use those? I said, I, yeah, well, yeah, okay. Halt. He walks away. I walked back over and said, Hey, can you give me back those two? Because earlier I said to another lady while they're eating their midweek meal over there, I was like, Hey, I said, You guys like rodeo? Because I gave away four Parker McCullum tickets as well. Y'all are like, You are a bad man. No, you should read email. That's why. Uh, and and so people are like, Well, it just makes me glad. I I could go, but I why not when somebody else could go? And I said, You like Parker McCullum? I saw you, you didn't get the tickets. She goes, I yeah, I like him. I said, Well, I had two Lauren Dagle, I just gave away. She goes, Oh my gosh. So I got the four, took it back to the lady, and said, Here, take all your kids or your friends. Texted this lady's husband because I'm not gonna text some woman at nine o'clock at night. So I texted her husband and said, Does your wife still want to go? I got those two tickets back. So two go to her, four go to her. The two two of the girls that got to go walked up to me this morning with a thank you note. They said, Oh my gosh, it was my first concert. It was incredible. Thank you. Why'd you do that? I said, Because it made me glad. No, when you're 15, that's not a word you have a frame of reference for. They're just like, okay. That's kind of a weird old man word. And I was thinking in my mind, you little punks have no idea. You want to be happy, glad. See, why? Because we want to practice what what what Jesus did and what he taught. When you learn things, you need to live the things that you learn. Does that make sense? Say amen. You see, what you see in the life of Jesus, his life and ministry was balanced. Here's the second thing you see: the resurrection of Jesus was a historically verifiable reality. Oh, that's a big thick sentence. Stay with me. The resurrection of Jesus was a historically verifiable reality. We live in a culture, they're like a chicken, it just kind of pecks away at some of the basic uh fundamental doctrines of Christianity because it does not want them to be true. They can't prove that they're not true, they just want them to not be true because if they're true, it means something for them. You say, What do you mean? The resurrection does four things. Number one, it demonstrates Jesus' victory over death, it demonstrates his victory over death. That's why the Bible says, Oh, death, where's your sting? Where's your sting? What what we we don't have to fear death anymore because there's life after death. Here's the second thing it does it proves that Jesus was divine. It proves divine means that he was the son of God. Like the Roman centurion, the soldier at the cross, when the cloud, when the sky turns black, the sun turns black, the Roman soldier is like, surely this was the Son of God. Translation, uh oh. We done, we done, we done screwed this up here. Now, what do you mean? Here's a rhythm that you'll see all through the book of Acts. I'll point to it as we continue in the weeks to come. Here's this rhythm, it's called the rhythm of Acts. It sounds like this. They say that, hey, to the people, hey, Jesus was the son of God, you guys killed him, we are witnesses, y'all are in trouble. Yes. Hear it again because you'll see it every time they preach. They just started with what people most tangibly fail. Hey, by the way, the Jew that you guys killed the other day, that was the son of God. You, you can he was the son of God, you killed him, we are witnesses, y'all have a problem. And then they would preach the gospel, and people were so cut to the quick that they were like, What must we do to be saved? Wait till the last time someone asked you that question. It sounds weird to be even saying that loud, doesn't it? We don't hear that question because it's kind of like, uh, why? Because we don't preach the gospel, we preach church. Inviting people to church is great, but don't stop short of that because you and I have to be people that contain and carry the gospel with us. Here's the third thing the resurrection does it validates the teaching of Jesus. He rises from the dead as proof of everything that he said. Because he would say to his disciples, he said, Hey, the Son of Man must go to Jerusalem. I'm gonna suffer at the hands of religious people, I'm gonna die, and in three days I'll rise again. And they still didn't get it. But once he right once he uh rises from the dead, once the resurrection happens, all of a sudden everything Jesus said and did is cast in a whole new light. Here's the last thing the resurrection does it testifies that Jesus' atoning work was accepted by God as sufficient. Now you may be thinking, oh bro, that's another big sentence. Yes. Let me say it again. The resurrection, it's it's it's a testimony that Jesus' death on the cross, look at me, was enough for your sin. It's like the receipt that God accepted payment. Okay? It's it's it's paid in full. Now you may be thinking, hey, I'm not very religious. Matter of fact, I don't even believe in Jesus. I think he was a good moral uh teacher, an example, maybe even a prophet. Okay, you don't have many problems, but here's three you have. You have to come up with a plan for your life that meets the requirements of the law, that atones for your sin, that pays for your sin, and makes you holy so you can be in the presence of a holy God forever in a place called heaven. Beyond that, you don't have any problems. Let me say it again. If you don't believe, one thing will never happen at this church. If you come to this church, and I hope you do, I hope you'll strap in and come on this journey to act, because it is a hilarious book of the Bible that is very uh formative and accessible. It's not eggheaded. They bring it right down where people live. Okay? At one point, this guy named Paul's walking around the city, sees all these statues, and they had one that says, uh, to an unknown God. They were so religious, they were superstitious. They're like, hey, just in case there's a God out there that we don't know him, we built a little statue to that guy. And Paul comes along and he's like, Hey, you see this? This God that you don't know, you want me to tell you what he's like? And they're like, Yeah, absolutely. And they're like the Harvard, they're at this place called the Arophagus where all the smart people get together uh and just talk. And he smokes these fools. It is incredible. And they you know what they say when he's done? Two things you're bringing some strange ideas to our ears, and then the next sentence they say, we want to hear you more. Look at me. If you learn the rhythm of the book of Acts, you'll be able to talk about God in a way that people will want to hear you more. Does that make sense? Say amen. You see, this is what the resurrection does, okay? And here's the third thing you see in the text. Jesus came to inaugurate the kingdom of God. Jesus came to inaugurate the kingdom of God. Let me read in verse three. He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during 40 days and speaking about the kingdom of God. Look at that. He says he appeared to them during 40 days. If you had 40 days with people and you knew, hey, I'm gonna be here for 40 days, wouldn't you talk about the one thing you most wanted them to remember? And for Jesus, it is it is the kingdom of God. He beats this drum over and over. And while staying with them, verse 4, uh, he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which he said, You've heard from me, for John baptized with water, but you'll be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. Look at this response, verse six. So when they had come together, they asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? Now that's a subtle, innocent sounding sentence for those knuckleheads to say, Hey Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? You know what they're really saying? Hey, the Democrats have had the house and the Senate in the White House for far too long. We're gonna buy Ron DeSantis' book and we're gonna take back. They want the kingdom to be restored to them. We want to be in charge. I want to be the Secretary of State, he wants to be the Secretary of Defense, he wants to be the Vice President. We want positions of power, we want positions, and God wants them to have power. When I say that Jesus came to inaugurate the kingdom of God, He He came not just to inaugurate, but establish this as foremost in people's thinking. It has to be the thing you think most about. But they're like, hey, this just means we get to be have positions of power and authority because we can set things right, and Jesus is like, no, I want you to be men and women of power. I don't want you to have a position. So you got to ask yourself, do you want to be somebody in the religious subculture with your friends? Or do you want to be a man or woman of power? Because Jesus says, you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. Now I say Jesus came to inaugurate the kingdom. Here's the thing that these people, uh, it happens all through the Bible. They thought about the kingdom in too small a terms. The way they thought about the kingdom was, we're gonna get the power back and we're gonna get to run the government. And Jesus is like, oh, that is not at all what I'm talking about, all right? Now, the power of this got got got well, I was reminded of this a couple weeks ago. My wife and I, and our oldest daughter flew in, she flew in from Dallas, we flew from here to up to Birmingham to hang out with our youngest daughter who's a student as a sophomore at Stanford University. And so we fly in, we get a hotel, we eat, and there's a young man from our church that also, he's a freshman there. His name's Aiden Reyes. So we like, hey Aiden, we're in town. You want to go to dinner? We'll go get ice cream. He said, Absolutely, pick me up. So we take him to dinner, we go get ice cream. If you're ever in Birmingham, there's a there's a it's a creamery. It's not an ice cream shop called the Edgewood Creamery. They have this chocolate peanut butter ice cream that is just like to die for, okay? So we're standing in line. I'm at the back of the line because I'm paying and they're all ordering, and then there's a man and woman's headed about right there, and the dude's kind of staring at me. Now, have you ever felt somebody staring at you and you try to stare back and figure out they're staring at you? Without them knowing you're staring at them? So I'm like, and he's just like this. I mean, I'm right there, he's just doing this. He's looking at his wife, and I'm like, uh, bro, you got a man across? What's going on here? Uh and finally he goes, Is your name Neil McClendon? I said, McClendon, yeah. And he went, Oh my gosh, too small. I was in the seventh grade, changed my life. And I'm like, excuse me? He goes, Germantown Baptist Church. I said, Yeah, yeah, Chris Lovell was your youth pastor. You did my camp. And when I was in the seventh grade one night, you preached a sermon. I said, Yeah, from Isaiah 49, where God says to Israel, which all through the Bible, people's idea and their vision of what they want and God's vision, it's not that there's as bad, it's just not big enough. He said, Dude, that changed my brother and I wore that CD. Oh my gosh, what are you doing? I said, Pastor of Church in Sugarland, I don't travel anymore. He said, Oh my gosh. Now my wife is standing here, and this is all cute and everything, until he goes, Hey, bro, can I take a picture with you? And my wife is just like, I've had enough of that. And she walks off to get her ice cream. And so we took a picture. His wife said, Here, I'll take the picture. And we sat down, and my wife's like, Really? And I said, Hey, the guy's in his 30s now. When he was in the seventh grade, he said, Dude, you said to me, I said, remember the first point of the talk? He goes, I don't. I said, The first point was not because it's not like God goes around and go, Oh, too small, you're a bad person. I said, No, God is not a God of incrimination, he's a God of invitation. He's not mocking the smallness of what you call life, he's inviting you and I into the bigness of what he calls life. He goes, Yes, yes, that was it. Oh my gosh, let's take a picture. And I hear my wife walking off going, okay, let's sit down. This could be a while. Same thing happens right here. They talk about the kingdom. Our Jesus talks about the kingdom and they think about themselves. They think about, oh, we get positions. And Jesus says, No, you get power. Here's the fourth thing kind of the pre flight instructions that I want us to get in the marrow of our bones as we dive into Acts. The fourth thing is this that God tells his story through people. I'm gonna put a verse up here. Verse 8. It's very common if you grew up in church. If you didn't, that's okay. I want you to look at verse 8 and tell me, pick a word that you think, man, that word stands out to me. It says this, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you'll be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all of Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. Somebody, audience participation, just just say, speak out loud a word that you're like, oh, my eyes drawn to that word. Go. Power. Yes, yes. Good Baptists love power. What? And close but not there. Holy Spirit, witness. Oh, there we go. We like power, Holy Spirit, witness. We like Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, because those are pretty stamps in our passport. You're all wrong. Welcome to church. Say it again. It's the little look at me. When you read the Bible, don't let your eye be drawn to the same words you've always read. Holy Spirit, great word. Power, great word. Okay. Witnesses, great word. The word you, but you will receive power. You say, what do you mean? Let me tell you three things that are not in your outline, not in the notes, okay? We are terrified of the parts of us that we are disappointed with. Everyone of you in this room has parts of your life or yourself that you're pretty disappointed with. And you are terrified. If God were to walk up to you today, you'd be like, oh, uh, let's not talk about that thing right there. It's the you. He said, What do you mean? Who's the you? Skip down. We stopped reading verse 11. Look at verse 13. And when they had entered, and when they had entered, they went up to the upper room where they were staying. Peter and Jay and John and James and Andrew and Philip and Thomas and Bartholomew and Matthew and James and the son of Alphaeus and Simon the zealot and Judas, the son of James. Look at verse 14. It doesn't stop there. All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer together with the women. And Mary, the mother of Jesus and his brothers. Look at me, ladies. God has a plan for your life besides making potato salad and babies, okay? And people always ask, Well, you have women on, yeah, well, yeah, we don't have a woman elder. No woman's gonna get up and preach on Sunday. Stop putting your religious fears on us and making us responsible for them. We believe that women have a priesthood, women have a gift, and we want them to use them. We want you to use yours in this church. Because it wasn't just a group of men. These women were there together with the women. Now, when he says, and you, but you will receive power when we think about, oh, somebody us receiving something, we think in terms of whether we deserve it or not. That's not the issue. Because, see, here's the second thing that's not in the outline. You should write down God puts a yes on us that disqualifies the no we have come to believe. God puts a yes on you, and it ought to supplant and and and suppress and force out the no that you've come to believe. Some of you got to know early on in your family, and it's just stayed on you your entire life. You're like, I don't want to get out over my skis and get too bigheaded because I know this. But this God who knows everything, he tells his story through people. Let me point to three three people on the list. First of all, there's Peter. Peter swore when he denied Jesus. I mean, he's what he's the guy that says, oh Jesus, these people, they may, they may, uh, they may crawfish and back up on you, but not me, God. I mean, I'll die for you. And Jesus is like, Amen. Before the rooster crows, you'll deny me three times. No, I won't. Yes, he did. This is the Peter that almost got Jesus killed in a bar fight. They came to arrest Jesus in the garden. Peter, oh, Peter's like John Moran. He got his gun out in the club waving it around on Instagram. Nobody, nobody. John Moran is probably the most dynamic and best player in the NBA. He's better than old bald old man LeBron James, okay? So stop rolling that dinosaur out to me, Leo. Anyway. Leo had to have an ongoing violence like LeBron sprained his ankle. He got to take the rest of the year off. Because he he's got his AARP card like me. You know, he gets a discount. I saw him in Light Louis the other day at 430, getting a super senior citizen discount. Leo doesn't like that, by the way. It's good for him. No, no, Peter is the guy that comes to arrest Jesus. He pulls out a sword and cuts a guy's ear off. And Jesus picks it up and pushes the blows the grass off, puts it back. Three-second rule, puts it back on. That actually happened. The guy's name was Malchius. Read your Bible, it's in there. So when he says, you, but you shall receive power, he's talking about Peter. So if you're here and you're quick to speak, but not slow to and slow to listen, you got it, you got it backwards? God says, I trust you to represent me to the world around you. Then there's James. James was the half-brother of Jesus. He didn't believe in, he didn't believe his brother was the son of God until after the resurrection. How'd you like to be that wrong? You ever get it wrong about somebody and you know you're wrong, and you're like, I'm not gonna admit that I'm wrong. I'm just gonna keep on acting like, oh no, un me. I mean his own brother. It's like, hey bro, where's the love? Yeah, Messiah, son of God, my eye, dude. I knew he'd get in the seventh grade. Yeah. And then here's the last word I point to a guy named Thomas. Thomas is on the list. When Jesus says in verse 8, oh, by the way, uh, you shall receive, but you will receive power. You is includes God named Thomas, he's also known as doubting Thomas. Why? Because, you see, if you're a cynic or you're scientific or you're like, hey man, I I I'm in mensah, I don't believe in all this stuff. I don't, I don't believe in the sky fairy. Okay. God wants to tell his story through you because other scientific people who have a hard time believing will listen to you and they wouldn't listen to me. See, the you includes this guy named Thomas, who got the name doubting Thomas because he's the one that said, after the some of the disciples saw Jesus after he was resurrected from the dead, Thomas said, He's eating a sandwich and I ain't gonna believe unless I see his side and I touch his wounds myself. And then a few days later, Jesus walks through a door, appears in a room to Thomas, and he puts the sandwich down and he's like, Hey, let me see your hand. Touch my side. It's worse than an episode of Dr. Dr. Pimple Popper. He's just like, right here, dude. Right here is where they stabbed me and they cut me open right here. Touch it. And Thomas Thomas's confession was, My Lord and my God. Look at me. God's not afraid of your doubt if you're not afraid of his answer. You can't go around and talk, I doubt this, and I got this hope, I got blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. He's not afraid of your questions. You just can't be afraid of his answer. God tells his story through people. See, here's the thing. Here's a third thing that's not written down. You should write down God sees who you are and who you're going to be. He sees who you are and who you're going to be. See, our problem, we just see who we are, and we're like, who am I kidding? Man, listen, if they didn't have mints out here, somebody could smell on my breath what I did at the rodeo last night. That's what some of you are thinking. You're just seeing who you are. God sees who you can be. Ask yourself this question this morning. Who is the first person who saw who you could be? Because if you'll think back, they they talked to you and about you in a different way. Like for me, it was Mrs. Moore, my business law teacher, and when I was in the ninth grade. I was in the ninth grade. Let me let me out myself here in my age, in 1978. Yes. Yes. And Mrs. Moore taught business law. I just thought this sounds fascinating because I'm going to be a global entrepreneur one day. And we took business law. I got into it. I loved it. We took our first test. I made 100. She gave me a 99. I raised my hand. Are there any questions about the test? I said, yes, ma'am. I didn't get any, I got a hundred, you gave me a 99. And out of her mouth, this is a school teacher. Okay? A school teacher. She said, I said, Miss Mark, I got I got 100. You gave me a 99. She goes, You foolish boy, Neil McClendon, you shut your filthy mouth, boy. There wasn't but one perfect person ever lived, and he died on the cross. Glory to his name. What parallel universe did we just enter into? I was like, what? What did you say? She said, Boy, your foolish mouth is open again. Boy, you are not perfect. She said, You will never get a perfect score in my classroom. I don't care how good you do. And so it was on like Donkey Kong from then on. Every time we had a test, I would study for it. My friends go, You got this? I got this. We get the test back. I'd raise my hand. She said, Mr. McClendon, you better take your hand. She said one time, teachers, think about this. She said to me out loud in front of 32 other people, Boy, you take your hand down. I'm gonna break your arm off and beat you with the bloody end. I didn't sue her. I'm not a little snowflake. Oh, you hurt me. That's a microaggression. I think that might be macro. Toughen up, Sea Biscuit. And I said, Mm-hmm. So I switched my hand. She would call everybody else, and she'd say, Neil McClendon, you better not ask me that same question. I said, right here, got a hundred. You gave me a 99, and she did it every time. Boy, there wasn't but one perfect person ever lived, and he died on the cross. Glory to his name. Now, by the way, I smoked pot with half the youth group from the first Baptist church in my town. I finally met somebody that talked about Jesus in an intimate way. And it was like a clown on fire. And on my report card, she gave me a 99. And I said, Miss Moore, I shut your foolish mouth. Now, my senior year, fast forward. I'm not a Christian. My senior year, I'm still not a Christian. And my counselor said, You need an elective. I said, I'll take type. She said, What about type? I said, Who teaches it? She said, Mrs. Moore, I'll take it. I got so good at typing, I was selected to go to UIL in a typing competition. Now, I graduated, not a Christian. I became a Christian about a month after I graduated. I went back to my high school to get my transcript because I thought, I'm never gonna need that thing. I ain't never going to college. My high school principal threw it on the ground and said, I usually charge $2. You can have yours for free. You ain't gonna amount to nothing. See, some people put a no on you. But God has the last word. He said, I picked it up, I said, Hey, can I go say hi to Mrs. Moore? And he said, Yeah, you go up there and you better not talk to any other teacher. I'll wear you out. Because this may shock some of you students. We didn't have in-school suspension where you're gonna sit in a room and drink apple juice and have fruit snacks and write a paragraph about your inner child. No, no. I had a football coach that had a red paddle, had LBS on it. He held up the first day of school and said, This is my loose booty striker. You get loose in the booty and I will strike you. He'd be in prison right now. And I was just like, Okay, I think I know who's in charge of this classroom. So I'm a Christian now. I get my transcripts up off the floor, I walk up there. Now look at me. Miss Moore has no idea what just happened. She just walked with God. She came walking over to the door, tears sprawling down her face, and she said, You know, ain't no blessing for you down here. You stop coming down and let that man curse you. All he can do is curse you. He don't he can't acknowledge what God's done in you because he has to acknowledge what God has not done in him. Now you get up out of here and stop coming down and let these people curse you. I've never been to anybody talk like that. She's crying, I'm crying, and I said, And she said, Yeah, God got his hand on you, boy. Don't you forget that. Don't you ever come back here? All these people know is who you used to be. They can't even testify to who you are. But I'm here to testify. I'm like, ooh, whatever that is. And I said, Yes, ma'am. And she said, Come and give me a hug. Hugged her, walk out. Something got broke off me that day. I didn't have to go back to the school to prove to them I wasn't who they told me I was all that time. Why am I telling you that? Because God tells his story through people. And God told a chapter of his story to me through a teacher named Miss Moore. So if you work in education or administration, you're walking on the most fertile mission field that exists in the world today. Because you got a lot of angry kids that come to school with a story behind their face. And you get to you get to tell part of God's story. Here's the last thing the text says the ministry of Jesus ends with a reminder. Are you still with me? Say amen. The ministry of Jesus ends with a reminder. Look at the last part, verse 9. And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into the heavens as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes and said, Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus who is taken up from you into heaven will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven. Too often, when I say the ministry of Jesus ends with a reminder, too often we stop short in the telling of the story of Jesus. We end at the cross or the resurrection because it's Easter and you get a new dress and a hat and all that stuff is great, but you never quite finish the story. And by finishing the story, we're reminded of how the story ultimately finishes. Jesus leaving the earth and being taken up into heaven is called the ascension. And the ascension does two things. Number one, it leaves no doubt about what happened. No doubt. Here's the other thing the ascension leaves no doubt about what will happen. He says, Hey, he's gonna come just like you saw him go in the clouds. Now, probably the past month, we've had like a lot of funerals in our church, a lot of deaths in our church. Some of them you saw coming, some we didn't see coming at all. There was one week we had three. I was past Clyde, I worship Pastor in Holland, like you okay? And he's like, Man, another funeral. I said, Yeah. You can get sad if you're not careful. You'll just be like, Man, is this what's going on? And so somebody said, How are you holding up? I said, I have to gospel myself. I have to remind myself of uh parts of the gospel, the good news of Christianity that I can forget when it gets sad. And so here's one of the things they said, what do you mean? I said, I read from First Thessalonians chapter four. I close this morning of reading this, starting in verse 13. Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind who have no hope. For we believe that Jesus died and he rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord's word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven with a loud command and with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. And after that, we who are still alive and left will be caught up together with him in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore, encourage one another with these words. It's that last sentence that ought to kind of buckle your knees, like what? Therefore, encourage one another with these words. I read that to somebody in the midst of all these funerals, and they were like, What? How do you find encouragement? I said, I here's where I find encouragement. About three sentences in, it says, For we believe that Jesus died and rose again. Hear this part. And so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. When it says fallen, those who've died in Christ, when Christ comes again, he was taken up in the clouds, he's gonna come back again the second time to claim what is his. And everybody, every Christian that's died in Christ is gonna come with him. You see a picture of it in Revelation chapter 19. It says that Jesus comes riding a white horse, and behind him are the armies of heaven dressed in white. Which means I buried Susan Hayes last week. And she's gonna come riding. And Bailey Cooper's gonna come riding. And anybody that you know that has died in Christ is gonna come riding. And they're not gonna look like they looked when you knew them. Susan's not gonna have to have dialysis anymore. Last time I visit her in the hospital, I said, How you holding up, girl? She said, I'm so sick and tired of dialysis and dialysis treatment. And she looked at me and she said, I'm ready. And if it's my time, I am ready. And so, what how do you encourage one another with these words? Look at me, we'll be done. Next time I see Susan Hayes, she's not gonna be hooked up to a dialysis machine. That's why. See, the ministry of Jesus ends with a reminder. This is the pre-flight instructions for the book of Acts. Just want you to know what's to come. It's accessible, it's available. It's not for religious people only, it's for people that are like, dude, I'm here because my wife and I kind of got sideways, and she said, We need to find a church, and she got online, and here I am. I like the free coffee, and I tolerate you. Keep tolerating, keep enjoying the coffee, keep tolerating. Look at me. Here's why. Because God speaks a language you understand, and God's goodness far exceeds your badness because He's gonna put a yes on you that is gonna suppress and send away all the no's you've collected in your life. Let's pray together. If you're a guest, just relax. We like to teach the Bible and give you some soul space to think about it. So I'll voice a prayer, and Brett will come. He may just play something and give you some time to think. Christianity is not just about maintaining an emotion, it's about engaging your mind. So engage your mind now. These questions that come up on the screen. Father, thanks for the gospel. Thanks that it's true, it's holistic, and it's complete. It's not just this life, but it's also the life to come. And so anybody that we've lost that was a believer will see them again, and they'll have their glorified body. And so that's why the Bible says we don't grieve as those who have no hope. Because we have hope because of the resurrection. You're the first fruit from among the dead, and the law of the first fruits, Jesus, is that there's gonna be more fruit. And so, Lord, as we journey into this book, just continue to speak a language we understand and say things that have our name on them. We'll take it from there because we believe that the learning is for living. It's hearing good teaching, and then it's going out and doing good. Now, Holy Spirit, just brood over us for a moment before we get out of here. God, I'm thankful for a school teacher who saw me, little angry kid at the back of the class, and didn't tolerate me. A woman that just occupied her space out of her identity and with authority. She was the place that all my nonsense went to die. But she saw me. And thank you for the people that saw these people in this room. Let us be the people that see people, not just who they are, but who they can be. Because that's what you did. That's why you use people to tell your story. So for people that have crippling anxiety in this room, you say, Hey, I'm gonna tell my story through you. You're not done. You don't get to check out, you don't get to quit. Because there's other people that have severe anxiety and they need to hear from somebody that can relay. So, Holy Spirit, thank you that you don't give up on us. Put a yes on us that displaces all the no's that we've received. This is our prayer. We ask it in Christ's name, and everyone said, Amen. Amen. If you're a guest today, I want to say thanks for being here. If you have any questions about anything you heard or saw, I'll be available down front with some of our pastors. We'd love to answer any questions that you may have, all right? There's all we've always got things going on. We don't want to be overwhelmingly busy. Like our next next Wednesday is our last midweek of the semester. And people say, Well, why don't you go year round? Because we want to take a lawn chair and go to the Little League Park and watch your kid play baseball. I saw Jack Collier sitting right over there this morning. I said, When's your when'd your season start? He goes, Yeah, yeah, we're we're going. You gonna come to one of my games? Do you have a concession stand? Yeah, I'll be there. Uh and and so that's why we don't want you down here to religion factory, you know, all the time year-round. Go out there where people live. Go to the rodeo. If I get more tickets, I'll give them away. You can have them. Don't come up like one guy this morning with a list of here's the artists I like. Come on, bro. Know when to say when. All right? We always got things going on in life for our church, and so here's some here's some things we want you to know about. Check out our video announcements.

SPEAKER_01 43:02

Thank you for joining us today. There's a few things we want you to know. If you're new, text welcome to 281-626-5707. This way we can know you're here and get you connected with the church. Today is a community group Sunday where we will gather in homes for spiritual dialogue, prayer, and encouragement. To find a group, head to grandparkway.org. As a reminder, Bible studies for fifth grade through adults are now at 1030 a.m. This is to help balance the tendencies in our services and make room for those who are new.

SPEAKER_00 43:32

To all the women out there married 20 years or less, how are you holding up? I want to invite you to the gathering on March 26th, where we're going to get real about marriage. We'll have a delicious dinner and a panel discussion with three women who have a combined 140 years of marriage under their belt. It's gonna be fun. Child care is provided, and it won't be the same without you. Register at grandparkway.org.

SPEAKER_01 44:01

Speaking of registration, New Believer Registration opens today. This is a class for kids in first through fourth grade who have already made a decision to follow Christ or who are very curious. Parents and kids will meet on Wednesday, March 29th, April 12th, and April 19th from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Finally, pray for our Costa Rica team. They'll be leaving today to do construction for our pastor in Costa Rica. If you have any questions or want someone to pray for you, find one of our pastors at the front of the stage at the conclusion of our service.

SPEAKER_03 44:33

Some of you may be like, What's Costa Rica? We we have what we call missional relationships. We don't we don't go just to different places every year. We like to establish a relationship. And so we've built probably four different buildings, uh, community buildings, schoolrooms, schoolhouses, uh, they're on the reservation for the Guami Indians. And so a group of our men are leaving, uh, and they'll be this week building a house for a pastor so they have a sense of permanence, so they can embed themselves there on the reservation and preach and teach the gospel. Uh, and so also uh Luciano, one of our chiefs over there of the tribe, his son is starting college and he didn't have a computer. And so our missionary reached out and said, Is there any way y'all could find like a cheap laptop and bring with you? And I said, No, you don't bless people when you give them cheap stuff that's not any good. So I took some of the money that you put in those boxes by the door and bought him a nice Dale laptop computer that will be delivered this week. So I want you to know that. Here's why. We practice full disclosure. So when you get to heaven and a Guami Indian, they have thick, thick black hair and they look reddish brown, beautiful, beautiful complexion. Comes up to you and says, Thanks for the computer, you'll know what he's talking about. Stand to your feet. We'd like to conclude our service with a spoken blessing. Hold your hands out. Yeah, it is. The yes of God is fat and juicy, weighty, thick, and dense. It's more durable and has more capacity than all the no's you've ever been given. Live under and in the yes of God to the glory of God. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Bless you.