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The Ascension of Jesus (Luke 24:50-53)

We may imagine that the short account of the ascension of Jesus here at the end of Luke’s Gospel suggests it was not very important. True, he gives another description of it at the beginning of his second work, the Book of Acts, but again his words about it are few. Yet the ascension of Jesus is a crucial biblical event: it was prophesied in the Old Testament, for example in Psalm 68:18 and Psalm 110, it was predicted by Jesus in John 6:62, and it was prayed for by Jesus in John 17 when he asked the Father to give to him the glory he had with the Father before the creation of the world. When gathered with them in the upper room on the same evening as his arrest Jesus had told the disciples that it would be better for them if he went away because then the Holy Spirit would come to live in them as the Comforter. The Saviour had mentioned that he was leaving them, a departure that involved him going to the Father’s house, which clearly indicated his ascension to glory. We can also see tha...
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How Jesus Changes Things (John 1:35-42)

John the Baptist, the forerunner sent by God to announce the coming of Jesus as the Messiah, is standing with Andrew and probably with John, two of his disciples. They had become John’s followers as he served God in the important way of making spiritual preparation, through the means of the preaching of personal repentance, for the arrival of the Messiah, which meant that these disciples were expecting the Messiah to appear in the near future, and no doubt they were excited about what would happen then. On the previous day, John had also pointed to Jesus with a similar but longer description of Jesus as the Lamb of God who was taking away the sin of the world, which is a picture suggesting that Jesus was focussed on a specific task as the Saviour. What ideas would have gone through the mind of the Baptist’s disciples when they heard this title of Jesus? That will be the first detail that we will think about, the description of Jesus as the Lamb of God. Then we will consider the discove...
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The Deity and Personality of the Holy Spirit

The deity and personality of the Holy Spirit is a great topic to consider. Yet often Christians do not do so. Sometimes they think of his gifts and other times they may focus on his fruit. But do they take time to worship him as God, to wonder and marvel at who he is? The deity The Holy Spirit is named in the baptismal formula at the close of the Gospel of Matthew as one of the three divine persons in the Trinity. He is equal with the other two as far as divine attributes are concerned. The divine attributes can be classified  in several ways, but one classification is known as the incommunicable and the communicable attributes. The incommunicable are attributes that only God has while the communicable appear  in creatures, whether angels or men. The incommunicable attributes are God’s eternal existence and the three omnis – omnipresence, omniscience, and omnipotence. Does the Bible say that the Holy Spirit has them? The writer of Hebrews says this in Hebrews 9:14: ‘how much m...
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Great is the Mystery of Godliness (1 Timothy 3:16)

How many times a day do you use the word ‘great’? Someone asks, How are you feeling? ‘Great,’ you reply. How was your holiday? Great. How was the meal? Great. How are things going? Great. The Bible uses the word often. Think of some of the examples:          Hebrews: How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation?          The Psalmist: Great peace have they who love your law.          Acts: There was great joy in the city.          Peter: Great and precious promises. His great mercy.          Paul: The appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ          Gabriel: He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. It has been pointed out that Paul may be alluding to an incident a few years previously in Ephesus where Timothy now was. The earlier incident included a crowd shouting ‘Great...
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A Friend Loves At All Times (Proverbs 17:17)

No doubt, this proverb has wide applications. Within the stories of the Bible, we have the account of the friendship of David and Jonathan, of Peter and John, of Paul and Timothy. In our own church tradition, there is the well-known friendship between McCheyne and Andrew Bonar. No doubt we have our own friends. What are the things that define friendship? We could suggest length, intensity, loyalty, comfortableness, interest in, willingness to protect, emotional connection. No doubt there are many more features. The Bible mentions one surprising friendship, and it is God who speaks about it several hundred years after the friendship occurred. He mentions it through the prophet Isaiah in one of his messages to the people of Judah: ‘But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham, my friend’ (Isa. 41:8). Of course, it is possible to read the statement as suggesting that Abraham was still God’s friend in heaven. It could be that the aspects of friendship se...
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The Challenge of Peter (Acts 2:37-39)

  The effects of Peter’s sermon about Jesus were immediate, identical, and intense as far as his listeners were concerned, which is a reminder about true evangelism. Here were unlikely converts because a few weeks ago they had shown their hostility to Jesus by urging Pilate to crucify him. It is all down to the power of the Spirit in their hearts.   The immediate impact is wonderful. We long to see this response when the gospel is preached. Unlikely people, unexpected people, pleading to know more about salvation, desperate to find a remedy for who they are and what they have done as sinners.   Cut to the heart This is a graphic phrase, it means something like a stabbing experience. The phrase shows depth of penetration, that the weapon pierces through different layers within each personal. The weapon Peter uses is the gospel, and the layers are the person’s mind, affections and will. What is described here is conviction of sin. Conviction of sin is an aspect of t...
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