7 Things Jesus Left Behind [ascension] Series

What Jesus Left Behind

Acts 1:6-11

http://gbcdecatur.org/sermons/7ThingsLeftBehind.html

Goodbyes aren’t easy, especially if the one leaving will be gone long.

Ill—Babe Ruth said goodbye at Yankee Stadium, eaten up w/ cancer, and w/ tears he said goodbye.

Ill—Watergate hearings, Nixon said goodbye to his staff, walked across lawn, then said goodbye and waved again on Marine 1.

If you’ve ever said a final goodbye to a child, you know how bad goodbyes can be…or a spouse, sibling, parent!

In Acts 1 Jesus is saying goodbye to His disciples…for 3.5 years they’ve been intimately intertwined, thru good times and bad! He had changed their lives! They’d never be the same.

They spent 40 incredible days together after He arose…and now it’s time to say goodbye, He’s leaving, He’s going home…and He tells them to do His work in the meanwhile (v. 8) He has given them His great commission, to go into all the world with the gospel.

v. 9 This is real…as real as the virgin birth, perfect life, sacrificial death, burial, glorious resurrection…it was as real as if you’d seen it w/ your own eyes that day!

v. 10 He’ll return the same way He left, physically!

As He left the earth ascending into heaven He left behind some things. In our text passage for today I want to point out 7 things that Jesus left behind when He ascended to heaven. Jesus said in John 19:30, “...it is finished...” He was saying that the atonement for sin was finished. That tells us that nothing more need be done. Salvation is complete in Christ. But the first thing He left behind was:

I. AN UNFINISHED TASK. Vs. 1.

(Acts 1:1) "The former treatise have I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach,"

A. His Task Was Not Finished. (Luke 19:10) "For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost."

As long as there is one person who has not heard the message, the task is not finished.

B. He Left The Task To Be Finished By His Churches. (Mat 28:19)

1. The mission fields cry out, “unfinished”.

2. The remote areas of every city and town cry out, “unfinished”.

3. The whaling of the unsatisfied soul cries out, “unfinished.”

4. The voices of your neighbors cry out, “unfinished.”

5. You have some loved ones who cry out, “unfinished.”

6. Perhaps your own soul is crying, “unfinished.”

Are you actively participating in carrying out His unfinished task? If you don’t help, much of it will go undone.

(John 9:4) "I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work."

II. AN UNCHALLENGED MESSAGE. Vs. 3.

(Acts 1:3) "To whom also he showed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God:"

The message of salvation can’t be challenged.

A. Man can’t challenge it.

1. Liberalism has attacked this one area more than any other.

2. Man has attempted to produce numerous other methods of salvation.

Galatians 1:6-9

I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: [7] Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. [8] But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. [9] As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.

B. Satan Can’t Challenge It.

1. The Gospel lives on.

2. We see an everlasting Gospel in Rev 14:6 "And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people,"

C. The Cults Can’t Challenge It.

1. It is a fool proof Gospel.

2. (Rom 1:16) "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek."

3. When the cults come knocking on my door, I tell them that I am born again by the shed blood and the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and that I am going to live forever in heaven with Him.

That blows their mind, and they go on their way saying, “This guy is crazy.” They can’t challenge the Gospel of Christ.

D. Everyone Who Challenges the Gospel of Jesus Christ Will Be In the Number That Is Mentioned In Rev. 20:14-15.