Frederick Osborn

The Book of Acts Frederick Osborn

The Book of Acts is often studied and presented in sermons and in Sunday School lessons as interesting church history, but little more. Some spiritual principles may be drawn out of its stories, but the idea that the Holy Spirit gave Acts to the church to be our handbook or training manual for how to fulfill the Great Commission is often overlooked. "That was then" most will say, "but this is a different time and place. Surely, the Lord does not intend for the church to experience the same results today!" But the evidence from around the world is clear: the church planting paradigm of Acts produces rapid, exponential growth of the kingdom whenever or wherever it is properly applied."From every corner of the globe the reports are coming in. Only a few at first, but now more and more frequently, reinforcing one another with their startling accounts of hundreds, thousands, and even tens of thousands coming to faith in Christ, forming into churches and spreading their newfound faith" (David Garrison, Church Planting Movements, 1999). What David Garrison was describing could just as easily have been an introduction to the Book of Acts; for that was exactly what Luke was describing as he recorded the rapid expansion of the church that started in Jerusalem on that first Pentecost after Jesus' Resurrection and Ascension. This commentary on the Book of Acts will examine Luke's story of the rapid expansion of the early and compare it with the many successful church planting movements of today. It draws many parallels between the principles of modern movements and the movement of the Holy Spirit as the church fulfilled the command of the Lord to take the Gospel of Salvation from Jerusalem, to Judea, and to the ends of the earth. This commentary can be used with the Study Guide of the same title, or it can be read and studied alone. It is useful for individual or group Bible study.