The Replacement of Judas for Unfinished Work

If you would, take your Bible. Turn to Acts chapter one. Tonight we're gonna be in Acts chapter one. We're gonna finish up that chapter. We'll be in verses 12 to 26. I think most everyone knows that we are in a study through the book of Acts. Back on October the 15th, we got started in the book by examining chapter one verses one to 11. And from verses one to 11, we studied what I call the promise of power for unfinished work. The promise of power for unfinished work. Simply we saw that Jesus commanded his followers not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for the promised Holy Spirit.

He told them that they would receive the person of the Holy Spirit and the power of the Holy Spirit for their ultimate calling. Their calling was to be Christ's witnesses starting in Jerusalem, then in Judea, in Samaria, and even to the ends of the earth. So verses one to 11 are all about Christ's promise of Holy Spirit power for the unfinished work of the Great Commission. Now I know I said this back in that message, but I wanna repeat it. We must see that the book of Acts is not complete. Now let me explain myself before you think I'm adding to the Bible and start calling me a heretic.

What I mean by that is this, the work of the Great Commission is not complete. We are a part of that work and we are part of completing the Great Commission and we're a part of completing what was started in the book of Acts. Now in the introduction to that message, I explained to us that Acts is a part two of a two-part account given to us by Luke. Luke's part one is his gospel account. I think we know what book that is, the gospel of Luke. And Luke's part two is the book of Acts that's before us. It's called the book of Acts and sometimes it's even called the Acts of the Apostles.

I call this book and this study the Acts of the Holy Spirit through the Apostles. But we're gonna see tonight, it's even through a whole lot of other believers. But we need to remember that here in chapter one, we are in the middle of this big two-part story. Warren Wiersby says that Acts one is a bridge between Luke's gospel and Luke's account of the Acts of the Holy Spirit through the Apostles. In Luke's gospel account, we see that Jesus had completed his work of redemption. His earthly ministry was complete, it was finished. So part one was complete.

But here in Acts chapter one, the Holy Spirit has not yet been given and the church really has not yet been born. So Acts one, so at Acts one, the part two has really not started yet. And that is where we are in our message tonight. We are still on Warren Wiersby's bridge. I like that. We are still on Warren Wiersby's bridge. But we need to see where we are on the bridge, that is in chapter one. We're in the second half of chapter one where the Apostles and those other believers were in the work of waiting. That might sound odd to you. They were in the work of waiting. Let me explain what I mean.

In verses one to 11, our Lord commanded his Apostles and those early believers to wait. And in verses 12 to 26, we see them in their work of waiting. But as we will see in understanding the work of waiting, we're gonna understand they were not idly waiting. They were not doing nothing in their waiting. They were doing certain things in their waiting and these things are tremendous lessons for us when our Lord has us in a time of waiting. Now, I don't know if you realize this, but as a believer, obeying the command of our Lord to wait is one of the hardest things to do.

The work of waiting can be one of the hardest times for a believer and I speak from personal experience and we're gonna come back to that in a little while in the message. Now, earlier I said that these verses one to 11 are all about the unfinished work of the Great Commission. More specifically, I call that message, those verses the promise of power for the unfinished work. Well, tonight we will see that verses 12 to 26 are all about this unfinished work as well, but more specifically, we will see the replacement of Judas for this unfinished work. That's the title of the message. The replacement of Judas for unfinished work.

So let's get into our verses. There's quite a few starting in verse 12 and we'll go down to verse 26. Then they returned to Jerusalem from the Mount called Olivet or the Mount of Olives, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day's journey or walk away. And when they entered, they went up to the upper room where they were staying, Peter and John, James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus and Simon the zealot and Judas the sons of James. All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer together with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus and his brothers.

Some translations may footnote brothers there and say brothers and sisters referring to Jesus earthly siblings. Verse 15, in those days, Peter stood up among the brothers. The company of persons in all was about 120. And he said, brothers, the scriptures had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke beforehand by the mouth of David concerning Judas, who became a God to those who arrested Jesus. For he was numbered among us and was allotted his share in this ministry, speaking of apostolic ministry. Now this man, speaking of Judas, acquired a field with the reward of his wickedness.

And falling headlong, he burst open in the middle of the field and all his bowels gushed out. And it became known to all of the inhabitants of Jerusalem so that the field was called in their own language, Aclima, that is field of blood. For it is written in the book of Psalms, may his camp become desolate and let there be no one to dwell in it and let another take his office. So one of the men who had accompanied us during all the time that the Lord Jesus went out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day he was taken up from us, one of these men must become with us a witness to his resurrection. And they put forward two.

Joseph called Bar-sabas, and then also, who was also called Justice and Matthias. And they prayed and said, "You Lord, who know the hearts of all, "show which one of these two you have chosen, "to take the place in the ministry and apostleship "from which Judas turned aside to go to his own place." And they cast lights for them and the light fell on Matthias and he was numbered with the 11 apostles. Now this is how I wanna divide the verses. This can all be summed up actually in three words. Waiting, explaining, and replacing. I'll repeat those. Waiting, explaining, replacing.

We will see the believers waiting as they were commanded in verse 12 to 14, really and beyond. We will see Peter explaining what took place with Judas and his betrayal of Jesus in verse 15 to 20. And we will see the process of replacing Judas with Matthias in verse 20, the end of verse 20, verse 21 to 26. Now that's quite a lot of scripture, but we'll be able to cover it tonight. So let's get started. Number one, we see the believers waiting. I'll say this is specifically in verse 12 to 14, really and beyond, but the believers waiting, here we see that they were waiting as they were commanded by Jesus back in verse four.

We see that our Lord commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Holy Spirit, the person of the Holy Spirit, and the power of the Holy Spirit. Let's make sure we understand that. They were waiting for the promise of the Holy Spirit, the person of the Holy Spirit, and the power of the Holy Spirit. But here I want to notice, I want us to notice a few details. First, where they were waiting, where they were waiting. We see that in verse 12 and the beginning of verse 13. Now back in Luke, Luke 24 verse 49, Jesus commanded his disciples to stay in Jerusalem until they had been clothed with power from on high.

Well, in Acts 1.4, we see that they were not to leave Jerusalem, to wait for the promise, the person, and the power of the Spirit. So what did they do? They returned to Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives, the distance of a Sabbath day's walk from the city. And verse 13 says that they entered the upper room there in the city. Now, what is my point? In the original, there is a definite article before the word room. And the use of this definite article in our English translations, it reads the upper room. This seems to suggest that this room was familiar to them.

This seems to indicate that this may have been where Jesus celebrated the Passover just before his crucifixion. Now, what's my point? The apostles and these early believers had a place of meeting together that seemed to have been well known. So as they obeyed Jesus' command to wait, they went to a particular place of waiting. But then second, who was waiting? I want us to see who was waiting. We see that at the end of verse 13 and at the end of verse 14. Now this is simple, but notice what Luke's doing here. In verse 13, he lists all of the 12 disciples minus Judas the Betrayer.

So he was emphasizing that all of the disciples were obeying Jesus' command to wait and they were waiting together. He doesn't just say the apostles, he gives their names. Now contrast that with how they acted in between the crucifixion and what's taking place here. Earlier, they had not been all together. Peter went back fishing, we see that in John 21, and Thomas didn't even believe that Jesus had been raised from the dead. Remember what he said? I'm really not gonna believe it unless I touch him and see him. Also notice in verse 14 or the end of verse 14, Luke mentions the women, Mary the mother of Jesus and Jesus brothers.

Again, that could refer to brothers and sisters. And in verse 15, he mentions that Peter addressed a crowd of about 120 believers. Now what do we need to see here? We need to understand that Luke was and is showing us that there was a completeness and an incompleteness in the disciples. All were obeying Christ's command, wait, all of the disciples, all of the believers were obeying this command. But he shows us the incompleteness in that there was a vacancy in the list. He named all of the disciples, obviously minus one.

But also Luke is showing us that this band of believers includes not just the disciples, the apostles, but the believing women in Jesus earthly siblings. And what needs to be seen here is this. Luke is showing us that this band of believers who would be the nucleus of the first church, this includes Christian women who were an integral part of the work. Also Luke is showing us that Jesus siblings did come to saving faith. Now back in Mark three, we see that during Jesus earthly ministry, they did not believe in Jesus as the promised Messiah. But obviously things had changed.

They did come to believe in Jesus as the Messiah and they were an integral part of the first church as well. Now to me, there's some lessons here. Yes, God uses leaders like we see with the apostles. Obviously those guys were high profile, but he uses women in the work as well. And he uses what I call the late comers. Jesus siblings were late comers. You might feel like a late comer. You may feel like you came to faith in Christ later in life and you feel like you're a late comer. Or maybe you wandered around in years of being in bad churches and you've come here a little later in life, you feel like a late comer.

Look, don't feel like a late comer. God's brought you here at the right time, not at the late time. But simply all the believers here are an integral part of the church. As a matter of fact, I like what 1 Corinthians 12, 21 says, "The eye cannot say to the hand, I have no knee to you, nor again the head of the feet." Now what's my point? All of these believers were an integral part. They were the nucleus of the first church. But then third, I want us to see what they were doing while they were waiting. Now we see this at the beginning of verse 14 and then from verse 15 on to verse 20. Here we see that in their waiting, they were not idle.

Actually they were doing quite a bit of work in the waiting. But before we get into what they were doing, we need to see who they were. The English Standard, the Legacy Standard Bible, the King James say that they were all in one accord. Now we know that's not a car, but what is that? This simply means that all of the believers listed were of one mind, they were spiritually united. Albert Barnes defines and describes this unity in oneness by saying, "The Word denotes the entire harmony "of their views and feelings.

"There were no schisms, no divided interests." William McDonald points out that this expression with one accord is seen 11 times in the book of Acts. I bring that to your attention because we need to be looking out for that. And he goes on to say that this is one of the keys that unlocks the secret of the blessings that they had experienced. And we'll touch on that more when we get to those other instances. But notice what they were doing. Actually I see three things. First, they were praying with one mind and heart and in great spiritual unity. They were continually devoting themselves to prayer.

And in the original language, this word translated as continually devoting themselves, this spoke of a strong steadfast devotion, a strong and constant devotion. So in great unity, they had a strong and persistent devotion to prayer. But a question. Maybe one you've thought about or maybe you've not thought about. What were they praying for? What were they praying for? I like how John MacArthur addresses this question because this clears up quite a lot. And this clears up quite a few misconceptions that people may have. He says that they were not praying for the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

The person and the power of the Holy Spirit had been promised so there was no need to pray for the Holy Spirit. They were to wait on the Holy Spirit. He says that they were praying because they were physically separated from Jesus. He had ascended, remember? So they were physically separated from Jesus. So this type of prayer kept them connected to him. I think he's onto something there. Now there's a lesson here that I think we need to see. Prayer is communication with Jesus. But it's more than that. Prayer is connection to Jesus and connection with Jesus. But it's even more than that. Prayer is communion and fellowship with Jesus.

It is personal in that we personally relate to him. It is personal in that we want him to relate to us. It is personal in that we want him and we want him to work in our life and in our particular circumstances. Simply we should seek and want him in and through the prayer. Now I'll give you a little bit of a warning here and maybe a little bit of a correction for you to think about. If your prayer life is centered on nothing but requests, you may be missing out on the heart and the key to your prayer life. It can't be first and foremost about your requests. It has to be about him. It is personal.

And when you get to the place where you understand that prayer is communion with Jesus, it is connection to Jesus. And then it is a connection with Jesus to you and it is personal and you relate to him personally and he relates to you personally, sometimes the requests won't really matter. Second, they were receiving instruction from Peter. Peter was instructing them. Now I will get into the details of what Peter taught when we cover verses 16 to 20. But here in verse 15, we see that Peter stood up among the entire band of the believers and he simply began to teach them from the scriptures concerning Judas and all that was going on.

But then third, they were obeying. They were praying, Peter was instructing. Third, they were obeying. Now the verses do not say this directly, but in reading verses 15 to 26, we see that all the believers obeyed, we see that all of the believers obeyed three things. First, they obeyed the scriptures that were taught. Second, they obeyed the leadership in Peter as he taught them and led them. Third, they obeyed the scriptures and Peter in his leadership in doing what needed to be done and that is replacing Judas. So notice what we see here in verses 12 to 15, really and beyond.

We see the disciples, that would be the apostles, the 11 apostles, we see the believing women, some are listed, some are not. We see Jesus' earthly brothers and siblings who believed. Then we see all these other believers who are not named and they were busy in the work of waiting as they had been commanded. Now before we move on into Peter's explanation of these things, I wanna emphasize the activities that must go on in waiting. I ran across this earlier in the week when I was studying James Montgomery Boyce as he's breaking down these verses. That's a good resource.

Sometimes he's called Jim Boyce, but he points out the activities seen in their waiting. He calls this a time to practice obedience, that's what they were doing. He called this a time for fellowship, well that's what they were doing, fellowshiping one with another. He called this a time for constant prayer, that's what they were doing. He called this a time for study, that's what they were doing. He called this a time for recognition of and choosing leaders, that's what they were doing. You see all the work in the waiting?

Now real quickly here, I wanna take what Jim Boyce says here, these good observations, and I wanna give us some instruction for when we are in times of waiting on God. Just like these early believers that we see, when we are in a place of waiting on God, we should be busy working doing these five things. First, we should be busy obeying what we do know. What did they know? Wait. What had the Lord told them? Wait in Jerusalem, wait on the promised Holy Spirit. Well when we are in a time of waiting, we should be busy obeying what we do know.

You see sometimes when we are in a place of waiting, spiritually speaking, we can't see our hand in front of our face. So what we do is this, we just obey what we do know we should obey. We put one foot in front of the other, and we obey what we do know to obey. Second, we should be busy in fellowship with other believers. For them, they were pouring their lives into this great fellowship, this unity, this oneness that they enjoyed. So if you find yourself in a place of waiting, again, sometimes you will feel like you can't see your hand in front of your face. You should be busy fellowshiping with other brothers and sisters.

I've known believers who were in a time of waiting, and they were in the pits of despair in their waiting, and they just said, "Oh, I'm so down. "I can't even come to church." Wrong answer. Third, we should be busy in constant prayer. For them, they were praying and seeking Him. They were not just seeking the promise, they were seeking the person of Christ. So when we're in a time of waiting, yes, we seek Him. But when we're in a time of waiting, let's don't fall for the trap of wanting our answer. Let's look for Him in the waiting. Sometimes when we're in a place of waiting, we feel like we're in a thick fog bank.

All we have to do is find Him. Fourth, we should be busy in studying God's Word. Peter knew and studied the Old Testament scriptures, and the scriptures gave them answers, comfort, and guidance in their circumstances. So when we're in a time of waiting, again, we may not be able to see our hand in front of our face. We might not feel like we know what's up or down spiritually. We study the scriptures. And then fifth, we should be busy recognizing and submitting to our God-appointed leaders. All of those 120 believers were looking, were looking to and submitting to Peter in his leadership. Now, what does that look like for us?

That means that when we're in a time of fellowship, when we're in a time of waiting, excuse me, we're busy connected to the fellowship, being faithful to church, and submitting to the leaders that God has for us, and many times God will use those leaders to guide you in that time. Now, I'm not gonna share too much of this because of time, but I'll go ahead and tell you, this year coming up, I will preach on waiting. There was a time in my life where I spent quite a bit of time waiting. I left a particular church under certain difficult circumstances in 2006, and the Lord didn't lead me to go to a church immediately.

And I spent a period of time of about four years working in the real world. And then I began to do some itinerant ministry, preaching at different places. Then I began to ultimately, God led me to Nola. And during that time, it even looked like I was out of the ministry. I had a minister friend of mine say, when are you gonna go back into the ministry? And I thought, wait a minute, I'm not out of the ministry. But it looked like I was. And look, sometimes I couldn't see my hand in front of my face. But I'll tell you what the Lord used in my life during that time was Psalm 40 verses one, two, and three.

The Lord screamed to me, just wait, just wait, just wait. But Psalm 41, two, and three speaks about waiting patiently. I had a hard time waiting patiently. I know what waiting is. And it is hard work. In many of these five things that Boyce gives us, all of them, actually, I was doing them. It was best I could. So we see the believers in their waiting. Number two, we see Peter explaining verses 15 to 20. We see Peter explaining. Here we see Peter was explaining what had taken place with Judas. And we see that he used the Old Testament scriptures to explain these things. Now here I want us to see two details.

The first is pretty simple, and the second one is not. First Peter's position. Here we see that Peter stood up and he assumed the position of leadership. Not only among the body of 120 believers, but notice among his peers, the apostles too. And notice this was and is consistent with what we see in Luke's gospel account as well. All throughout the gospels, we see Peter's character and characteristics as a strong leader among the apostles. Now you might say, "Time out, pastor. "Didn't Peter get off track and out of balance at times?" Oh yes.

I think about the fact that time, I think about the time that he rebuked Jesus when Jesus said he was going to the cross. Talk about getting off into a ditch. But he clearly demonstrated the character and the characteristics of a leader among the apostles. And we do know that Peter became the lead apostle or pastor of the Church of Jerusalem. But then second, Peter's explanation. We see this in verses 16 to 20. Now here we see quite a bit and we see quite a few things that can be very confusing for some. And if we condense what we see here, this really will make perfect sense. But notice what Peter is and was explaining here.

First in verses 16 to 17, he explained that these things were foretold. Here Peter is quoting specific prophecy from David concerning Judas. And notice what he said, "The scripture had to be fulfilled." The scripture had to be fulfilled. Well, what had to be fulfilled? The fact that Judas, although he was one of the chosen disciples, chosen by Jesus, and he shared in their apostolic ministry, he became a guide for those to arrest Jesus. But notice the tension here between God's will and plan and Judas and his demonic actions. It was foretold that one of his own would sell out the Messiah to one of his enemies.

But by his own deliberate choice, Judas became a traitor against Jesus. So that leads me to a question. Did these things happen because Judas purposefully made a choice to sell out Jesus? Or did these things happen because God said that they would through David? Well, the answer is yes. The answer is yes. But then second, in verses 18 to 19, Peter explained what happened to Judas in all of these things. Simply what we have here is this. These two verses are in a parentheses because they were not part of Peter's original message. Simply Luke was and is giving the rest of the story with Judas.

He was and is giving the rest of the historical facts about Judas and his death. And here Luke tells us that Judas bought a field and that he fell headlong into that field and his intestines or bowels gushed out. And if we look at the other gospel accounts, we can see other details about these events. Matthew tells us that after Judas returned the 30 pieces of silver to the Jewish chief priests and those other leaders, they went out, he went out and he hung himself. And the chief priests, they took the money and they bought the burial ground or the graveyard. But what we see here is this.

Luke was and is explaining what happened ultimately to Judas. But before we move on, we need to ask, what was Luke's intention here in explaining these things? It's safe to say that Luke was doing two things. First, he was explaining that God had predetermined these things. He had a predetermined plan with Judas and Judas certainly fulfilled God's plan. But second, Luke was obviously explaining these things to the 120 believers to educate them. It is safe to assume that some just did not understand what happened in these things. So notice what we have here in verses 15 to 20.

Peter stood up as their leader and he explained what happened with Judas and why. In verse 16, he said, the scripture had to be fulfilled. Meaning that these things were a divine necessity. Although Judas determined to do these things out of his own sin and sinfulness, he was not a robot. God determined these things to be. Now, here is a lesson that many of you know and understand as best as we can. But here is a lesson that some of you need. This is the lesson of divine sovereignty and man's responsibility and the fact that we cannot harmonize the two at times. So what do we need to see here?

God's sovereignty and man's responsibility and it seems contradictory. I mean, think about it. Did Judas act out of his own sinful will? Yes, he was not a robot. But yet did God determine these things? Yes, he did. Now, what do we do when we come across this seeming contradiction? What do we do when we come across God's sovereignty and man's responsibility? We state the one, we state the other, but we don't try to harmonize those things because when we do, we abuse what the text says. The scripture says God foreordained these things and the scriptures clearly teach that Judas, he did these things willfully, willfully.

So Peter, he was explaining and he was explaining quite a lot. Then number three, we see the process of replacing verses 21 to 26, the process of replacing. Here we see that Peter was explaining what took place to replace Judas and why. He explains that this was necessary and a fulfillment of scripture. Now, before I get into the verses, we need to see that there are some who say that this should not have taken place. You may have run across that. If you do some study on your own, you will see that some scholars and commentators say that replacing Judas with Matthias was not God's will.

They even try to say that it was Paul who was meant to replace Judas. But I believe we can see that this certainly was God's will. Now here, I want us to see four things. First, the necessity of this replacement. We see this at the beginning of verse 20 and verse 21. Now, if we look at the end of verse 20, we see a quotation from Psalm 108.9. Verse 20 reads, "For it is written in the book of the Psalms, "may his camp become desolate, "and let there be one to dwell, "no one to dwell in it, and let another take his office." And in verse 21, we see the same thing.

Peter continues to lead by speaking up and saying it was necessary to replace Judas with another. So it is clear that Peter and these other apostles and the other believers understood from the Old Testament scripture that it was necessary to replace Judas. But then second, he gives the qualifications of the replacement in verse 21. Now here we see that Peter laid out two qualifications. First, that the replacement be one who had been with the disciples the entire time Jesus had been with them from the beginning, beginning with John the Baptist.

This means that this replacement would have been an eyewitness to the entirety of the Lord Jesus earthly ministry from its beginnings with John the Baptist until the completion of that earthly ministry up until the ascension. And then second, that the replacement be one who had actually witnessed the resurrection of Jesus. This means that this replacement would have not only witnessed the resurrection, but he would have been able to communicate the central message that we find in all apostolic teaching. But then third, the possibilities for the replacement. We see this in verse 23. Now here we see that they put forward two possibilities.

Joseph called Bar-Sabbath, who was also called Justice and then Matthias. So it is clear that these two men were definitely qualified. Isn't it clear? But the question was which one was chosen? So Peter, the apostles, and the body of 120 believers or so took the next steps. Fourth, we see the choosing of the replacement. Now here we see three things that took place. First, they prayed. Simply they committed these men, their hearts and this choice to God, they did not make the choice, but they committed all of these things to God. Simply and then second, they cast lots. Now here there can be a tremendous amount of misunderstanding.

Some see this as a type of gambling or some kind of a game of chance in choosing this replacement. But what we have here is really simple. If we know our Old Testament, we understand what this is. Simply, this was a common accepted Old Testament method for determining God's will and that was casting lots or drawing lots. Proverbs 16.33 says, "The lot is cast into the lap, "but every decision is from the Lord." One thing I ran across even this afternoon is one scholar said, "This is the last time casting of lots is mentioned "in the scripture." But then third, the decision was made.

Simply verse 24 says that the lot fell to Matthias and he was immediately added to the number of the apostles. So the incomplete number of apostles, 11, was completed by adding Matthias. But a question, what do we do with the argument that this was not God's will? What do we do with the argument that Paul, not Matthias, was to be the replacement for Judas? Now in all of my study, I saw some different people who offered different ways to address this, but to me, John MacArthur offers the best explanation here. He says, and I'm quoting, "Nothing in this passage," and I would add to that by saying other passages as well.

Nothing in this passage or other passages indicates that this action is wrong. It is inconceivable that the Lord would allow such a crucial error in such a crucial office at the very beginning of his church. MacArthur goes on to say, "Why would he, thus God, "take pains to provide the apostles "with all the proper resources "and then allow them to choose the wrong man? "Jesus Christ chose Matthias "just as surely as he chose the other 11. "And while Paul was in no way inferior to the 12, "he was not of their number.

"By his own testimony, he," that's Paul, "was in no respect inferior to the most imminent apostles, "even though I am a nobody," he's quoting 2 Corinthians 12, 11. He was talking of Paul, a unique apostle. His mission, the mission of the 12 was primarily to the nation of Israel, while he, Paul, was an apostle sent to the Gentiles, Romans 11, 13. And to me, MacArthur's reasoning is good. So notice what we have here. Really the end of verse 20, verse 21 to 26. We see the process of God replacing Judas with Matthias as the 12th apostle. It immediately, he was added to the number and the ministry of the apostles.

And later in Acts 6, we see Matthias right there among the apostles doing apostolic ministry. Because Acts 6, 2 says, "And the 12 summoned the full number of the disciples "and said, 'It is not right that we should give up "'preaching the word of God to serve tables.'" Now notice what we have here. The replacement of Judas. But you know, we could say, why is this a big deal? I mean, why not just let Judas hang himself and go on? Why is this a big deal? This is a big deal because the replacement of Judas was for the unfinished work. This was for the unfinished work.

And that leads me to the title of the message, The Replacement of Judas for Unfinished Work. Now, we have completed the bridge. Chapter one being the bridge between part one, Luke's gospel account, and part two, the really the beginning of part two, which is chapter two. So next week we will get into chapter two and we will get into the baptism of the Holy Spirit. That's when some of you are saying, I can't wait pastor, 'cause I'm confused and I wanna see if you're gonna mess all that up. It's really not as complicated as you think. Now I will conclude by saying this.

Remember that I said that Acts is a book of history, but it's a book of action. And I even said that it is a thriller. Well, when we get into chapter two, we're gonna come into the thriller part because it gets really, really exciting.