I.
This week’s focus Scripture and the Scriptures for the following four weeks will all highlight passages in the New Testament book, “The Acts of the Apostles.”

We start this week with a reference to the first book written for Theophilus (that would be the Gospel of Luke), a reference to a period of 40 days when “Jesus presented himself alive…” and ending with the 40th day, which we now call Ascension Day.

As you spend time with this passage, notice what has happened during this 40 day period, the instructions Jesus gives his disciples, the questions the disciples ask of Jesus, and what the white robed men ask the disciples.

II.
Acts 1:1-11 (NRSVue)

In the first book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and teach until the day when he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. After his suffering he presented himself alive to them by many convincing proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. While staying with them, he ordered them not to leave Jerusalem but to wait there for the promise of the Father. “This,” he said, “is what you have heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” He replied, “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

III.
What holds your attention the most in this passage?

Maybe it is Jesus speaking to the disciples about the Kingdom of God? Or, maybe the reference to being “baptized with the Holy Spirit”? Or, the disciples question, “is this the time when you will restore the Kingdom to Israel”? Or even the disciples standing there and “gazing upward toward heaven” after Jesus is taken “out of their sight”?

It seems to me the disciples are not only left “gazing up” when Jesus leaves them, but they are left speechless.

While they might be speechless for the moment, what questions do you think are still on their minds?

charles
{ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est}