The Promise of the Holy Spirit
"In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when he was taken up"
Sounds like the author of this book wrote one of the gospels? Is he talking to Theophilus?
While with the apostles, Jesus gave them commands through the holy spirit. He ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the father, they will be baptized with the holy spirit days from now.
Apparently the holy spirit is going to come to the apostles shortly after Jesus died.
The Ascension
They had come together (the apostles and Jesus?) and they asked Jesus if he was going to restore Israel. He said that they would not know the time it would happen. But they will get power when the holy spirit comes to them. Jesus then was lifted out of sight by a cloud. A couple of guys come by and ask why they are looking up into heaven, they say Jesus will come in the same way he was taken into heaven.
So a couple random guys don't think it's a big deal that Jesus just ascended into heaven? That's the strange part of the story to me.
Matthias Chosen to Replace Judas
Somebody had to take the place of Judas for obvious reasons, ultimately it fell to Matthias.
We were discussing this recently in some comments, I'm glad we did or the significance of this might have been lost on me.
Acts of the Apostles.. Or as I like to think of them, the Gospel spinoff. We take the wild and wacky apostles and now they are "on their own" for some good ol' adventures.
ReplyDeleteMost of the mistakes in Acts come when referring to stories in other gospels, or the old testament. In the first chapter we have contradictions on stuff like where Jesus tells them to wait, (verse 4 vs Matt 28:10, Mark 16:7), where Jesus ascended (verse 12 vs Luke 24:50,51) or how many people saw Peter (verse 15 vs 1 Corinthians 15:6)etc.. But I think the things that stick out to me the most are the contradictions between the stories of what happened to Judas. Here (verse 18) he bought the field with the silver he got from betraying Jesus, and then fell down on the ground and his bowels gush out. In Matthew, its a completely different story. He threw the silver on the ground after he was paid for his transgression, then he hung himself in the field that the chief priests bought.
The other thing that stood out to me was that it is weird that they cast lots to see who would be the next disciple. I've heard from some Christians that gambling is wrong, and this kind of sounded like a sort of lottery to me. But, in a way, maybe it's not like gambling.
Goods points JKerber. I'll be honest, when they start telling their version of the story of Jesus my eyes glaze over a little bit. I didn't notice the discrepancies myself. Thanks for pointing them out. It is interesting to see yet another instance of contradictions in the bible.
ReplyDeleteThe gambling thing is interesting too. I've also heard Christians say that gambling is wrong. I'm not sure if I have heard them say it is a sin or not thought. I can't remember if it was just a "you shouldn't do that because it is throwing you're money away" or if it was "it is a sin". Does the bible say that gambling is wrong anywhere?
I don't think that the Bible actually is straightforward with the gambling thing, but Christians say that it's wrong anyway. I did a quick search on "why gambling is wrong and bible" and skimmed a few articles. That seems to be the consensus based on my small sample set of the first few things that popped up.
ReplyDeleteInteresting. I guess a lot of Christians are trained to take their instincts as "what God says". I think it comes from the whole personal relationship thing. It's more like "God is telling me it is bad", or something.
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