The Ongoing Church

Luke, the beloved doctor, was led by the Holy Spirit to write the book of Acts with a good beginning but a sudden ending. The Church of Jesus Christ started on the day of Pentecost and is still going on. The apostles are no longer with us but we have their inspired writings. It is necessary to know the book of Acts in order to understand the epistles, the most important part of the Bible.

In this book Gertrud Harlow draws many practical lessons from Acts both for individuals and churches today.

Introduction

What happened next? A er the Lord Jesus Christ went back to heaven? That's what the book of Acts is all about.

This book tells how the Church began at Jerusalem and how a Jew, Saul of Tarsus became a Christian. Later this same man, now called Paul, was used of God to take the Gospel to many Gentile countries. Other believers from Jerusalem brought the Gospel to other countries also. Paul wrote many le ers to help and teach the churches that had been formed in some of these places and some of these le ers are included in the New Testament.

Who wrote the book of Acts?

Luke, the writer of the Gospel which has his name continued his account in the book of Acts of what the Lord Jesus did and taught. The Holy Spirit guided Luke and showed him what to write, 2 Timothy 3.16.

Luke was a medical doctor and one of Paul's close friends, Colossians 4.14. We do not see his name in Acts but a number of verses show that he o en travelled with Paul and had seen with his own eyes many of the things he wrote about. See 16.10-17; 20.5-21.18; 27.1-28.16. He was with Paul when God called Paul to go into Macedonia. When Paul was in prison in Rome for the last time only one person remained with him—faithful Luke.