Lesson 14: Acts and the Letters – Discovery
Once we have gotten to know Jesus – and the Gospels are a great way to do so – we need to read and learn and study and meditate on these books of Acts and the letters. They are the writings of Jesus’ disciples to give us practical instruction in all the things Jesus taught them while He was with them.
Acts shows us an example of how Christians interacted with their world around them as these disciples obeyed Jesus’ last instruction to them before He left earth – to tell everyone in the world about Him.
The important principle for studying Acts is the same as those we read earlier in studying books of History. The events given in Acts are true and happened, and they are written to be an example and encouragement to us as we also obey Jesus’ last command of telling others about Him.
The principle for reading and studying the letters is that these letters are written to explain to us what and how Jesus’ words apply to our everyday lives. As noted in last lesson, each of the letters concentrates on a different area of our Christian life.
As Christians today, our major study in the Bible should be in these books of the New Testament because these outline to us the greater responsibility we now have to Jesus Christ in this time of God’s grace being poured out on all humanity. In the Old Testament, we see the examples of people trying to follow the rules God had laid out – we now have been given the principles rather than the rules, and our responsibility before God is to those principles rather than just to the rules.
Principles of life are always more difficult to follow than just the rules. Rules are about actions; we can follow a rule sometimes without whole-hearted consent to that rule in our thoughts. Following the principles is only possible as our minds are transformed to be like Christ (Romans 12:1-2, Philippians 2:5). Following the principles means we allow Jesus to change us on the inside so what comes out in actions will be His way without us even needing to think about what we are doing. When our mind is transformed, our actions will follow without effort.
Jesus’ gave us two ways we could demonstrate we are His disciples:
> John 13:35 – You are My disciples if you love one another (inner obedience)
> John 15:14 – You are My disciples if you do what I command (outward obedience)
Both are necessary, both are important, but the principle of inner transformation comes first. The inner transformation, however, is not real if it is also not followed by the outward actions (see the book of James).
*Where are you concentrating your efforts in becoming like Christ?