Acts 1:6 - Meaning and Application

In Jerusalem, Christ had, through his angel, told his disciples to meet him in Galilee. There he later appointed them to meet him again in Jerusalem on a certain day. In this way, he tested their obedience, and they were found ready and cheerful. They came together exactly as he had told them, to be witnesses of his ascension, which is what Luke now describes.

Notice first the question they asked him at this meeting. They gathered around him, as people who had talked it over among themselves and agreed on the question. They asked it together, with complete unity: “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” This question can be taken in two ways. They may have meant, “Surely you will not restore it to the present rulers of Israel, the chief priests and elders who killed you, and who gave up the kingdom to Caesar to carry out that plan. Will those who hate and persecute you, and us, be trusted with power? May that never be.” Or they may have meant, “Surely you will now restore it to the Jewish nation, as far as it will submit to you as king.”

In this question, two things were wrong. First, they expected the wrong kind of kingdom. They thought Christ would restore the kingdom to Israel, meaning that he would make the Jewish nation great and important again, like it had been in the days of David and Solomon, or Asa and Jehoshaphat. As Shiloh, the promised ruler, they thought he would restore the scepter to Judah and the ruler’s staff. But Christ had come to set up his own kingdom, a kingdom of heaven, not to restore an earthly kingdom to Israel. Even good people are often too ready to place the church’s happiness in outward power and splendor. We are quick to think Israel cannot be glorious unless the kingdom is restored, or Christ’s disciples cannot be honored unless they are nobles. Yet we are taught to expect the cross in this world and the kingdom in the next.

We also see how stubborn early teaching can be. The disciples had taken in, almost with their milk, the idea that the Messiah would be a political ruler. For a long time, they could not think of his kingdom as spiritual. We are also naturally biased toward our own people. They seemed to think God would have no kingdom in the world unless it was restored to Israel. But the kingdoms of this world were to become his, and he would be glorified whether Israel rose or fell. We also tend to misunderstand Scripture, taking what is meant figuratively as if it were literal, and forcing Scripture to fit our plans. Instead, our plans should be shaped by Scripture. When the Spirit is poured out from above, these mistakes are corrected, as they soon were with the apostles.

Second, they asked about the timing: “Lord, will you do it at this time?” Since he had called them together, they wondered if it was to arrange the best plans for restoring the kingdom to Israel. Surely, they thought, there could not be a better moment. But here they missed the mark. They were asking about something their Master had never told them to ask about. They were also impatient for the kingdom, in which they imagined they would have such a large share, and wanted to get ahead of God’s plan. Christ had said they would sit on thrones (Luke 22:30), and now they wanted the throne at once. They could not wait. But the one who believes does not rush ahead. He trusts that God’s time is best.

Christ’s answer was a gentle rebuke, much like the one he had given Peter about John: “What is that to you?” Here he says, “It is not for you to know the times or seasons” (Acts 1:7). He does not directly deny their expectation that the kingdom would be restored to Israel, because that mistake would soon be corrected by the pouring out of the Spirit. After that, they would no longer think of a political kingdom. There is also a true sense in which the kingdom would be restored, the setting up of Christ’s gospel kingdom in the world. Their mistake about the promise would not make the promise fail. But he does forbid their curiosity about the time.

The knowledge of this was not given to them, and so it was not for them to ask. Christ was just about to leave them, and he left them with a loving rebuke. It is meant as a warning to the church in every age, to keep us from crashing on the same rock that brought down our first parents, namely, a forbidden desire to know what God has not shown. It is foolish to try to be wiser than what is written, and wisdom to be content not to know more than God has revealed.

Christ had already given his disciples far more knowledge than others. He had told them, “To you it has been given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God,” and he had promised them the Spirit to teach them more. So, to keep them from becoming proud because of their many revelations, he now tells them there are some things they are not meant to know. We should see how little reason we have to be proud of our knowledge when we remember how much we do not know.

He had already given them enough instruction to do their duty, both before his death and after his resurrection. He wanted them to be satisfied with that knowledge. In Christians, empty curiosity is a harmful appetite that should be put down, not fed. Christ had told them what belonged to the kingdom of God, and he had promised that the Spirit would show them things to come about it (John 16:13). He had also given them signs of the times, which they should watch carefully and not ignore (Matthew 24:33; Matthew 16:3). But they must not expect, or even want, to know every detail of the future or the exact time of each event.

It is good for us to remain in the dark about the times and moments of future events, both for the church and for ourselves, and even about the final end of time. God, in wisdom and goodness, has hidden these things from us in the clouds of deepest night.

As for the times and seasons of the year, we know in general that summer and winter will keep changing. Yet we do not know which particular day will be clear or stormy, whether in summer or in winter. In the same way, when our life in this world is a summer of success, we are told that a winter of trouble will come, so we will not feel too safe. And in that winter, we are assured that summer will return, so we will not sink into despair. But we cannot tell what any given day will bring, so we must adjust ourselves to it and make the best of it.

The knowledge of future times is kept by God as his own right. It is what the Father has put in his own power, hidden with him. No one else can reveal what is to come. All his works are known to God, but not to us (Acts 15:18). It belongs to him alone to tell the end from the beginning, and in this he proves that he is God (Isaiah 46:10). He did sometimes let Old Testament prophets know times and seasons, such as the four hundred years of Israel’s slavery in Egypt and the seventy years of captivity in Babylon. But he has not chosen to tell you the exact times and seasons, not even how long it would be before Jerusalem was destroyed, though you were sure it would happen.

He did later reveal more to his servant John, but even that was in his own power to give or withhold as he saw fit. And what the New Testament reveals about times and seasons is so dark and hard to understand that, when we try to apply it, we should remember this lesson: it is not for us to be certain about the times and seasons. Buxtorf mentions a rabbinic saying about the coming of the Messiah: let the spirit of those who calculate the time perish.

He appoints their work, and with authority he assures them that they will be able to carry it out and succeed in it. It is not for them to know the times and seasons, because that would do them no good. But they are to know this, as Acts 1:8 says, that they will receive spiritual power when the Holy Spirit comes upon them. They will not receive it in vain, because they will be witnesses for him and for his glory. Their testimony will not fail, because it will be received in Jerusalem, in the surrounding country, and all over the world (Acts 1:8). If Christ makes us useful for his honor in our own time and place, that should be enough for us. We should not trouble ourselves about future times and seasons.

Christ tells them that their work will be honorable and glorious: they will be witnesses to him. They will proclaim him as king and spread the truths that will establish his kingdom and show his rule. They must openly and solemnly preach his gospel to the world. They will also confirm their testimony, not by an oath, as ordinary witnesses do, but by the divine seal of miracles and supernatural gifts. Some copies read, “You will be my martyrs,” and that fits as well, because they defended the truth of the gospel by their sufferings, even to death.

He also tells them that their power for this work will be enough. They did not have enough strength, wisdom, or courage in themselves. By nature, they were weak and foolish people. They had not dared to stand as witnesses for Christ at his trial, and they were not yet able to do so. But they would receive power when the Holy Spirit came upon them, or, as the words may be read, they would be moved and empowered by a better spirit than their own. They would have power to preach the gospel, to prove it from the Old Testament Scriptures, which they later did remarkably well (Acts 18:28), and to confirm it by miracles and by suffering. Christ’s witnesses receive power for the work he calls them to. Those whom he sends into his service he also equips for it, and he supports them in it.

He also tells them that their influence will be great and very far-reaching. They will be witnesses for Christ and carry his cause first in Jerusalem, where they must begin, and where many will receive their message, while those who reject it will have no excuse. From there their light will spread throughout all Judea, where they had once worked without success. Then they will move on to Samaria, even though at an earlier mission they had been forbidden to preach in the cities of the Samaritans. Finally, their usefulness will reach the ends of the earth, and they will become a blessing to the whole world.

After giving them these instructions, he leaves them (Acts 1:9). When he had said all he meant to say, he blessed them, as we were told in Luke 24:50. While they watched him and kept their eyes fixed on him as they received his blessing, he was gradually taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight. Here we see Christ ascending on high, not carried away as Elijah was by a chariot of fire and horses of fire, but rising into heaven by his own power, just as he had risen from the grave. His body was now, like the bodies of the saints at the resurrection, a spiritual body, raised in power and without decay.

Notice that he began his ascent in the sight of his disciples, while they were still watching. They did not see him rise from the grave, because it was enough for them to see him after he had risen. But they did see him go up toward heaven, and they watched him so carefully and closely that they could not have been mistaken. It is likely that he did not rise rapidly, but moved upward gently, giving his disciples fuller assurance.

He then vanished from their sight in a cloud, either a dark cloud, because God has said that he would dwell in thick darkness, or a bright cloud, showing the splendor of his glorious body. A bright cloud had overshadowed him at his transfiguration, and this was likely the same kind of cloud (Matthew 17:5). The cloud received him, probably when he had gone as far from the earth as clouds usually are. Yet it was not a broad cloud as we often see, but one that only enclosed him. In this way he made the clouds his chariot (Psalm 104:3). God had often come down in a cloud, and now he went up in one.

Dr. Hammond thinks that the clouds receiving him may have been the angels receiving him, because angelic appearances are often described by a cloud, comparing Exodus 25:22 with Leviticus 16:2. Through the clouds there is a kind of meeting point between the upper world and the lower world. Vapors rise from the earth in them, and dews come down from heaven. It was fitting, then, that he should ascend in a cloud, since he is the Mediator between God and man, the one through whom God’s mercies come down to us and our prayers go up to him. This was the last that was seen of him.

A great many witnesses watched him go into the cloud. If we want to know what became of him then, we can look at (Dan. 7:13), where one like the Son of man comes with the clouds of heaven and is brought before the Ancient of days.

The disciples, after he went out of their sight, kept looking up toward heaven (Acts 1:10). They did this longer than they should have. Perhaps they hoped Christ would come right back and restore the kingdom to Israel, and they were unwilling to believe they were truly parting with him for good. They still clung to his physical presence, though he had told them it was better for them that he should go away. Or perhaps they were looking after him, wondering whether he might be dropped again, as the sons of the prophets thought about Elijah (2 Kings 2:16). In that way, they might still get him back.

Or perhaps they expected some change in the visible heavens at Christ’s ascension. Maybe they thought the sun would be dimmed or the moon put to shame (Isa. 24:23) because Christ’s glory outshone them. More likely, they expected the heavens themselves to show joy and triumph. Perhaps they even hoped to see the glory of the unseen heavens as they opened to receive him. Christ had told them that one day they would see heaven opened (John 1:51), and they may have thought that time had come.

Then two angels appeared to them and brought a timely message from God. A great company of angels was ready to receive our Redeemer as he made his public entrance into the Jerusalem above, the heavenly city. We may imagine these two did not want to stay away then. Yet, to show how much Christ cared for his church on earth, he sent two of those who had come to meet him back to his disciples. They appeared as two men in white clothes, bright and shining, because, as part of their service, they truly serve Christ when they help his servants on earth.

The angels first corrected their curiosity: “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up into heaven?” By calling them men of Galilee, the angels reminded them where they had come from. Christ had given them great honor by making them his messengers, but they were still men, weak clay jars, and men of Galilee, unlearned men looked down on by others. The angels were saying, in effect, “Why do you stand here like rough Galileans, staring up into heaven? What more do you expect to see? You have seen all you were called here to see. Why keep looking? Why stand there as if you are frightened, confused, or lost for what to do?” Christ’s disciples should never be left standing helplessly, because they have a sure rule to guide them and a sure foundation to stand on.

The angels also strengthened their faith about Christ’s second coming. Their Master had often spoken about it, and the angels were sent at just the right time to remind them. “This same Jesus,” they said, “who was taken up from you into heaven, and whom you are watching after so longingly, is not gone forever. A day has been appointed when he will come back in the same way you saw him go. Do not expect him to return before that day.”

This same Jesus will come again in his own person, with a glorious body. The same Jesus who came once to take away sin by offering himself (Heb. 9:26, 28) will appear a second time, without sin. He came once in shame to be judged, and he will come again in glory to judge. The same Jesus who gave them their task will return to ask how they carried it out, he himself, and no other (Job 19:27).

He will come in the same manner. He went away in a cloud, with angels attending him, and he will come in the clouds, with countless angels with him. He went up with a shout and the sound of a trumpet (Psalm 47:5), and he will come down from heaven with a shout and with the trumpet of God (1 Thess. 4:16). They had lost sight of him in the clouds and in the air, and they could not follow him there now. But one day they will be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. When we are staring aimlessly or wasting time, the thought of our Master’s second coming should wake us up. When we are staring in fear, it should comfort and strengthen us.