Sobering Truths for Believers and Other Seekers

Luke, the beloved disciple and companion of Paul, has performed an immeasurable service for the Church of all ages by recording his brief history of the Early Church in the book of Acts. By doing so, he has left the church a compass for guidance; a model or example for us to follow. He is brief and precise, bold and disciplined, in his efforts. He does not write simply from the point of research, but from his firsthand personal experience. He had lived with them, walked with them, shared their woes and their wonders, their tests and trials, and he had participated in their fellowship as a follower of the Master and His cause.

The author has gone beyond just giving us places, events, personalities, and their struggles with the scribes and Pharisees, along with some of the forms of persecution under which some of their bright stars had fallen, like James and Stephen. Even though Luke talks freely about the influence of the mass conversions in the young church moving from thousands to multitudes, and giving attention to the miracles that astonished the unbelievers and inspired the believers; he moves further and deeper to capture and describe what has made the church rise so quickly with such authority, power and influence that those who opposed them confessed they had “turned the world upside down.”

(From the Preface)