Hope you are pleased with your A level results…Here’s is a cleaned up version of the lesson. Kenneth’s commentary (and hook if you are preparing it) is still in the post below. Cheers.

Main Point: As Christians, we have a calling to do God’s work (does your action match your belief) and our doing is in response to His love.

Theme Verse: Acts 1:8

Questions:
Who are you? What does it mean to be a Christian? What makes a Christian different? Oh don’t give them the answer to this yet. Have them write it down on a paper, or tell you but don’t give them an answer. Let them sit on it.

Read Acts 1:1-11

Who did God say the disciples were supposed to be?
(Answer in Acts 1:8, cross-reference to Matthew 28:18-20)

God was speaking to the apostles (his first eleven disciples) but as we will see in Acts, it was not just the apostles that were filled with the Holy Spirit but many believers, and every member of the early church took the instruction of preaching the gospel upon themselves.

Has God’s commission to be His witnesses to the “remotest part of the earth” been fulfilled? (Has everyone on earth heard the gospel?) …. Obviously, not yet… and as Christians (the people who know God) in Today’s world, this commission falls upon our shoulders.

What do you think it means to receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you? (Acts 1:8) To answer this question, ask yourself, what is this power for? It is to enable us to do God’s work. Why is this important?

As mere men, we know little about the will of God. Yes we can read the Bible but even when we read the Bible we need God to reveal the depth of His truths (See Psalms 119:18). Combine our lack of knowledge with our sinful nature and you will begin to understand how difficult doing God’s work can be. But God will not ask us to do something without providing the means for us to do it.

God knew that we have fallen so far that we don’t even want to do the things He created us to do. Don’t believe? How many of us have the desire to share the gospel? Because of our sin, we are not able to be His follower. That’s why He sacrificed His son Jesus.

One of Jesus’ names is Immanuel, which means ‘God is with us’. Although Jesus is not physically present with us now, if we ask God for the forgiveness of our sins through Jesus Christ, God sends us the Holy Spirit, which is God’s way of always being with us. Because of Jesus (who cleanses us from our sin) and the Holy Spirit (who dwells in us), we can know the will of God just like Jesus did (Acts 1:2). How? Pray.

Oh yeah, say to them ‘God is with you!’, and get them to say it to each other’ =]

OK, we have established that we can know the will of God and God has given the commission of being His witnesses to us, the people that know Him. So the question is does your action match your belief? Are you His witnesses? After becoming a Christian, have you taken an interest in God’s work or you sit back relax?

Actually you don’t have to do God’s work if you don’t want to.
Read Acts 1:12-26. Just like Matthias replaced Judas, God can always get someone to take your place. But God chose you (James 1:18) leh.

If you keep ignoring God… you put yourself at risk of forgetting who you are. Consider this logic map: Ignore God’s work -> Bored-> Find some other stuff to do, preferably stuff that YOU like-> End up doing your ‘work’-> Forgot about God...hmm...can you still really call yourself a Christian? Still not convinced? Was there a time your parents asked you to do something and you put off doing it till later....like much later....and you ended up not doing it? In the same way, if we keep putting off God, we can forget about Him totally. The Idle mind is the devil’s workshop. And any work you don’t do for God is work you do for yourself.

Also, you gotta remember, why else are we doing God’s work? John 3:16. Jesus died for our sins because He loved us… How are you going to respond to Him?

OK, application time... what are you going to do about it? share…

Some suggestions for your kids:
Make Prayer bookmark, kinda like a little simple bookmark that says stuff like: I prayed for you today, just like any other day, but Jesus loves you so, and I know; truth be told, so I made you a prayer anyway. And have them take this and pray for someone they know during the week and give that person this bookmark. If that person is a Christian ask them to challenge them to pass the bookmark on!

Leaders pray for them and erm well make them bookmarks b4 hand that say Proud to be a Christian!