As we preach and teach through the Book of Acts, there is a shout of triumph on every page. The early Church learned how to pray, and they saturated their lives with prayer. God gave them the victory. Now, compare the New Testament Christians with the average Christian today. Compare the early Church with the average church today. We are failing in our battle against the world, the flesh, and the devil; and, the reason that we fail, ladies and gentlemen, is that, primarily and fundamentally, we do not know how to pray. There’s not a failure in your life or in my life that is not a prayer failure….

I am going to give you from God’s Word, three marvelously, wonderful witnesses that will attest that Jesus Christ is the saving Son of God. God does not want us to have to be a question mark with our head bent over an exclamation mark, standing up straight and tall, saying, “Yes, praise God, I am a child of God.” Our text tells us about Cornelius. He was a Gentile. Up until this time, the Gentiles had not been added to the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. All those early believers were Jews. Cornelius was a Roman army officer. He’s from Italy—garrisoned there in Palestine. He was hungry to…

We are going to learn about Christ and the Old Testament. In Acts 10:43, Peter testifies in the household of Cornelius about the Lord Jesus. He says, “to him,” that is to Jesus, “give all the prophets witness.” When he said all the prophets, he’s talking primarily about the Old Testament. The New Testament had not yet been written. Would you like to be able to understand the Old Testament? Would you like to get into some of the mystery rooms of the Old Testament? There is a master key that unlocks the key to the mystery rooms of the Old Testament and that master key is the Lord Jesus…

The blueprint and the pattern for the Normal 21st Century Church are found in that first-century Church. For the Bible says: “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creation: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). Nature forms us. Sin deforms us. Schools inform us. Prisons reform us. But, only Christ transforms us. In Christ, we become a new person. A Christian is not just somebody who has become nice—he or she has become new. He doesn’t just turn over a new leaf—he or she receives a new life. Now, a Christian is not like a tadpole that has…

If Jesus Christ were to meet you face-to- face—literally, bodily, physically were to appear to you, and you had the opportunity to ask Him one question, What would it be? Suppose He said to you, “What do you want to know?” What would you ask Him?Do you know what I think it would be? I think you would ask Him this question: “Lord, what would You have me to do? n Acts chapter 9, Jesus appeared to a man named Saul and and that’s what he asked Him. We read in Acts 9:1-6: “And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the…

Is the devil for religion or against religion? Yes, Satan is for religion. He uses religion to oppose the Gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The devil’s opposition to the “true religion” began in the Garden of Eden. The first temptation that came to humankind, when Satan crawled his slimy, corroding path into the pages of history in the Garden of Eden was a religious temptation. Do you remember what Satan said to Eve? He said, “If you eat this fruit, then you will be like God.” He was saying to her, “I’m going to tell you how to be godly my way.” It wasn’t a temptation to…

A sales manager was trying to lift up the vision of some of his sales force. He went into the meeting and he took a piece of white poster board that had one black spot in the middle. He looked at everyone and said, “Let’s have a little creativity.” He asked the first person, What do you see there? He said, “Well, a black dot.” He asked another person, “What do you see?” She said, “A dot.” Everyone answered the same way. And he said, “Isn’t it strange that all of you saw the black dot, but none of you saw the white all around it.” I think so many…

If you are not a lover of winning the lost, then you probably have not been won by the Lord. God had only one Son and He was a foreign missionary. Jesus left a holy place to come to a hellish place; He left a blessed place to come to a broken place; He left a sanctified place to come to a sinful place; He left his crown in heaven to be lifted up on a cross on a Calvary’s hill. Jesus died the way He lived. In the Gospel narratives, Jesus lived with sinners and saints. On Calvary, He hung between two thieves. The one on the right received…

Stephen was a remarkable person who became like a fallen star. He brightly burned for God for a short period of time. His death was a disaster to the Church. Stephen was full of the Holy Spirit and had an outstanding ability to handle the Old Testament. Yet, on the outside, it seemed that his speech rendered only negative results. It was the trigger that set off the persecution of all Christians. His public testimony unleashed the anger of a Jew named Saul. Saul tried to extinguish Christianity as quickly as possible. Why was it necessary for Stephen to have such a brief ministry? Why did he have to get…

Dr. Elmer Towns The Global Church Network was the first to announce plans for the 2,000th birthday of the Church. On November 1, 2017, at the graveside of Martin Luther, the Protestant Reformer, in Castle Church, Wittenberg, Germany, we committed to do our best to complete the Great Commission by 2030. Much evidence points to Pentecost, 30 A.D., as the starting date for the Church. Some, however, will celebrate the Church’s birthday three years later, in 2033, because they believe Jesus died in 33 A.D. As a network, we are focusing on the 2000th birthday of the Church. Why are we looking to 2030, rather than 2033? “Jesus is the…