The book of Acts is about the deployment of the apostles and leaders of the early church. What do I mean by “deployment?” Well, to be deployed is to actively be on a mission. Deployment involves boots on the ground. Deployment involves being sent into a specific area for the purpose of liberating or defending people. It is about pushing back and silencing the enemy. A true disciple of Jesus is a deployed disciple.
We are supposed to report for active duty. We are trained to be deployed, to take what we learn and to actively take down our enemy, Satan, and to liberate captives, lost people. An army in training should expect to be an army deployed one day.
Listen, without the deployment of those early believers, what happened on the Cross and on the day of Pentecost would have died out. Where would we be without the accounts of the witness of the early church and the instruction of Paul and the other New Testament writers? They didn’t keep their experience with Jesus to themselves. They were deployed for the cause of Christ.
I want to share some things we see from the book of Acts about being Deployed Disciples.
- Deployed disciples go in the name of Jesus.
See Acts 3 and 4.
American military soldiers who are deployed won’t be shy about taking territory in the name of the United States of America. They won’t hesitate to plant our flag, to make their identity known when they are fighting for freedom and peace. They are proud to be soldiers of the U.S. Why should we shrink from being in the Lord’s army? Why should we be quiet about who sent us to do His work? If we believe there is power in the name of Jesus to break every chain, we need to be slipping it into every conversation we can. We need to be boasting and posting about the name of Jesus. We need to pray with people in Jesus’ name.
Listen, the world is using Jesus’ name casually, caustically. His name flows off their lips, but from calloused and corrupted hearts. Why are we, the ones who KNOW HIM, the ones who are called to SERVE HIM, why are we not living deployed to use His name in the ways that bring revelation about His healing and saving power. Let’s live deployed to honor His name wherever we find ourselves.
- Deployed disciples live by the motto, “We must obey God rather than men.”
The apostles lived with constant threats from the religious leaders. In Acts 4, after Peter explained to the religious leaders who Jesus was and the power His name had for healing and salvation, they were charged, verse 18, not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus.
Listen, Satan knows if he can silence the name of Jesus, if he can get us to clam up about the relationship we have with the resurrected Lord, he can limit the expansion of God’s Kingdom on earth. Praise God for the bold determination of Peter and John to please God in all things. In response to the threats made to them, they said in Acts 4:19, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, 20 for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.” They weren’t taking their marching orders from earthly authorities.
Acts 5:28-29-“We strictly charged you not to teach in this name, yet here you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching, and you intend to bring this man’s blood upon us.” 29 But Peter and the apostles answered, “We must obey God rather than men.
There it is. Deployed disciples have an allegiance to God alone. It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks or threatens to do to a deployed disciple, that person is on a mission to carry out their Commanding Officer’s orders, and our orders are to speak and preach and teach the name of Jesus above all names!
- Deployed disciples recruit others to serve.
In Acts 16 we read about how Paul tapped Timothy and asked him to start traveling with him to preach about Jesus. Timothy, much younger than Paul, agreed, and began a mentoring relationship with Paul that led to powerful Kingdom results. We read in Acts 16:4-5-4 As they traveled from town to town, they delivered the decisions reached by the apostles and elders in Jerusalem for the people to obey. 5 So the churches were strengthened in the faith and grew daily in numbers.
What a strategic partnership! When churches are strengthened in the faith and growing in number, you know leadership has been effective and Holy Spirit empowered! Paul starting equipping Timothy to preach the Gospel.
- Deployed disciples are led by the Spirit of God.
Acts 8 tells the story of a disciple named Philip who encountered the angel of the Lord. The angel of the Lord spoke to Philip and told him to go south on the road that went between Jerusalem and Gaza. It was a desert area. The Spirit was going to take Philip off the grid, off the beaten path, for a special assignment. Philip took off and encountered a man who was in charge of the treasury of the Ethiopian Queen. It “just so happened” that the man was reading from the book of Isaiah at the moment Philip drew near, and he was reading out loud.
The Holy Spirit told Philip to go over to the man’s chariot, so Philip did, and he interrupted the man as he read and said, “Do you understand what you are reading?” to which the man replied, “How can I, unless someone guides me?” The man invited Philip to jump up in his chariot and explain the Scriptures to him. The very passage he had been reading was Old Testament prophecy about Jesus and what He endured. Verse 35 says, Philip opened his mouth, and beginning with this Scripture he told him the good news about Jesus. Acts 8:35
Guess what happened next? As they road along, they came to some water, and the man asked to be baptized. They stopped the chariot and both of them climbed out, got into the water, and Philip baptized the man. But wait, it gets even better! When they came up out of the water, Holy Spirit carried Philip away! I am telling the truth! The man saw Philip no more, but he went on his way rejoicing.
Philip was a deployed disciple, ready to move out at the command of the Spirit, and after Hell lost another one in that desert on the road to Gaza, the Holy Spirit picked Philip up and transported him to another location. I’m not making this up! Verse 40 says, “Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he passed through, he preached the Gospel to all the towns until he came to Caesarea!”
When you read the book of Acts, it is clear that those being deployed were being sent by the Holy Spirit.
What would it take for us to move from being people of God in training to active duty? How could we move from simply being disciplined disciples to deployed disciples?
- Can we become intentional about taking and proclaiming the name of Jesus everywhere we go?
- Can we die to the opinion of man and resolutely live to obey God in all things?
- Can we call up and train up others to be deployed with us? ‘
- Can we cultivate a sensitivity and obedience to the voice of the Holy Spirit?
We must be more than dedicated to our training. We must be determined to be deployed. If we truly want to be like Jesus, we will seek to live sent, just as He was. We will seek to bring salvation to the lost, just as He did. Soldiers, God is calling each of us to active duty. Will we answer the call?
