The structure of Acts continues to impress me as I teach the book of Acts at my church. While I’ve studied Acts before at an in-depth level, teaching Acts has helped me see the structure afresh.
Before teaching the book, I thought the outline of Acts was rather simple: Modeled after Jesus’ post-resurrection commissioning in Acts 1:8, the apostles obeyed the command to be witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.
Yet it’s not quite that simple. As the outline of Acts reveals:
The mission of God is not linear.
While it’s purposeful, intentional, and centrifugal, it’s not linear.
Download the PDF version of this outline here so you can use it for teaching and preaching.
Download the JPEG version of it here to use however you see fit.
Here’s what I mean. Just because the mission moved progressively from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth, it doesn’t mean the apostles conquered one area and then moved to the next without looking back. Thus, while the mission moved centrifugally, it did not move linearly.
I believe this outline as a whole reveals three aspects of God’s heart.
God is the main actor of the story of Acts even though the disciples, deacons, and apostles did the work. God motivated their work, energized it, and brought it to completion.
The three aspects are:
1. God expands his kingdom centrifugally.
2. God nurtures his church as it grows.
3. God works through loci of authority.
Now, for each one in turn.
1. God expands his kingdom centrifugally.
As a business owner, I often think about growth methodology, strategy, and models. Since my business publishes books by Christian authors, unsurprisingly, I look to how God’s kingdom grows as a model for my methodology. This is because:
The nature of God’s kingdom impacts how this world works.
That is, the way God’s kingdom expands gives us insight into how anything of substance in this world expands, whether the purpose is for good or for ill.
God’s kingdom expands in a centrifugal manner.
- He didn’t just randomly spout and tout the good news of Jesus.
- He didn’t haphazardly plant churches.
- He didn’t leave his mission to chance.
He intentionally grew his kingdom—like any smart king does. He started with the Jews and Jerusalem and centrifugally reached the Greeks throughout the Greco-Roman world.
As I emphasize in my Acts class, God’s people in Acts joined his missional methodology to go first to the Jews, then to the Gentiles—in every town they entered. Even Paul on his Gentile missionary journeys did this everywhere he went. Yes, even in Corinth before he spoke to the Greek philosophers on the Areopagus, he went to the Jews first (Acts 17:17).
So we see Jerusalem as the starting point and a major touch point throughout the outline of Acts. Even when Paul was on his missionary journeys, he went back to Jerusalem en route each time.
Then between Paul’s second and third missionary journeys—when I believe the focal point of the early church changed from Jerusalem to Antioch—Paul still went to Jerusalem. As further evidence of this, Luke signifies Jerusalem as “the church” in Acts 18:22.
This leads to the next point.1
2. God nurtures his church as it grows.
Even though God seeks the nations—“the ends of the earth”—he still nurtures the church. You can see this in the life of Paul. Luke records what happens next in Acts 18: “After spending some time in Antioch, Paul set out from there and traveled from place to place throughout the region of Galatia and Phrygia, strengthening all the disciples” (Acts 18:23; see also 14:21–22 and 20:1–3).
Over and over again we see this theme of strengthening and encouraging the disciples. This is God nurturing his church.
So even the great missionary Paul cared about nurturing the church along the way as it expanded and grew. This reveals the heart of God to care for the bride amidst church expansion into the world.
God tends to the churches he plants.
This is one of those golden threads woven throughout Scripture, functioning as a story of warp against the woof of mission. That is, expansion into new territories and nurture of what’s been established go hand in hand in the growth of the church.
Understanding God’s heart here can instruct church leaders today. We should never focus solely on the mission nor solely on church nurture. It’s a both-and scenario in the long run.
As we continue to look at the outline of Acts, we find another principle at work.
3. God works through loci of authority.
I mention in my Acts class that the focal point in the early church changed from Jerusalem to Antioch. I explain that in detail in the class, for reference, but for this post, just the fact that the church had a focal point of authority in the early church reveals the heart of God.
My assumption is while the people of God moved and took initiative, God’s Spirit guided them along the way. So when they moved, we can often see the heart of God in their actions.
Throughout the history of the Jews, Jerusalem was the city of God—God’s dwelling place. But starting with the inauguration of King Jesus, we learn more about God’s presence: through the Holy Spirit, God promises to be with us wherever we go.
The presence of God is not bound by a location.
Many Jews in Jesus’ day thought God was bound somehow by location, but that’s not true. So while we know God is omnipresent, he also condescended to the human perception that gods live in temples. Yet Isaiah reminds us of this when God said, “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool” (Isaiah 66:1).
The lesson here is that God chose to work through loci of authority in Acts. Here’s what I mean.
On a macro level, the outline of Acts reveals a few movements:
- A movement from the authority of Jerusalem to the authority of Rome (Paul appealed to Caesar)
- A movement from the church in Jerusalem to the church in Antioch
- A movement through the governmental powers in various locations and levels
As one reads Acts and explores the nuances of these movements within authority structures, one can see this principle at work: God works through loci of authority.
A locus of authority is a place that manifests God’s delegated authority.
I use the word “locus” (“loci,” plural) because it best represents the connection between movement along a path and a center point. The dictionary defines “locus” as a:
Curve or other figure formed by all the points satisfying a particular equation of the relation between coordinates, or by a point, line, or surface moving according to mathematically defined conditions.
An example the same dictionary entry offers is “a parabola is the locus of a point that moves so as to be equidistant from a fixed point and a straight line.”
I like this image of a locus and a parabola for thinking about authority in the early church because there were fixed points of authority—Jerusalem, Antioch, and eventually Rome—that functioned as loci for the expansion of the church. While the early church grew throughout the world, these locations of authority served as anchor points for the church’s growth.
This explains the significance of the Jerusalem council in Acts 15, for example. And why the church sent delegates from Jerusalem to Antioch to confirm the council’s conclusions (Acts 15:22).
God works through people and places of authority.
He does have a kingdom after all.
Kingdoms function through people’s authority, who can be represented by the location in which they live. So when the church in Jerusalem sent a letter to the church in Antioch, that letter came with the authority of the leaders who lived there.
This focus on authority happened between Jerusalem and Antioch, but even when Paul appealed to Caesar, he appealed to the authority located in Rome, which represented in a sense, the authority of Caesar throughout the established world.
For more on how God works through delegated authorities, read my book The Revolutionary Disciple.
This relates to another aspect of the heart of God—the physical world.
God, the Great Storyteller
As I’ve emphasized, the outline for Acts reveals the growth of the early church as well as the heart of God.
God moved in a certain way, and God’s ways reveal his heart.
In summary:
- God moves centrifugally.
- God nurtures as he goes.
- God works through loci of authority.
When we take a step back, though, we can see on an even higher level how God told a good story. That is,
Acts is exciting and adventurous.
The desire. A good storyteller knows how to focus on a main character who wants one thing. God focused on Peter and Paul, yes, but really, it’s the story of the church.
Peter wanted to preach, and Paul wanted to “[testify] to the gospel of God’s grace” (Acts 20:24). They represented the early church as a whole, so the early church, the protagonist of Acts, had a single desire, which is the stuff of great storytelling.
The challenges. A good storyteller also presents challenges, which we see in how the church overcame challenges. Persecution, death, and trials throughout—these made for significant challenges. The ultimate victory in Acts was not primarily physical but spiritual. The church took ground spiritually with massive victories throughout the narrative.
The plot. And a good storyteller moves the plot through twists and turns, eventually bringing resolution. We see the church facing death, which feels sudden at times (James and Stephen, for example). We also read of Paul’s unexpected appeal to Caesar.
Oh no! Why did he do that? Didn’t see that coming!
Yet the resolution ended in Rome, where Paul slowly and steadily prepared to testify before Caesar.
But that’s not a resolution! we protest.
Or is it?
The beautiful reality of Acts is that the story doesn’t end with Acts 28.
We carry on the story of Acts even now. Acts tells a good story, but what makes it truly amazing is it’s alive and active today.
God, the Great Storyteller, wrote the stories of Acts, but then he invites us to join the story.
Subscribe to HIM Publications here to get long-form discipleship content delivered to your inbox each week.
