Acts 11:19-30 by Robert Dean
Our passage backtracks in time to the scattering of believers after the persecution of Stephen. It is God who expands His Church. Compare God’s progress report on the expansion of His early Church to today’s Church Growth Movement and the compromises necessary to post growing numbers as an indication of success. Is it human methodology or transforming Truth that grows God’s Church? Learn the history of Phoenicia, Cyprus and Antioch where the Jewish believers fled and evangelized to the Jews. Follow Barnabas, the encourager, sent from Jerusalem to Antioch where he summons Paul for help and where the followers of Christ were first called Christians. See how the Church supports its own when Jerusalem suffers famine. Understand the focus of real growth in God’s plan for His Church.

Hear an answer to claims of those who have “been to heaven and back” and write a book about it.