The Gospel of the Holy Spirit

Luke’s second volume is history
 
Luke, the author of the third God-inspired Gospel that is a required prelude to this work, continues to be open to the inspiration of God and prepares for us the first Church history in a unique way.
 
This gentile physician beloved by Paul (see Col. 4,14 and 2Tim. 4,10) continues a biblical history, which started in his Gospel, and describes for us how the process of God’s eternal salvation promised to the Hebrews is now being extended to the rest of the gentile world through the power and direction of the Holy Spirit. This is why Acts of the Apostles is at times referred to as the Gospel of the Holy Spirit.
 
This first volume on Church history or the history of Christianity, written before 70 AD, can be summed up in one verse, “…you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1,8).
 
This verse from the past is our clear God-mandated path for the future!
 
The three key themes in Acts of the Apostles are simple:
 
Jesus Christ is exalted by God as our redeemer, Lord, savior and messiah. All this clearly manifested through the Paschal Mystery of his passion, death, resurrection and ascension into heaven.
 
The Holy Spirit is essential for the life of the Church. Beginning from Pentecost, and all through the life of the Church, disciples must be open to the Holy Spirit, also known as the spirit of Christ or the spirit of God, if they are to fulfill their mission to proclaim to the world the Good News of salvation. The Church needs to breathe in the life of the Spirit to be able to be the community of life, love and joy that we are called to be. Through the Holy Spirit we see the development of a Church hierarchy.
 
The Church is the continuation of the mission of Christ. The Church is the risen Christ still present and acting in the world in a special way through a young and developing liturgical life. The Church lives by and through prayer and the Eucharist! Through this liturgy, celebrated on the first day of the week, the Church learns to be a generous and loving family of faith. We also see how, as in every family, at times we don’t see eye-to-eye and differences of opinion must be resolved as they were in the first council of the Church in Jerusalem.
 
The book of the Acts of the Apostles is a wonderful God-inspired history. Let me rephrase that, it is still about Christ, it is his story as told through the Holy Spirit.