Thanks, guys.
Two more questions, if you don't mind:
1.) Is acts the only book that has mention of the Disciples speaking, "in Jesus name", after they were baptized with the Holy Spirit?
It's the only narrative text in the New Testament apart from the Four Gospels. The rest of the New Testament is composed of epistles from Paul, Peter, John, Jude and James (and an anonymous epistle, to the Hebrews). Even the Book of the Revelation, which belongs to the genre of literature known as apocalyptic (the word apocalypse means "unveiling" or "revelation"), is actually an epistle, specifically an encyclical.
2.) Is there anything in Acts that would lead one to believe that what they said actually happened after the disciples were baptized? Meaning, I've heard stories about whether or not Revelation was the "last" book, so it would be nice to somehow proove the chronological order of John and then Acts.
The Acts itself refers to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost early on in the text (chapter 2), the rest of the text is an account of the apostles going out and acting and fulfilling the mission Jesus gives them prior to His ascension in chapter 1. The Acts is actually the second part of a two-volume work often called "Luke-Acts" since the author of Luke also wrote the Acts, and addressed it to the same person as a continuation of where the Gospel of Luke left off.
As far as textual dating is concerned, when the Acts was written depends largely on when Luke was written. There's some debate on this front, the Acts has to have been written later since it's the second part of the work. So if Luke was written around 80-90 CE then Acts appears sometime later, though likely not that much later. Though of course another argument places the authorship of Luke-Acts prior to the year 70 CE since Acts ends during Paul's first imprisonment.
It's well acknowledged that Paul was executed during the reign of Nero, which means before the year 69 CE, common dates are between 62-65 CE. Given how much time the author of Acts spends detailing the activity of Paul it seems rather strange to end the text while Paul is still alive and not mention his second imprisonment and subsequent martyrdom. Which leads many to believe it may have been written earlier based on the internal evidence itself.
As far as the text of the Revelation, few question that it was written near the end of the 1st century, around 95 CE. Ancient historians such as Eusebius place the penning of the Revelation to the reign of Domitian, which was the last decade of the 1st century.
Thus regardless of when the Acts was written, the events it's talking about occur prior to the destruction of Jerusalem and may have been written before as well (though obviously that's a matter of debate) since its main focus, Paul, is still very much alive to the very end of the text and, again, he died under the reign of Nero.
Additionally, the Gospel of John, being a Gospel, is about the life, ministry and passion/resurrection of Jesus. Which clearly makes its subject matter pre-Acts which is post-ascension material. The Gospel of John itself was probably written rather late, the last quarter of the 1st century at the earliest, the first quarter of the 2nd century at the latest (our earliest manuscript of the New Testament is from John and is dated to around the year 125 CE which means the text had already been circulating for at least a couple decades by that time).
-CryptoLutheran
