The New Society
Acts 2: 42-47
Margaret Thatcher is famously credited with having said ’there is no such thing as society’. And even though we remember the phrase, I think most of us have long forgotten the context in which it was said. No doubt it has been often taken out of context and misquoted. Nevertheless, I think there is an important truth here, which is that society today is becoming more fragmented, people are becoming more isolated, and communities are becoming more fragile. And the general consensus is that this is not a good thing
And although this isolation, fragility and fragmentation is true on a national and social level, it can often be a problem for the church. But I do not believe that this is God’s vision for his people. And to get an understanding of what God’s vision for his church may be, we have a very good starting point in our reading this morning taken from Acts 2. (page 1095 NIV).
Now as we saw last week, at Pentecost, the early church became the spirit filled body of Christ. They were radically and deeply stirred by the Holy Spirit, and this made a significant and outstanding difference to them. It changed them, they became the living church.
And our reading this morning I think gives us four marks of that new Christian community which can help us to understand God’s vision for his people, God’s vision for his new community, his new society.
The church had a teaching relationship with the Apostles
First of all, we see that the Christian community had a relationship, a teaching relationship with the Apostles. That may be a bit surprising. But it is important to understand that a living church is a learning church. The first thing that we read here is that the fellowship of the believers ‘devoted themselves to the apostles teaching’. You might say that the Holy Spirit opened a school in Jerusalem, with three thousand pupils. It is interesting to note that this group of believers, newly filled with the Spirit, were not enjoying some kind of mystical experience which led them to neglect their intellect, or despise theology. Jesus describes the Holy Spirit as the ‘ Spirit of truth’, and here we see that these people, truly filled with the Holy Spirit, were eager to learn. They devoted themselves to the apostles teaching. They took it seriously and got stuck in to learn.
And I believe that this is an important thing for us to understand. There are people who wonder why we have sermons in church. There are people who wonder why we need to have study groups, or why the Rector is keen to run the courses he does, such as God’s Big Picture last autumn. But the fact is that the living church is a learning church. It is a church which is devoted to the apostles teaching. It is a church in which there is a relationship of teaching, a community of teaching, and environment of learning. And it has been my experience that when a Christian community learns together, it really does become a community, in which strong and lasting relationships are formed. It becomes a new society. And that is part of God’s vision for his people.
The church had a sharing relationship with each other
Secondly, we see that the Christian community in Jerusalem and a sharing relationship with each other. As well as devoting themselves to the apostles teaching, they also ‘devoted themselves … to the fellowship’ v42. We also read that ‘all the believers were together and had everything in common.’ V44. This word fellowship is the well-known Greek word koinonia, which really expresses the commonality of our Christian life and all that we share as Christian believers.
There are things that we share in together, especially the grace of God. Many things separate us - age, gender, background, wealth, but we are united in having the same heavenly Father, the same saviour and Lord, and the same indwelling Holy Spirit. It is what we share in together in God and his grace that makes us united, makes us one.
There are also things that we share out together. Koinonia is the word that St Paul used when he was organising a collection among the Greek churches to provide support for other poorer churches. The adjective derived from koinonia means generous.
So how did this work out? In v45 we read that they sold their possessions and goods and gave to anyone as he had need. This is a little bit disturbing, and it would be very easy to jump over it. There is a line of thought which suggests that we should all be in some kind of monastic community without any possessions of our own. But that isn’t borne out by the Bible. In v46 we read that ‘they broke bread in their homes’. So clearly they had not sold their houses. And in Acts 5 we see that the sin of Ananias and Sapphira was not that they kept back part of their property, but they kept back part of their property while pretending to give it all. So the issue here is not that we need to give up everything, but that we need to make clear decision before God about how we use our possessions.
What is clear here is that the early Christians loved one another, which is hardly surprising, since the first fruit of the Spirit is love. And in that love they cared for those of their Christian family who were in need, and shared with them their goods. And this principle remains with us. It seems to me that we cannot say that we share in the same heavenly Father and yet not be prepared to share out all that we have with other members of the Fathers family, our brothers and sisters. Our God is a generous God, and his people must be generous too. And one of the marks of the early church was that they had a generous sharing relationship with each other.
The church had a worshipping relationship with God
As well as being devoted to learning and sharing, we can see that the living church is a worshipping church. For that early church in Jerusalem was ‘ devoted to the breaking of bread and to prayer’. The breaking of bread is evidently a reference to the Lord’s Supper, but is also likely to have included a fellowship meal. The word prayer is more literally ‘the prayers’, and seems to be referring to prayer meetings.
And there seems to be a real balance about their worship. It took place in the temple, but also appears to have taken place in their homes. They don’t appear to have rejected the formality of the temple worship, but clearly supplemented this with more informal meetings in their homes and with the distinctively Christian worship in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. So their worship was a mixture of formal and informal.
Their worship was also a mixture of joyful and reverent. The word used for praising God in verse 46 speaks of an exuberant outburst of joy. And so it should, for one of the fruits of the spirit is joy. And sometimes this kind of joy is not encouraged by some of our ecclesiastical traditions. But their worship was also reverent. We see in verse 43 that everyone was filled with awe. The living God had sent his Spirit upon them, and they bowed down before him in that mixture of wonder and humility that is worship.
I wonder if our worship reflects that mixture. That mixture of formal and informal, that mixture of joy and reverence.
There are some that take the view that the only valid way to worship is that which takes place in church on Sunday morning using the Book of Common Prayer. That clearly cannot be sustained on the basis of what the early church shows of God’s vision for the Christian community. There is that mixture of formality and informality. There is a mixture of worship in church or the temple and in people’s homes. There are times when I have been to church and wondered if I had come to a funeral service by mistake. And there are other services which are frankly flippant and trite. But that is not how it should be. Our worshipping relationship with God should be full of joy, should be full of wonder, and one which brings us closer to him and to each other.
The church had a witnessing relationship to the world
Now there is a danger of imagining that the early church was very self-centred. But it is clear that the early Christians were also committed to mission. They clearly had a witnessing relationship with the world around them. They did not live in some kind of spiritual ghetto. For in verse 47 we read that ‘the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.’ They had witnessing relationship with the world around them. We’ve seen earlier in the book of Acts that the Apostles were effective preachers, but they were undoubtedly witnessing through the enthusiasm that they had for their faith, and also by the clear love for each other evidenced in their common life. And there are three important lessons in this verse. The first is that the Lord did it. We may share our faith in our words and in our lives, but ultimately it is the Lord who draws people into relationship with him. It is the Lord who does it. Secondly, the Lord did two things together. He added to their number those who were being saved. He did not add people to the church without saving them, or save them without adding them to the church. Salvation and church membership go together, not least because being one of God’s children makes us part of his family and in a relationship with each other. And thirdly we see that the Lord added people to the church and saved them every day. This was no occasional activity, reserved for special occasions. People were entering a new relationship with God and each other on a daily basis.
As Christians today, we often focus a great deal on our worship, and the things we do together as believers. And we have a tendency to forget that this is only part of the story, and that sharing what we believe is very much part of what it means to be part of the Christian community. As a result, we tend not to expect God to be working in people’s lives, bringing them into relationship with him and with us. And so, if we really want to be that new society, that new community that has God’s vision for his people, we need to recover this expectation today.
Numerous studies show that isolation and loneliness are major problems in our world today. But this is not how it is meant to be. Even the Time Lord, Doctor Who, needs a companion to stop him being lonely! And contrary to what Margaret Thatcher may (or may not) have said, there is such a thing as society, and it is part of God’s vision for his people and his world.
I believe that God is calling us to reflect his vision for his people. I believe that God is calling us to be that new society that we can see modelled in the early church. I believe that God is calling us to be a church where the Bible is taught, a church where there is a loving, caring and sacrificial fellowship, a church where there is authentic worship, and a church where there is a real expectation that God will be adding to our numbers.
And so let us examine our own situation, and seek God’s direction and power as we work with him to build that new society that has the power to turn the world upside down.
I am indebted to John Stott’s book, ‘Through the Bible, through the year ‘ as the main resource for this sermon.
