Text: Acts 2:42-43, Title: Koinonia Ekklesias, Date/Place: NRBC, 7/1/07, AM
A. Opening illustration: Some story about the reformers kicking off the Reformation with a conviction to recapture the spirit of the NT church.
B. Background to passage: Luke gives us a glimpse of the life of the early church in detail. And if we want to attempt to have a biblical church, this is the start of the record of how the early church turned the world upside down in the span of a few hundred years.
C. Main thought: this text and others like it are incredibly important to our understanding of the way church should be today. We will see eight focuses (things they were obstinately committed and devoted to) of the first church of the apostles, four now, and four tonight.
A. Apostolic teaching (v. 42)
1. The first thing and the last thing mentioned in a first-century list were usually the most important thing. And what we see in the early church is a clear emphasis on learning and maintaining the doctrines of the apostles. These were the men who spent time with Christ, and whom He commissioned to go forth teaching and baptizing in His name. This indicates that even during the times of the first church a body of correct teaching was be developed and codified. This continued in the compilation of the NT.
2. Hosea 4:6, 1 Pet 2:2, James 1:22-25,
3. Illustration: the first thing that Dr. Platt did this week was to stand up and quote verbatim the last three Psalms (148-150), the new believers in the underground church that Dr Platt visited studying the word for 12 hours a day in preparation for service and ministry, the truly sad thing about it all was that his deep teaching was beyond most of these kids, and even if it wasn’t beyond them, it was the first time that they had heard much of it, “A believer should count it a wasted day if he does not learn something new from, or have his life enriched by the Word every day.” MacArthur,
4. We live in one of the most educated and accessible societies ever in the history of the world to biblical truth. And yet it does not translate into a people full of biblical truth. We will be held accountable. Are we as a church really committed to the teaching of the Apostles? Does this text mandate that we have some kind of systematic plan to teach the “whole counsel of the word?” The reason that we have lost two generations now is that in one we failed to teach accurately and sufficiently the word, thus we are stuck with evolution, abortion, self-esteem, etc. Are we content with a basic knowledge? Many of you do not attend Sunday School, DT, Wed night, because you really lack a hunger to learn more. When was the last time that you read something that you are quite sure that you have never read before in the bible? And I know that I sound like a broken record on this one, but really I shouldn’t have to beg you to study the word. One writer went on to say that a great evidence for genuine conversion was a hunger for the word. But we must also remember that the reason they wanted the teaching was to put it in practice in their lives.
B. The Lord’s Supper (v. 42)
1. We are going to skip fellowship for now, even though that is where I get part of the title for this message. The “breaking of bread” was not simply the sharing of meals, although that was a part of their life too, but a reference to Communion. This was a constant part of the life of the early church. There is good evidence that the first church observed this ordinance (define ordinance) at least weekly. This was not only a time where they remembered the death of Christ, which was central to everything in the faith, but a time where they expressed their unity and commitment one to another as the body of Christ. This was a time for self-examination (of sin and service), purging of old sin, and accountability.
2. 1 Cor 11:23-34, John 6:48-58,
3. Illustration: If you give a street drunk a bottle of expensive alcohol, he will appreciate it the same as he would a cheap bottle of booze. Why? He does not know what he has. Likewise, whoever eats and drinks the Lord’s Supper in ignorance, fails to enjoy the true richness of what she is consuming! …they broke off a tiny little piece of a wafer, and placed it in the elderly gentleman’s mouth, and poured in a tiny sip of grape juice; and sure enough, the man swallowed. He never woke up. Neither do many people today.
4. This is another area where we tend to get so comfortable with routine that we fail to realize the significance of it. You can tell when it becomes routine if: you allow your mind to wonder, you don’t do any real self-examination, you simply want it to hurry, you don’t realize the seriousness of your own sin, when we don’t give the warnings and instruction to others. How did you approach the Lord’s Table last week? Did you confess any sin? Did you examine your function within this body? Did we eat in unity as one body, or is the unity in word only?
C. Corporate Prayer (v. 42)
1. The early church felt the compulsion to have prayer. It wasn’t just a meeting that they had once a week where they voiced all the concerns and prayed for five minutes. The word is plural, meaning multiple kinds of praying. They met daily at the regular Jewish times for prayer and at gathering for the church to seek the face of God.
2. Acts 4:31, Luke 18:1, 7, Col 4:2,
3. Illustration: I remember the first time that I heard the altar prayer at Bell Ave…Our success in Maine was due to hundreds of people praying every month for specific needs, and the NAMB prayer chain praying in general, Dr. Platt spoke of the prayer time they had with the underground church where there were puddles of tears when people arose, all major revivals in history are immediately preceded by excessive prayer,
4. Prayer meeting tends to attract only the faithful few. There seems to be no sense of duty or urgency about the duty of churches to stand in the gap of intercession for the nations, for lost people, for her own business. We are commanded to be persistent in prayer, knowledgeable in prayer, fervent in prayer, purposeful in prayer, and to pray in the Spirit (define). And yet we usually offer up generalities that accomplish little. We use prayer to do lots of things in our church, but rarely to be the “slender nerve that moves the muscles of omnipotence.” When was the last time that NR truly met for the purpose of prayer, and really gave ourselves stubbornly to it? What do you do when we have prayer in service? Do you link your mind to the prayer of the person praying or beseech the Lord on your own? We agree in the covenant with each other to pray for one another and the advancement or furtherance of the Kingdom agenda through NRBC. Recently I have been moved to seek God more specifically for Him to send the Holy Spirit to revive us here at NRBC. I passed along to the deacons that at 6 am on Mon-Thurs there would be a time of prayer for the Spirit to come and move at NRBC. Meet with us in spirit.
D. Sense of Awe (v. 43)
1. This is really a condition of the early church, rather than a focus. Luke explains that the church had a supernatural character about it. Signs and wonders were done, that along with everything else that the church was doing created an awe for God about the people. This is the word Phobos, from which we get our word phobia. And every other time it is used in the NT, it is translated “fear.” They had a holy awe or reverent fear of God as a body of people. They really did stand amazed in the presence of the Nazarene, and all that He was doing among His church. When they came to church they did not have a business as usual mentality. They had a posture of prostration before a holy, active, working Savior. They had a sense that Jesus was in the house, and that was scary, because of His holiness and their sinfulness
2. Ps 33:8, 96:9, Rev 14:7,
3. Illustration: but as I watched you worship last week, I saw people yawning, gazing off, staring straight ahead, many not singing, nor participating in any way, can you imagine when angels came to Sarah and Abraham and Him yawning, or being there with Isaiah as his eyes gaze upon the Lord of Hosts and simply kicking back and spectating, or sensing the moving of the Spirit on Patmos with John and looking upon the feet of fine brass, blinding white raiment, eyes like fire, hair white as snow, with a sharp sword coming out of his mouth, then trying not to nod off? You know how the best worship service this week began—with 1300 students and adults being silent before God, meditating on scriptures that declared the awesomeness of God,
4. And the point is not “look happy, busy, and worshipful, because the preacher is watching” but the simple fact that God is worthy of all our attention, effort, and praise. And to not give it to Him demeans Him and belittles Him. But really, that is probably the problem anyway, we think way too little of God. There is no holy fear, because we don’t believe He really will do anything. We don’t come with a sense of expectation that God will speak or save or move, because we don’t really think that He will. This kind of worship even stifles the Spirit because He is grieved that you don’t consider Him worthy of your effort. And this is the God who lives inside of you, and satisfies the deepest longings of your soul, and freed you from your bondage and rebellion by pouring out His wrath upon another in your stead, His very own Son. A sense of awe commands immediate repentance and self-examination, lest we be consumed because His patience and mercy has grown thin for our wickedness. A sense of awe causes humility in the realization that this awesome God is mighty to save you in your sin. A sense of awe compels us to worship with all our might even when we don’t feel like it, or all our preferences about style aren’t met.
A. Closing illustration: a good Conrad Grabel and George Blaurock baptized each other in the fountain in the town square of Zurich, Switzerland on Jan 21, 1525, because they were convinced that the reforms of Luther and Zwingli were not enough, and that the church should be made up of baptized believers (baptized as adults) and it should be separate from state control. They began to be called Anabaptists, or rebaptizers, and persecuted as heretics. “The martyrs were many—probably more than those who died during the three centuries of persecution before the time of Constantine. The manner of their death varied from region to region, and even from case to case. With ironic cruelty many were drowned. Others were burned to death, as had become customary with heretics centuries earlier. Some were tortured to death, or drawn and quartered. The stories of heroism in such difficult circumstances would fill several volumes. And still, the more fiercely it was persecuted, the more the movement grew.” All this they did in pursuit of a God-honoring, Christ-exalting, world-engaging, disciple-making, NT church
B. IT IS THAT IMPORTANT! Oh, New River, I would to God that we could teach the whole counsel of apostolic doctrine to the point that it rings in our ears as we sleep at night and that we would talk about it when we rise up, lie down, and bind it to our foreheads. I would to God that we would eat the Lord’s Supper in sweet unity and purity that this church has not experienced in some time. I would to God that prayer would go forth from us that accomplishes much to the glory of God among the nations. I would to God that we, at New River, would recapture a sense of awe in our lives for Jesus Christ, and meet and bow down for worship based on that holy reverent fear! We should weep and wail for our church at the smallness of our desire for glorifying Christ in his church, and beg His forgiveness, and the rekindling of the flame that comes from the moving of the Holy Spirit.
C. Invitation to commitment
