3. The Book of Acts
June 7th, 2009
Unity with Believers
Have you ever been white water rafting? My youth group went one summer before a CIY conference. A group of us went to this extreme games camp where there was rock climbing, ropes courses, and of course white water rafting. The last day we were there we went down this river on these inflatable tube boat things. Each raft carried 6-8 people plus the guide. The guides really knew the river. Some parts were nice and relaxing and some parts were really intense and exciting. The boat that was traveling next to mine had a daredevil guide. There was the one spot where the river dipped and the front of the boat would drop almost straight down. The guide on the boat next to me waited until the back of the boat launched up into the air and then used the momentum to kick himself off the raft. With rocks all around this guy basically catapulted himself into the air. One of the people in our group just happened to take a picture at this moment showing him in the air about 5-6 feet off of the boat. Then the river levels out only a few seconds later. Some people in the group started freaking out when they looked back to see their guide was gone. Then out of no where he lands back in the back of the boat picks up his ore and starts barking out instructions. It was one of the coolest things I have ever seen. There was one part of the river in particular that was really fun. It was a long path of white water that moved the rafts really fast downstream. Immediately after getting through it like a four year old child playing with there dad you just want to go: again! Again! It was so powerful and exciting you want to re-do that part of the river but you can’t. You can’t go back upstream. You get caught in a current and once you have moved passed a certain point there is no going back.
Sometimes were hear people talk of getting back to the New Testament church. What they are saying is they want to go back to the way things were before, they want to ride that exciting part of the river one more time. The problem is: you can’t. We cannot go back to being the New Testament church. History, culture, religion, and the very world around us has changed. Even if we wanted to we cannot simply hit the undo button and go back to the way things were. We cannot go back we can only move forward.
When you look at the New Testament church we see things that I really wish we could get back. Look at what happens with the early church: In Acts 2:41 Peter gives a sermon and 3,000 people come to a relationship with Christ. When you consider that at this time they would have only counted the men it is very likely that with women and children factored in this number could be 2-3 times bigger. That is the first day in the life of the New Testament church. Acts 2:47 then mentions that the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved. That would be pretty exciting to see. I remember about a year or so ago we had about two months where we had a baptism every week. It was amazing to be a part of. Can you imagine having that not just weekly but daily? In Acts 4 Peter and John were teaching in the temple and 5,000 men came to believe. Again the actual number of converts would likely be much higher when women and children were included. In Acts 6:1 the believers rapidly multiplied. We don’t know exactly what kind of numbers this would entail but if 5,000 converts are mentioned casually rapid multiplication would be something to see. In Acts 6:7 the number of believers greatly increased. No wonder people want to go back to the New Testament church. That must have been an exciting journey. 120 disciples of Jesus and 12 apostles are there at the beginning but their number grows by the thousands on multiple occasions. This is certainly an exciting part of the river. The church is moving. It is growing. The church is actually transforming the world around it. Wouldn’t it be amazing if we could go back to being a church like that? Too bad we can’t.
That does not mean however, that there are not some things about the New Testament church we can adapt. We may not be able to go back to being the New Testament church but there are some things we can learn from them. While we cannot go back to being that church we can have the same transforming effect on the community that they had. We can’t become them. We can however continue to carry out the mission of God just as they did. That is actually the goal of our vision. We seek to join together to become passionate followers of Jesus. That is what the New Testament church was. That is why they were so effective in the ministry. They passionately followed Jesus with their lives. God used the New Testament church to transform the world because they made themselves available to God. If we want to have a church that is powerful and effective like the New Testament church was we need to learn to be usable by God. So what does that look like? How can we make ourselves available so that God can use us?
Turn in your Bibles to Acts 2:42. If we see what the New Testament church did to transform the world we might learn to see what we need to do to be useable by God.
Ac 2:42 They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Ac 2:43 Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. Ac 2:44 All the believers were together and had everything in common. Ac 2:45 Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Ac 2:46 Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, Ac 2:47 praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
Notice that the church devoted themselves to the apostles teaching which is preaching and the word of God. They devoted themselves to fellowship within the community of believers. They devoted themselves to sharing in suffering with Christ through communion and to a relationship with God through prayer. This devoting themselves is an active process it was something they worked on. They did not just achieve these things by accident. They did not accomplish them naturally. It took effort for them to build these pillars of the church. It wasn’t easy and yet they devoted themselves to it. If you look over this list one of the items doesn’t seem as important as the others. Obviously the reading or hearing of God’s word is very important. Likewise prayer as our communication with God is clearly an important pillar of the church. Communion is our remembering, fixing our minds on, and celebrating what Jesus did for us on the cross. We certainly can’t go without that. Fellowship however while we might say is important may not seem as important to us as other items on this list. Of all four of these pillars fellowship is probably the most neglected. As a result of our individualistic society we are used to independence. I can’t tell you how many people I have met who believe that you don’t have to go to church to be a Christian. They believe that if you pray and seek God in your life you can be a Christian without ever going to church. They say things like: the church is not a building it is us so I can have church by myself I don’t need to go somewhere. Honestly there is a certain degree of truth to this but they are completely wrong. The church needs dynamic fellowship. This is why Family is one of our core values. It is why our vision starts of joining together to become passionate followers of Jesus. We need fellowship not just good greeting times where everyone shakes hands. We need to be more than just a friendly church we need fellowship where we have unity, and intimacy in the church. We need the kind of fellowship where our church family is closer to us that physical family. We need dynamic fellowship if we ever hope to accomplish what the New Testament church did. This concept of stay at home Christianity has led to the perception that from our list fellowship is not important.
When I was a little boy my family took me to the redwood forest in California. I remember running around and playing sliding around on some trees that had been knocked over. It was a lot of fun. If you have never seen a redwood they are amazing. Redwoods are the tallest trees and the largest living thing on earth. They can grow to as tall as 300 feet and some of them are over 2,000 years old. Typically the root system of a plant matches the above ground plant. If you look at a 20 foot Oak tree it will have about 20 foot deep roots. The bigger the plant the better root system it needs to have so that it can survive storms. Can you imagine how big the roots would be for a tree that stands 300 feet tall? I had thought that redwoods would have enormous roots running down to the core of the earth. That is not the case however. In fact their roots are actually very shallow. An oak tree one tenth the size of a redwood would have a deeper root system. So how can redwoods survive a storm? The redwood survives because its roots intertwine with the roots around them. The redwood interlocks its roots with its neighbors and when the winds blow and the storms rage the redwoods stand because they hold each other up. Their intertwined root system enables them to endure the storms because they support each other. In fact they need each other and so do we. We are a lot like redwood trees in that in order to survive the storm we need to support each other. This is the purpose of fellowship in the community of Christ. When we join together and build relationships we begin to develop an interlaced root system that will stabilize and support us through the storms of life. We play a vital part in each other’s faith.
The closer we stand in community the better we can endure the storms of life. People come hurting wondering why they have been so devastated trials in life. So often it is because they failed to engage themselves in the community of God and to allow their roots to interlace with others. There is always going to be pain in this life. There will always be frustrations and disappointments. Life has trials. In order to really survive those trials we need to be rooted in the community.
As a community Christians are expected to be there for each other. The truth is there are no Lone Ranger Christians. We can’t survive the storms of life if we do not support each other and allow others to support us. Just as redwoods need the roots of others to keep them standing so we need each other to stand. We are expected to be there for each other, hence if your brother is in need and you do nothing than the love of God is not in you. Which we see in 1 John 3:17.
1Jn 3:17 If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? 1Jn 3:18 Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.
God put us together for a reason. He blesses us for a reason. Sometimes the very reason that you have in abundance is so God may be glorified when you give to your brother in need. The church exists as the community of God. We are the shadow of heaven. It is our responsibility to provide for each other. It is our job to take care of each other. When our brother has financial need sometimes that means we make a sacrifice in our own lives so that there need can be met. The church should be a place where the glory of God is seen in our community. We rejoice with those who rejoice. We mourn with those who mourn. When there is pain we support. When there are trials we encourage. When there is conflict we mediate and push toward reconciliation.
The mark of the community of God is not an absence of conflict or trials but an attitude that moves towards unity and reconciliation. When we draw close together we will hurt each other. The temptation is to pull away from the pain but to do so prevents us from developing the unity we need. When we pull away we loose our connection to the others and our security to stand in the storms. When we pull away from the community we fall.
Following Christ is not easy. Life poses challenges, the world opposes us, and there is pain, hardship, and disappointment. How can we stand in such a life? Together. If we want to do what the early church did we need to join together to become passionate followers of Jesus because we can’t do it alone.
