Average is not good enough
I’m sure many of you are Peanuts fans like me. One day Linus came home with his report card. As he turned on the TV, his sister Lucy scoffed at his grade: “You got a “C” in history? That’s only average.” Linus defended himself: “So what? I’m an average student in an average school in an average community. What’s wrong with being average?” Lucy retorted, “Because you’re capable of doing much better.”
How many of us settle for just average eh?
Average man Average Woman
The average man is 34.4 years old. The average woman is 45.
He is married with two children. She has 2.5 children (married?)
earns £17,500 per year earns £16,000 per year
sleeps for 6 hours on a work night. Sleeps 6hrs 45 minutes (prob every night)
The average man is 5’ 9" tall. The average woman is 5’4” tall
weighs 175 pounds (12.5 stone) Weighs 152 pounds (10.8 stone)
Takes a size 9 shoe Takes a size 5 show
I wonder how close are you to the average?
Average Christian
The average Christian will, over the course of their life (about 35 - 40 years):
Attend more than 1,600 church services
hear more than 1,600 sermons,
sing over 20,000 christian worship songs,
participate in over 10,000 public prayers...
and will lead zero people to faith in Jesus Christ in the course of their Christian lifetime.
It’s a sobering and sad statistic. How close are you to being an average Christian? As Lucy said to Linus ‘we’re all capable of doing much better’.
Average Disciples
Those 12 disciples that Jesus chose to follow him were just ordinary, average people. Peter, Andrew, James and John were just ordinary, average, everyday fishermen, living ordinary, average lives, doing ordinary, average jobs. Matthew was just an ordinary, average, everyday tax collector, living an ordinary, average life, doing an ordinary, average job.
But then they met Jesus and they became average, ordinary people, living extra-ordinary lives. That’s what happens. When ordinary, average people have an encounter with Jesus Christ they become average, ordinary people living extra-ordinary lives.
But it doesn’t end there. These disciples didn’t remain average people. They didn’t remain ordinary people. When they first met Jesus Christ they became average, ordinary people living extra-ordinary lives – but when they met the risen Christ – they became extra-ordinary people living extra-ordinary lives – and the book of Acts is where that transformation, from the average and ordinary, to the extra-ordinary, takes place.
Facts about Acts
So over the next few weeks we’re going to be looking at the ‘Facts about Acts’. Many people have pointed out how similar life in the first century is to life in the twenty first century. Back then Christians lived in a predominately pagan culture where the vast majority of people had no knowledge of God.
They lived under Roman rule and as Christianity began to spread the Roman rulers reacted first with apathy, then with curiosity, and then finally with outright hostility.
Those early Christians proclaimed a message that Rome just could not accept: Their message that - Jesus is Lord. In the first century if a Christian stood up in a public gathering and shouted, “Jesus is God,” no one would have objected because everyone knew the Romans permitted you to worship whatever god you chose. But, let that same man shout, “Jesus is Lord,” and he would be arrested and put to death - because as far as Rome was concerned - Caesar was Lord. So to proclaim the lordship of Jesus Christ was a direct attack on the supremity of Rome itself.
And we live in very similar days. No one cares about your religion as long as you keep it to yourself. No-one cares about what you believe – as long as you believe it quietly. No-one cares what religion you are – as long as you do it in private. But if you dare stand up and proclaim that certain things are right and others are wrong, if you stand up and claim the ultimate truth of the gospel - you will be branded an intolerant bigot—or worse.
We need to be extra-ordinary christians!
And it takes extra-ordinary people, living extra-ordinary lives to proclaim the truth of the Gospel. It takes extra-ordinary people, living extra-ordinary lives to proclaim that Jesus is Lord. . It takes extra-ordinary people, living extra-ordinary lives to proclaim that there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we can be saved – and it’s the name of Jesus Christ. We need to be extra-ordinary people, we need to be extra-ordinary Christians, we have to be living extra-ordinary lives.
And that’s why we’re going to be looking at the book of Acts. The Book of Acts shows us how the those early Christian responded when living in a predominately pagan culture. And it teaches us about the worldwide mission of the Christian church.
Jesus didn’t want a Jewish church or a Roman church or a Greek church or even a British church. He wanted a church that would include people from every tribe and nation and every language on the face of the earth. And the only way that he can do that is by using extra-ordinary people, living extra-ordinary lives. He uses Spirit-filled Christians to take the message from one place to another, and from one person to another, sharing the gospel, winning the lost, and passing the faith along one person at a time.
And I want to say three things this morning about this opening chapter of the Book of Acts:
It would be a time of change
The first thing I want to say is that it would be a time for change. Now, in one respect the disciples new that – but they misunderstood it. Verse 6 they asked Jesus, ‘Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?’ You see the change they wanted was a return back to the old ways. They wanted Jesus to come and kick out the occupying Romans and restore Israel to what it was before the occupation.
They wanted to revert back to the old ways, to the old traditions. They wanted to go back to the way things used to be – before them Romans came and spoilt everything. That’s the change they wanted! In fact they were so desperate to change things back to the way they were that they even tried to mould Christianity into Judaism. They tried to take that which was alive, and vibrant, and fruitful, and stuff it into a system that was lifeless, and dead and decaying.
How do we know that?
Acts 3:1 – Peter and John were going up to the Temple at the time of prayer.
Acts 5:12 – All the believers used to meet together in Solomon’s Colonnade (which was? an open, roofed walkway situated along the east side of the temple complex)
Acts 5:21 – At daybreak the apostles entered the temple courts… and began to teach the people.
Acts 5:42 – Day after day, in the temple courts, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Christ.
They have massive debates over what food can be eaten, what religious festivals should be observed, whether non-jewish people who convert to Christianity should be circumcised or not. And if you read Galatians Chapter 2 you will see some of the arguments this caused between the giants of the faith like Peter and Paul.
You see they didn’t want Christianity to be a separate thing, they didn’t want it to be a new thing, they wanted it to be a continuation of what already was. And so they tried to keep on with their temple worship. They tried to keep on with their rituals. They tried to keep on doing what they had always done and tried to make Christianity fit into what already was.
And it took a lot of arguments, it took a lot of debates, it took a lot of falling out – it took a lot of persecution – before they finally got the message. It took a lot of heartache and pain and division before they finally understood that new wine requires new wine skins.
Yes change was coming, yes change was inevitable – but it wasn’t going to be a change back to the old – it would be a change for the new. That’s what Jesus had told them way back in Matthew chapter 9, ‘No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch will pull away from the garment, making the tear worse. Neither do men pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved."
New wine needs new wine skins. You can’t go backwards, you can’t make the new fit the old – ‘cos it want!
Change is not a bad thing. Change is not a negative thing. In fact change is essential if we are going to receive the new wine that God has for us. You know I often hear people moan and complain that we don’t do this anymore, or we don’t do that anymore, or we don’t do something like we used to. But let me say – if we don’t do something anymore then there is a reason for it – and it’s either because it doesn’t work or because it’s out of date. And there’s still a lot more stuff that we still do that we shouldn’t be doing for those very reasons and I will continue to work on those areas until my final day.
New wine requires new wine skins. New wine skins require change – constant change. And the year 2010 is going to be a year of change for Orchard. Some of the changes you will like, some of the changes you will probably find threatening to your sense of security. But change is necessary to keep this church vibrant, and active and applicable to the culture it’s put here to reach.
Can I encourage you – that when you come to find your new pastor later in the year – that you look for someone who has a heart for change, who has a heart for adventure. Someone who will embrace the new.
Point number 2 – it would be a time of challenge. And the challenge came in two forms:
Firstly: - The sheer scale of the task that faced them - ‘you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth’ (v8)
Wow – some task! But they’re just a handful of rough, uneducated , working class people, living in a back street, down trodden city. No printing press, no televisions, no God Channel, no mobile phones, no internet.
And yet – this handful of people managed to evangelise the whole of the then known world in what was just a few short years. How? Have you ever been faced with a situation, or a task or a problem that just seems so big, so huge, so impossible that you just look at it and say ‘where on earth do I start’? Well you start right where you are – that’s where.
That’s what those disciples did – they started right where they were. The clue is in what Jesus said - ‘you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth’ (v8). You start in Jerusalem – where you are – and then you work you’re way out to Judea, and then work your way out to Samaria, and eventually you work your way out to the whole of the earth – but you start WHERE YOU ARE!
It’s no good you looking at the thousands of lost people in China, or Africa, or wherever because you will become so overpowered by the task in hand that all you’ll do is throw your hands up in despair, shout ‘Lord this is impossible’ and end up not do anything. You have to start right where you are – right here in Orchard, right here in Colchester, right here in your office, right here in your school, right here in your street. One person at a time.
Secondly - it would be a time of challenge because of the persecution they would face. You know you think you might have it tough but listen to this – this isn’t in the Bible but it is part of Church tradition – this is allegedly what happened to those disciples:
Mark: dragged to death in the streets of Alexandria
Matthew - arrested in Ethiopia and there nailed to the ground with short spears and beheaded.
John - Was allegedly boiled in a huge basin of boiling oil during a wave of persecution in Rome. He was miraculously delivered from death. Imprisoned on the island of Patmos and died as an old man, the only apostle to die peacefully.
Bartholomew: skinned alive with a whip in Armenia
Luke: hanged by idolatrous priests in Greece
James(the Less): killed in Egypt
James Zebedee: beheaded by Herod
Matthias (the apostle chosen to replace the traitor Judas Iscariot) - stoned and then beheaded.
Thomas: killed with a sword in India
Simon Zelotes: crucified
Peter: crucified upside down in Rome
Paul: is beheaded near Rome
Makes any excuses that we try to make not to witness seem pretty pathetic doesn’t it. ‘Oh I couldn’t possibly tell anybody about Jesus – what would they think of me? They might even make fun of me and call me names’.
How did they do it? How did they evangelise the whole known world in the face of such horrific persecution?
Point number 3 – it was because it was also a time of commissioning.
Verse 8 - ‘You will receive power when the holy spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses’. Des will be looking more at this next week. But this is the point, this is the place, this is the time, when ordinary people become extra-ordinary people, when they receive the power of the Holy Spirit.
You know there’s a lot of argument, and there’s a lot of debate, and there’s a lot of disagreement about the nature, and the purpose, and the person of the Holy Spirit. Whole movements have been formed around it and denominations have been divided over it. But let me just – whatever your stance this morning – the whole purpose of the Holy Spirit, is not that we might prophesy, or speak in tongues, or heal the sick, or get goose bumps. The purpose of the Holy Spirit is to give you POWER to be a witness for Jesus Christ.
In many ways the Holy Spirit is like an electrical cable – if we want to turn this lamp on we have to plug it into the power source. And then an electric current travels through the cable to make the light come on. But the trouble with the cable is that it is wrapped in insulation. And in order to get an electric current to flow through the cable – you have to strip away the insulation to reveal the bare wires – to make a good connection.
And the Holy spirit is like that electric cable that connects the believer to God. But the problem is we’ve insulated ourselves and we’ve stopped the power getting through. And we have to strip away the insulation, we have to strip away our objections, we have to strip away our negativity, we have to strip away our apprehension, we have to strip away our criticism, we have to strip away our comfort zones, we have to keep stripping away the layers of insulation that stop his power from flowing into our lives.
Because it’s only by the power of the holy spirit that we will stand in the face of persecution. It’s only by the power of the Holy Spirit that we will face the challenge of the great commission. It’s only by the power of the holy spirit that we will become extra-ordinary people living extra-ordinary lives.
‘You will receive power, when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jeruslam, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth’.
Conclusion
It was a time of change
It was a time of challenge
It was a time of commissioning
Let me just finish with this. The story is told that on the day the Lord Jesus ascended to heaven, he happened to see Gabriel and they had a talk.
Gabriel asked, “How did it go?” The Lord said, “Great, excellent.” “Did they make you king?” “No.” “Did they make you prince?” “No.” “Did they worship you?” “Most of them didn’t.” “Well, what happened?” “They crucified me.” “Then they worshipped you, right?” “No.”
“So, what happened?” “I left my people down there.” “Oh, so you got a couple of million followers?” “No.” “A Hundred Thousand?” “No.” “A couple of thousand?” “No.”
“How many did you leave down there?” “120.” “120?” “120.” “That’s all?”
“That’s all.”
“Are you going back down to help them out?” “Not right now.” “How are they going to make it?” “They’ll make it.”
“Well, what if they fail, do you have another plan?” “There is no other plan.” “What if they fail?” “I’m not worried Gabriel. I know them, they’re mine. They will not fail.”
They didn’t fail. We are here today because they didn’t fail 2000 years ago. And what God provided for them, He has also provids for us. We have the same God, the same Bible, the same Holy Spirit, and the same gospel message. And we also have something they didn’t have. We have the record of their faithfulness to encourage us in our work for the Lord.
May God pour out his grace on us to make us strong. May we experience a fresh outpouring of his Holy Spirit in our day. May we become extra-ordinary people living extra-ordinary lives and may God grant that in this new year we might be able to take the gospel from Orchard Baptist Church to the ends of the earth.
