Acts 2:36-47: TOGETHERNESS WITH GOD, TOGETHERNESS WITH EACH OTHER
A few years ago I was in California, and I was walking down the street of one of those old western towns. Old buildings were on each side of me – the old bank, old stores, old homes – you could see where people used to live and shop. When I got to the end of the street. I turned the corner – and that’s when I realized that everything was fake. None of the buildings were real – they just looked real from the street. When you walked behind these buildings, you could see that they were just pieces of wood, propped up to look like buildings. I was at Universal Studios, walking through the set of one of those old western towns. Nothing was real – everything was fake.
Isn’t that how our relationships with other people can sometimes be? Nothing is real? Everything is fake? Maybe on the outside, it looks like you have a real friendship with somebody. But deep down, on the inside, you can sense that there is an emptiness there – something is missing, and you don’t know what it is. Sometimes our friendships, our bonds with other people, are like those buildings on that Hollywood set – they look good on the surface, but there’s really nothing underneath – no depth.
Why is that? What’s the cause of this problem? And how do you change a shallow, empty friendship into something deeper, something more meaningful? Today, as we look at God’s Word, we will find the secret to REAL TOGETHERNESS. It all begins with our relationship with God. And when that’s right, we find that our relationships with others can be more meaningful than we would ever expect.
We find the Apostle Peter preaching a sermon in our text for today. Let me give you a little background on the setting. It’s fifty days after Easter. Jesus has risen from the dead and has ascended into heaven. God has sent the Holy Spirit into Peter’s heart and has changed Peter into a confident disciple of Christ who wasn’t afraid to speak to the crowds. A crowd of people had gathered, and Peter was preaching to them. We catch Peter in the middle of his sermon when he says in verse 36: “Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.”
Peter tells the crowd that they have a problem – they have no relationship with God. The people thought they could please God simply by being good people, living a decent life. “That’s good enough,” the people thought. And because of that, they had an “I don’t need Jesus” attitude. “I’m OK with God,” each person thought. “I don’t need Jesus. What do I need to believe in Jesus for? God likes me just the way I am. I’m a good person, and that’s good enough.” The people rejected Jesus, even to the point of handing him over to be crucified.
But the people were dead wrong. They weren’t in God’s good graces like they thought. If they were, then Jesus, whom they had crucified, would have stayed dead. But he didn’t stay dead. God the Father raised Jesus from the dead, showing the people that they were wrong for rejecting Christ. Their “I don’t need Jesus attitude” was wrong. The “God likes me just the way I am” attitude was wrong. They thought they had a relationship with God, but they didn’t. As it stood, they were all going to hell. Verse 37 says, “When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, ‘Brothers, what shall we do?’”
Isn’t our world plagued with an “I don’t need Jesus” attitude? “I’m OK without Jesus,” people say. “I’m a good person. What do I need Jesus for?” Our world believes that it’s OK to live a life without Jesus Christ, and as a result, our world rejects him, just like the people rejected Christ in the first century.
This “I don’t need Jesus” attitude can sneak into our way of thinking too. Even after you become a Christian, you still struggle with the “I don’t need Jesus” attitude. “What do I need Jesus for,” we say to ourselves, “I can get through the day without him. I don’t need to read his Word. I don’t need to talk to him in prayer. I can figure things out myself. I don’t need to hear his Word on Sunday. I think I’ll come every other Sunday. Or maybe once a month. Maybe just Christmas and Easter. Maybe not at all. I don’t need Jesus to be a part of my life.”
You and I may not reject him as blatantly as the world, but as Christians, we do struggle with this “I don’t need Jesus” attitude, and often give in. And in the eyes of God, our subtle rejection of Jesus Christ is just as damning as the blatant rejection of Christ in the first century. We also must turn to the Apostle Peter and say with the crowd, “Brothers, what shall we do?”
What Peter says to us, and to those people back then, is the secret of having a real relationship with God, and ultimately, with other people: “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Peter tells the crowd to give up their “I don’t need Jesus” attitude. Turn to Christ, and he will forgive you. Be baptized, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and you will be forgiven of all of your sins. God will give you the gift of the Holy Spirit. And that gift is a real relationship with God. A real bond. Peace of mind. Confidence and joy. All these things come from repenting and believing in Christ.
Are you included here? The answer is yes. Peter talks about you in the next verse. He doesn’t mention you by name, but look at what he says: “The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off (that’s you) – for all whom the Lord our God will call.” What God offered to those people many years ago, he offers to you today, and to all people. You and I know that we are guilty of having the “I don’t need Jesus” attitude. But we can turn to God, and ask him to forgive us, and he does. We can remember our baptisms, that moment that Jesus washed our sins away and put his name on us. You and I can be assured that we have the gift of the Holy Spirit, a real bond with God.
There are lots of books written about WWII. One of them tells the story of a German soldier who had been taken prisoner by the allies. That German soldier had been told horrible stories about what the Americans would do to POW’s, and so he was scared. That German was wounded and was taken to the medical station. The American medics tried to give him a shot of morphine so they could tend to his wounds, but, the German objected furiously. He was afraid that he was going to be tortured by the Americans.
After some time, after observing the attention given to the other wounded, and the other POW’s, this soldier finally started to figure out that he was being treated like everyone else and his amazement grew. Finally, the chaplain making his morning rounds, gave the German soldier cigarettes, and candy, and soap, just like everyone else. That German soldier started to grin, and sat up, playing with his new possessions like a little boy with new toys. He realized that people were there not to hurt him, but to help him.
That’s how it is with your relationship with Christ. At first, we push Jesus away. We’ve heard stories, we want to be careful, we’re OK on our own. But really, we’re not. We’re wounded by our sin, we need help. Then you hear the Word of God, and you find out that Jesus doesn’t come into your life to hurt you, but to help you. He comes to take your sins away. He comes to bring you peace with God, and peace in your heart. And when you hear this good news, you stop rejecting him. You stop running away. You begin to believe in Christ as your Savior.
Many of the people that listened to the Apostle Peter believed. Verse 41 tells us that 3000 people became Christians that day.
Have I forgotten something? Have you ever listened to a sermon, and wondered if the pastor missed something? At the beginning of this sermon, I told you that I was going to tell you about having meaningful relationships with other people. But it seems that we’ve gotten off the subject here, doesn’t it? We’ve been spending the whole time so far talking about having a meaningful relationship with God, rather than relationships with other people.
But there’s a reason for that, and the reasons is this: once you have a real relationship with God, you can deepen your relationships with other people. If I want to have a real strong friendship with you, then first, we both need to have a real strong friendship with God. If you want to have a strong relationship with your spouse, or your children, then first, your family needs to strengthen their relationship with God.
Lots of people live their lives with an “I don’t need Jesus” attitude. That attitude destroys any chance of having a relationship with God. It also hurts destroys your relationships with other people. But look at what happens when people repent of that sin, and believe in Jesus as their Savior – verse 42: “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer.” Spiritually, these people who repented were bonding, weren’t they. They were listening to God’s Word together. They were praying together. All of them knew that their sins were forgiven, that Jesus was their Savior, and that they were going to heaven because of him. Because of this, verse 43…
“Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles.” God was showing the people that they were believing the right thing, that Jesus was indeed their Savior. Their attitudes toward each other were beginning to change. They were beginning to look out for each other. If someone in the group was in need, look at what they would do – verse 45: “Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need.” They cared for each other. They met for worship, for Bible study. They even had potluck dinners in people’s homes, like what we do at Beautiful Savior – “They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.”
These people had a special bond, didn’t they. These weren’t shallow, fake friendships. Those friendships weren’t like those fake houses at Universal Studios. These people really cared about each other. And they were happy, genuinely happy. What was their secret?
Their secret was this – each one of them had a relationship with Jesus Christ. Each one of them had abandoned the “I don’t need Jesus” attitude. Each one of them knew that Jesus had died for their sins on the cross, that Jesus was their Savior. All of them enjoyed togetherness with God. And that togetherness with God enabled them to have a deep and meaningful kind of togetherness with each other.
That’s what we are striving for at Beautiful Savior. What is the purpose of our church? The purpose of our church is to be what these people were in the book of Acts. We want to be people who first of all to have togetherness with God. We want to repent of our sins. We want to receive God’s forgiveness. We want each person here to believe in Jesus, and grow in his or her relationship with him. And as that happens for each person at Beautiful Savior, something else will happen….
People will begin to enjoy togetherness with each other. Not just a shallow kind of friendship, but a real bond. And the reason that people at Beautiful Savior can enjoy that kind of bond is because they will have something in common that’s very important. More important than a common interest in sports or music or hobbies or kids or whatever – bigger than all that – what you have is a common faith in Christ. That’s what holds together our church. That’s how we can be like these people in Acts chapter 2. We want to be people who are devoted to the apostles’ teaching. People who pray together. People who look out for each other. People who break bread in each other’s homes. People who have glad and sincere hearts, who praise God and enjoy the favor of all the people. We want God to add to our numbers, just as he added to those Christians in the first century.
This togetherness is a gift from God. It happens when people repent of their “I don’t need Jesus” attitude. It happens when people believe in Christ. Someday this togetherness will be much better, when all of us will stand in the presence of God in heaven. There we will be able to enjoy fellowship with God and each other to a degree that will make us never want to leave. And we’ll never have to leave. Look forward to that day. And until then, let’s enjoy that little slice of heaven God gives us here – the fellowship we enjoy with Christ and each other right now. Amen.
