WITNESS IN JERUSALEM – PROGRESS OF THE CHURCH
(Acts 3-6)
Introduction:
Last we began our 5-week series on Acts where we saw that the Church began well under the topic: Witness in Jerusalem: power of the church (chap 1-2)
This morning we continue with Witness in Jerusalem: progress of the church (chap 3-7)
But due to the large amount of text to cover, I will only cover chapters 3-6 and leave chapter 7 for next week.
First, let’s have a quick recap of some of the key things highlighted. (Show transparency)
• Are we marked by Obedience?
• Do we wait for God’s timing in the things that we wish do for God? ?
- WAITING PRAYER
- Patient in preparation and prayer?
• Do we witness when God opens the doors?
• Is our church marked by “universality”
- Is everyone welcome irregardless of race, age, sex, social status?
- do “outsiders” fit in?
-
• Is our church marked by power and purity?
• Does our church have the five signs the early church had?
1. Worship – they believed in glorifying God
2. Instruction – they believed in training disciples
3. Fellowship – they believed in loving one another
4. Evangelism – they believed in winning the lost to Jesus Christ
5. Service – they believed in caring for the needs of each other.
• Are people being added to your numbers?
And we left off with the fact that the church began well,
but did it always continue in the like manner as described in Acts 2:47?
And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
Move One:
Acts 3 opens with Peter healing in a dramatic fashion, a man crippled from birth.
Let’s read it: Acts 3:1-10
We are told that the apostles did many wonders and miraculous sign sin chapter 2:43 but this is the first miraculous sign that Luke chooses to describe to us.
Again, Peter performs the miracle as a sign that allowed him to witness to others about Christ (preach the gospel)!
Move Two:
This time 5,000 (counting just the men) believed and became Christians (2,000 more than the time Peter preached).
But for the first time, the apostles face opposition.
Read Acts 4:1-4
If you read the rest of chapter 4, you will find that they were not only jailed, but they are out on trial and threatened!
They were told in no uncertain terms that they were not allowed to preach about Jesus!
But the apostles did not back down.
Remember that they were obedient to Jesus’ command to Wait and Witness.
They waited and received the promised Holy Spirit and
that made them bold (powerful) in their witness.
That was all they needed
Read Acts 4:7-13, 18-22.
Move Three:
Let’s pause for a moment to further reflect on this incident. There is a lessons I would like us to consider:
Anyone who is obedient to God, and allows the Holy Spirit to take control and guide them can be a bold and effective witness. Remember the fact that the Peter and John were unschooled BUT they God’s power and thus wisdom and abilities.
You may not think that you have significant gifts or abilities that God can use. BUT God thinks differently.
Very often, I think God would rather use less naturally gifted people because such people more naturally choose to depend on God not their gifts.
Gifted people tend to get too arrogant and cocky and overconfident due to their natural abilities.
This is not meant to be a boast …
I was always an average student –
I got a grade 2 in my SPM.
I couldn’t get my credit in BM.
I dropped out after my first year of university as I was doing badly and was on probation.
But despite all this, God is using me more and more
– not on the basis of superior abilities BUT on the basis of my sincere desire that grows each day to be obedient to His Word and call ..
– to wait on the Lord and to witness for the LORD.
And God can and wants to use you as well.
It will be hard work’s hard work and demands a degree of boldness to trust and obey God.
Move Four:
Let’s carry on … It is important to note that at this stage, the church was till very Jewish in nature.
People from all over the world may have heard the gospel and come to faith in Christ, BUT the church was still essentially Jewish.
The first Christian converts were either Jews or proselytes – gentiles who lived as “Jews” and were absorbed into Jewish community.
Hence the Christians still went about their ways as devout Jews would – the only difference was that they knew that the Promised Messiah (Saviour) of the Jews had come and they made it a point to tell others about it.
But this upset the status quo and the position of the official religious leaders and teachers.
The irony of the Acts 4 incident is that the religious leaders knew that the man was indeed miraculously healed but rather than rejoicing, they were against the apostles.
Religious persecution and pressure is to be expected as a church grows (both in size and dynamism)
I believe the religious resurgence of other religions in Malaysia is a direct reaction to the growth of the Malaysian church over the last 20 years.
The more Hindus, Buddhists and Muslims turn to Christ, the more opposition you will find.
More and more people from other religions are becoming
more religious and knowledgeable about their own religions
and are also more aggressive in evangelism.
Move Five:
As we read on in Acts 5:17-40, we see that this antagonism grew to the extent that the apostle were not only arrested, they were jailed and even flogged (which is a very painful affair).
But all these persecution did not seem to have any
negative effect on them.
Rather, it seemed to spur them on.
Their standard replies were bold:
Judge for yourself, whether it is right in God’s sight to obey you rather than God. For we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.
And
“We must obey God rather than man.”
The fact is, as we read the accounts, we cannot help be amazed by their faith in God.
Read Acts 4:29-31 (this is after the first persecution – no
flogging yet)
Read 5: 41-42 (this is after the flogging – the infamous 40
lashes minus 1)
What was their secret?
Notice how they spent so much time in prayer, that resulted in fresh out pouring of the Holy Spirit (4:31)?
Once again, you will note that it was simple trusting obedience that consisted in their waiting on God for the purpose of witnessing.
Move Six:
In these 2 passages we find some important practical principles of how we can grow our church
1. Be obedient to God – be willing to obey God rather than man (even if it hurts)
2. Pray to God with boldness that His name be glorified through you
You may not necessarily see growth in terms of numbers – as this also depends on God’s timing BUT you will certainly see growth in terms of maturity.
Move Seven:
There is one episode in the middle of these two episodes that is very crucial for us to look at.
In chapter 5:1-11 we see read of how two Christians, Ananias and his wife Sapphira attempt to deceive the apostles and the church.
Read Acts 5:1-11
Why was Peter’s actions so harsh? And why did God go along with Peter and strike them dead?
Remember last week, how we saw that when the Holy Spirit came down at Pentecost, there were three signs given to mark the three important aspects of what the church should be?
• The speaking of tongues (different languages) – a symbol of universal nature of the church
• Sound like a violent wind - a symbol of the powerful (dynamic) nature of the church.
• “Tongues of fire” that separated and came to rest on each person – a symbol of the moral purity of the church.
Move Seven:
You can see that at this early stage, the church so far had no problem with the universal nature of the church (but they would later, as we will see next week)
The church also had no problems with its power. They in fact excelled in t as the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders.
BUT it was beginning to show cracks in the aspect of moral purity.
The first two are more external to the eye – universality and power BUT moral issues are often more subtle and hidden.
In terms of lessons for church growth, this is an important matter to consider.
We can sometimes get too hung up with the glamour and power of ministry, its exciting programmes and activities etc. and neglect the purity of the church.
Move Eight:
Let’s spend a little time considering this episode.
Facts:
Ananias’ and Sapphira’s offer of property was voluntary. (Acts 5:4)
1) No one was forced to give anything, much less all. The decision to give was entirely up to them.
2) Ananias and Sapphira sinned, not by holding back, but by lying.
Dishonesty (which demonstrates a lack of integrity) is a serious matter
In the OT, there was the case of Achan and his dishonesty in taking what was devoted to God. (Joshua 7:20-25)
- the whole nation suffered a great defeat because of his sin.
- And he was stoned to death as punishment.
Move Nine:
Note the parallels. All sins are serious but God chose to punish severely and openly in these two cases because these were public sins that were committed at the beginning of the forming of a new community: a community that was to represent God!
In Achan’s case, many people knew of the sin! (Large community that size, you can’t hide such things. People were secretly waiting to see whether Achan could get away with it.
In Ananias and Sapphira’s case, people would eventually discover that the money “offered” was not the full price.
Move Ten:
The growth of the church (in terms of maturity) is often affected negatively by “spiritual phonies”.
Ananias and Sapphira lied because they wanted to impress the rest of the church.
Illust:
Woman who hardly ever attended her cell group meetings – and when she did comes for the 8.30 meeting at 9.30 and goes home less than an hour later.
But out to impress her pastor’s wife – finds out when she visits, picks her up and arrives before 8.00 PM and stays till past 11.00 PM
Looks good BUT God knows and … others know – if we keep playing such “games”, one day it will blow up in our faces.
Trying to impress people just makes you look fake.
Move Eleven:
Worse than that, dishonesty and lack of integrity ruins our witness with non-Christians.
Robert Tamasy writes about a Christian friend of his in the Midwest who was general manager of a chain of newspapers.
One of his responsibilities was the setting of advertising policies.
At one point he ordered that advertising clients who used a Christian symbol or Bible verse on business cards or stationery would be required to pay cash in advance. These were his worst-paying accounts.
Our most effective witness - to non-Christians and to fellow believers - is not through what we say, but through what we do.
Is this what Christians are known for?
Christians should be more like the true story told by Ted Engstrom (that time of World Vision)
For Coach Cleveland Stroud and the Bulldogs of Rockdale
County High School (Conyers, Georgia), 1991 was their
championship season.
They accumulated 21 wins and 5 losses on the way to the Georgia boys’ basketball tournament.
There they had a dramatic come-from-behind victory in the state finals.
But now the new glass trophy case outside the high school
gymnasium is bare.
Earlier this month the Georgia High School Association
deprived Rockdale County of the championship after
school officials admitted a mistake.
A player who was ineligible due to low grades had played 45 seconds in the first of the school’s five post-season games.
"We didn’t know he was ineligible at the time; we didn’t
know it until a few weeks ago," Mr. Stroud said.
"Some people have said we should have just kept quiet
about it, that it was just 45 seconds and the player wasn’t
an impact player.
But you’ve got to do what’s honest and right and what the rules say.
I told my team that people forget the scores of basketball games; they don’t ever forget what you’re made of."
Move Twelve:
God needed to show He was serious about the importance of purity (integrity in the church).
And the whole church got the message – they were filled with fear. Acts 5:5,11
Move Thirteen:
So far, we can see that the church held up well against two kinds of attacks – from within (moral hypocrisy) and without (religious persecution).
But now we come to Acts 6 where we see new challenges before the early church.
Interestingly, these challenges came in more subtle and seemingly innocent forms.
These challenges will also be something BPGC will one day have to face because they will arise when the church keeps growing in size.
There are three challenges in particular that I would like us to consider.
The challenges of parochialism, leadership and church administration.
In this context, the three are closely related …
Move Fourteen:
By parochialism, I mean a form of “narrow close-mindedness”, a thinking that is limited to self-interest.
We see this in Acts 6:1
Division was threatening to form with Grecian Jews against Hebraic Jews because one group was upset over allegations of favouritism towards their widows.
Whether the allegations were true or not, the fact remained that Grecian Jews (Jews who were more at ease with Greek as their mother tongue) had a difficulty communicating with Hebraic Jews (Jews who were more comfortable with Hebrew as their mother tongue).
How can the church have a universal nature IF two groups of people from the same race BUT who speak different languages can’t get along with one another?
Whether there was favourtism or not, we do not know. Probably there was, as this is part of the sinful human nature.
Illust:
Preferential treatment because of race and even more if same dialect or hometown! (Even if complete strangers)
- different price for same goods
Move Fifteen:
As a church grows in size, it will grow in its ministries. And in time, there will be specialized ministries.
Do you remember a time when there was no Adult Fellowship?
… where youth fellowship and adult fellowship overlapped?
Then suddenly there is an AF – there will be a YF, later a Senior Citizens, Ladies Fellowship, Married couples fellowship, Men’s fellowship….
Don’t get me wrong, all these are often necessary
BUT if we do not be careful and keep the church heterogeneous (not homogenous), it will be parochial in thinking NOT universal in nature.
Special interest groups can actually divide a church.
As a church grows in size, it becomes harder and harder for leaders to administer the church.
Move Sixteen:
And as the church grows, there will also come the challenges of leadership and administration.
In Acts 6:2-7, we see how the apostles wisely handled the situation. Read Acts 6:2-7.
Can you read between the lines and see what the church wanted from the apostles?
They wanted them to personally handle this problem for them. It was a big deal to the Grecian half of the church.
But as valid as their concern was, the apostles wisely be sidetracked from their primary calling … which was to wait and to witness.
They made it clear in v.4 that their focus was to pray (wait) and to minister the Word (witness, which included not just evangelism but teaching)
It is so easy for leadership to be sidetracked putting out little fires here and there, trying to do everything and please everyone. BUT the apostles knew their calling and standing orders.
Move Seventeen:
And they handled this crisis well by delegating authority. The solution was good church administration policy.
They proposed a plan to ensure that the issue be resolved by asking the aggrieved parties to choose 7 men whom they could trust – namely the had to be known to be full of the Spirit and wise.
And they turned over this administrative task to them.
Problem solved, crisis averted.
And we know they did the right thing because Acts 6:7 confirms it: “So the Word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and (something of added importance), a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.
Move Eighteen:
Church growth will be severely hindered if the leadership is poor.
You can see the requirements and marks for leadership given here in such simple terms.
Leaders are to be people filled with the Sprit and wise.
How do you become wise?
Proverbs reminds us: The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
People who fear God study his Word diligently and obeys is.
The apostles certainly had these qualities and they insisted that even people who’s primary responsible were to distribute food to widows needed similar qualifications.
One of these 7 was a man called Stephen and he is described as such in v. 5
Then read the rest of chapter 6 and 7 and see that this man not only godly and spirit filled knew his Bible and was also a preacher.
Move Nineteen:
The simplest and best definition I have read so far of a leader is this: A leader is someone who has influence.
If you have influence over just one person, you are a leader and this is not condescending or patronizing talk.
It is a fact
That essentially makes us all leaders BUT of a different degree and type.
And so we do not have 12 people trying to drive a bus and crash the bus, the church needs wise administration.
This is simply, good organization of ministries, putting the right people in the right places, and empowering others to do their part in God’s ministry.
And the church will grow!
For us in BPGC, we need to plan ahead and pray ahead for leaders for each and every ministry.
As we grow, our organizational structure will have to change.
It must be dynamic not static. Administration is one of the listed gifts of the Spirit.
Look at BPGC and see how far you have come in the last couple of years.
You have grown not just in numbers but in leaders.
Compare the number of deacons you have now
– people proven and recognized for their contributions.
Among that which I know, I can see the tremendous growth and leadership in the music and worship ministry, the children’s ministry, education ministry, the maintenance ministry, just to name a few. …
I know you will have two gifted people in your children’s ministry next year!
Summary and Conclusion:
Very quickly now, let me quickly summarize what we have considered today on church growth from the book of Acts.
Show transparency 2
Next week, we will see how the early church responded to even greater challenges.
Let us pray …
