The Baby Church – Her Life
Acts 4:23-35 May 27, 2003
On their release, Peter and John went back to their own people and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said to them. [24] When they heard this, they raised their voices together in prayer to God. "Sovereign Lord," they said, "you made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and everything in them. [25] You spoke by the Holy Spirit through the mouth of your servant, our father David:
" 'Why do the nations rage
and the peoples plot in vain?
[26] The kings of the earth take their stand
and the rulers gather together
against the Lord
and against his Anointed One.'
[27] Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. [28] They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. [29] Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. [30] Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus."
[31] After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.
[32] All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. [33] With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. [34] There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales [35] and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.
Intro: The resurrection is not the end of the story, in fact it is just the beginning. The book of Acts tells us about the birth and growth of the body that Jesus called forth. Over the next several weeks we will be studying the baby church. At no time in the history of the church, was their more effective growth or intense ministry than in the first generation of believers. As the message of Jesus has spread to new people, this pattern of intense growth has been repeated many times. The first generation of believers is powerful and effective. If we would desire the effectiveness of the 1st Century, we must study these believers. And so we will be looking at their life, their message, their expansion, their commission and their birth.
When the church was born, it emerged from a very broad group of people. It was during a feast of the Jews that the Holy Spirit was poured out on the new believers. Many were present from around the empire, and many came to faith that day. After discovering the new life Jesus gave them, many of these new believers stayed in Jerusalem to learn and grow in their faith.
As might be expected there were times of tension and difficulty. Sometimes it was internal, and other times it came from outside. The passage we just read follows on of the first significant persecutions of the early church. Peter and John had called upon the name of Jesus to heal a man who had been born lame. In the ensuing attention that arose, they began sharing the good news of the Gospel with those who gathered. Soon they were arrested for disturbing the peace. After preaching to the authorities, they were disciplined: commanded them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus (vs. 18) and sent home.
I. The Outcry of the Church – Harmonious Prayer
When Peter and John were arrested, this was the first time we have any recording of the authorities objecting to the message of the Gospel. To this time they had been respected and accepted. But now because of the leader’s actions, the church was being targeted and told to be silent concerning Jesus. Throughout the history of the church, there have been men and women who have made the authorities uncomfortable. Dietrich Bonnhoeffer in Germany led a group of dissenting churches that would not accept the line of the German leadership. Bonnhoeffer was executed. Martin Luther King Jr. would not accept the 20th century church’s blind eye to segregation, he led a campaign that changed our country, and he was assassinated. On Sunday October 6, three Dominican sisters were arrested after entering a missile silo in northern Colorado. They were charged with state felonies for trespass and criminal mischief, but are expecting additional federal felony charges. They may receive up to 30 years each for their defiant acts of peaceful protest. We could speak of many others who have stood firm against the authorities of this world just as Peter and John did.
And this behavior often causes an outcry in the church.
So what happened? After Peter and John created a stir and clearly charged the authorities with killing Jesus, and being arrested and punished, there was an outcry in the church. The Church lifted their voices in a wonderful harmony in prayer and prayed about the every aspect of what was happening and then, notice what they did, in their outcry, they prayed, “Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus."
This is what had gotten them in trouble in the first place, but their desire was to obey God rather than men, and so they sought the blessing and power of God.
Here we see a pattern for us. When potentially divisive issues arise, there is often an outcry in the church. And we can respond in several ways. We can distance ourselves from the so called trouble makers. At times the church has done that. We can encourage our outspoken leaders to “do the right thing” and think about the consequences of their actions for others in the church. And we certainly have done that at times as well, when we have silenced our denominational leaders for taking unpopular stands for the Gospel. Or third, our outcry can be in prayer and we can join our voices in harmonious prayer for one another and pray for opportunities to continue to stand out and make a difference for Jesus Christ.
You see, when the church chooses to stand firm in the Gospel of God’s peace, when we choose to proclaim the message of Jesus Christ, a message of God’s love for the world and call to repentance for all, when we choose to call the poor and outcast into full fellowship in our churches and in our world, we will face opposition. Sometimes the opposition will come from outside the church, sometimes it will come from our own brothers and sisters (Jesus experienced this) When we face opposition, it is not easy, but when the church came together in harmonious prayer and their outcry was a outcry of support for those who had been persecuted, they experienced God’s blessing.
II. The Outpouring on the Church – Shaken by God
It began with an outcry of prayer as a body. They prayed that God would empower them and protect them and display his power. And the effect of the prayer was an outpouring on the church, it was shaken by and for God.
When God’s people come together in prayer, with one mind, and one purpose; when God’s people share God’s heart for the world; when God’s people see God at work and ask for the privilege of joining God; when God’s people are willing to let God work through them; when God’s people seek His power to transform the world, God will shake his church.
Throughout history, the story of revival begins with God’s people seeking His power and submitting to His authority. The Azusa Street Revival in 1906 began when God’s people began seeking His face. These prayer meetings ran for a number of weeks, and there was much spontaneous worship and some very wonderful healings. Faith increased rapidly for extraordinary things. Frank Bartleman wrote: “God made Pastor Smale a regular Moses to lead us toward the promised land. But soon the church dignitaries could tolerate the new, spontaneous order no longer. They ordered it to cease, or the Pastor to resign. The consequence was the Pastor wisely decided to go on with God, and the Lord and the people went with him. The cloud moved. A New Testament Church was formed. Here God wonderfully led and blessed." God shook his church, and some refused to go with Him. But for those who did, their lives changed forever.
The shaking of the Peter and John’s church did not make the problems go away, in fact in the very next chapter we discover that there were internal problems as well, but when they came together and God moved in their midst, they were prepared for the difficult days as well.
III. The Outcome for the Church – Unfettered Generosity
And what happened? When the outcry of the church was harmonious prayer, and God responded with and outpouring of His spirit, then the outcome for the church was an unfettered generosity. “All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. [33] With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. [34] There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales [35] and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.”
Remember believers were in Jerusalem from all over the world. The Gospel was cutting through the stratified social order and was leaving a level playing field in its path. In that church were wealthy leaders of the Jewish council, business people from Galilee, laborers from the countryside and slaves from the cities. But when God moved in their midst, the outcome was unrestrained generosity.
This was a ministry of hospitality. People opened their lives to one another. Each of us may carry that ministry out in different ways. My mother did it through always having room at the table for people in the neighborhood. I thought that was the definition. Then I married Sheryl and her ministry of hospitality was not to serve a meal, but to welcome people into our home. For some of us, hospitality takes the form of making this building the most inviting it can be. For others is the always welcoming spirit of a person who can be trusted with confidences. But hospitality is never cheap. It means giving up the right to live our lives the way we want.
You see, when the spirit moved, it cost members of the church. The relationship between people became paramount, they loved and cared for one another, they sold their property to provide for one another. When the Spirit of God moved, the believers were no longer willing to let anyone in the midst go without. People were not hungry because they cared for one another. People were not left on the street, because they loved one another. And as they demonstrated that love, the church grew.
The secret to the growth of the early church was in these three principles. When there were difficulties, their outcry was in prayer, they eagerly received the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and the outcome was love for one another.
APP: Today, I challenge you to take the first step in renewal of this church and of each of our lives. Let us join together and cry out to God. Let us tell Him all our concerns, not just about health and home, but in a harmonious voice, let us identify those roadblocks to the proclamation of the gospel. Let us empty our lives of anything that stands in the way so that we may open our hearts to receive the outpouring of God. And if God has shaken you, then open your heart to those around you. The ministry of hospitality was the most visible testimony to what God had done in the lives of the early church. In a society where cocooning has become the norm, once again, hospitality will have an impact on our world.
Do you know Jesus as your savior? If so, then it is time for an outcry, not of frustration, but of prayer, it time for an outpouring of God’s spirit and it is time for us to expect an outcome of growth because the world discovers that we love one another not only in word, and not only face to face, but in every way.
