There is a well known phrase in religious circles where someone is said to be “preaching to the choir.” The inference is that the choir members are not the sort of people who need to hear that particular message. The choir, as we all know, being the most zealous for the church. And yet I have known some pretty degenerate choir members in my day, so I’m not sure how well that idea really stands up.

But to some extent, any congregation that comes out at 8am on a Sunday morning, especially if you happen to be on vacation, sort of qualifies under the same sentiment. Chances are, most of you are fairly zealous for the things of God, and the fact that you are here this morning is a testament to that. So I applaud you for your zeal.

But I have to say that according to scripture, and which has been verified by my experience, religious regularity, or even a zealousness for church, or a high degree of sincerity does not necessarily qualify one as a Christian. In fact, in my experience, I have found that the choir needs preaching to more often than you might think. And that is because there is a great danger in religion; which is to come to a point of having some degree of faith, and to come to a point of practicing a certain degree of piety, but to never have become converted. Therefore, it is much better to be a sinner, and know that you are a dirty, rotten sinner, than to be content that you are in the kingdom, yet in the end find that you have missed salvation altogether.

I would dare say that if I were to ask for a show of hands in this audience this morning as to who believed that they were Christians, practically everyone would raise their hands. Yet, as I think back on all the years that I have been in ministry, and all the people that once were considered stalwarts of the church and have since gone awol, I have to think that in reality there is a large percentage of people in the typical church audience that have not truly been saved in spite of how they might perceive themselves. And the Bible validates that principle.

Jesus told a parable in Matthew 13 about the wheat and the tares. It was a picture of the kingdom of heaven, a picture of the church. And in this field, Jesus said, the enemy had sown tares among the wheat. All of the time that the tares were growing they were indistinguishable from the wheat. So much so that Jesus said “Do not try to uproot the tares, lest you uproot the wheat as well.” But rather, “Allow both to grow together until the harvest; and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, “First gather up the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my barn.” The point being that the Lord knows those that are His, but when the time comes to gather the harvest, it will be obvious which is the wheat, because it has born fruit. The tares do not bear grain.

I’ve said all of that to say this; I am very concerned for the state of the church today. I am concerned that we have a form of religion that seems acceptable to us, that seems to be based on scripture, that has a form of worship, and yet many have not been converted. Many who think that they are Christians are in fact not saved.

Jesus said as much in Matthew 7. He said many people will say to Me in that day, “Lord, Lord, did we not do all these things in your name?” And Jesus said, “I will say to them, depart from Me you workers of iniquity. I never knew you.” Many people will think they are saved when in reality they are not. Consequently Jesus spent the majority of His ministry preaching to the choir. He preached to the most religious people of the day. He spent a lot of time preaching in the temple and synagogues where people were essentially coming to worship God. And He was constantly questioning them, constantly challenging them to reconsider, to examine themselves, to see if their deeds matched their profession. His messages were always designed to reveal the truth about the kingdom of God, and turn upside down their self righteous assumptions. And as a result of Christ’s confrontational preaching, the religious aristocracy of the day had Him arrested and crucified.

Now as we come in our study of Acts to this sermon of Stephen, we are going to see how he parallels Christ both in his message and in his death. Stephen is the first martyr of the church. He lived a short life, and he had an even shorter ministry. This is the last sermon that he preached. It is likely that he had a divine intuition that he would be martyred after he had preached this sermon. So he didn’t pull any punches. He told it like it is. And the religious aristocracy rose up and stoned him to death. But if I can learn anything from Steven, it is that I must preach every message like it might be my last. This may be my last sermon I will ever preach, for all I know. Or it may be the last sermon someone in this audience may ever hear. This may be the last opportunity you have to hear the gospel, to examine yourself in light of the truth of the gospel. And so I want to make it count. We should live everyday as if it might be our last day.

Let’s look then at this last sermon of Steven. He is refuting the charges of the Sanhedrin, which was the supreme court of the religion of the Jews made up of 70 men. And many other religious rulers were there. The high priest was there. You could not find a more religious group in all of Israel. These were men that made their living from the scriptures. They believed in the One True God, Jehovah. They knew the Old Testament scriptures forwards and backwards. They had memorized large sections of scripture. They had studied it all of their lives. They practiced strict adherence to the Law – not just the 10 commandments, but all 600 plus laws and ordinances. From the average guy’s perspective, if anyone was in the kingdom of God, then these men would have to have been in the very choir loft of heaven.

But while Steven uses this address to answer the charges made against him, namely, that he had spoken against the law and the temple and against Moses, this message also is applicable to us today, as we examine our standing before God in the light of Steven’s last message. I want to point out five ways that Steven shows that these men, though extremely religious, were not in the kingdom of God. Five ways that we might also use to examine ourselves to see if we are of the faith or not.

Number one, Steven explains that they misunderstood the basis of their salvation. In verses 1-8 Steven starts out by talking about Abraham. I can only imagine the Sanhedrin covering their bored yawns as they must have thought that they knew everything there was to know about Abraham and thought this guy could teach them nothing new. After all, they considered themselves as Abraham’s children. They were God’s chosen people. And they had been circumcised which they thought guaranteed them a place in the kingdom of God.

But what they failed to understand was that the kingdom of God is not inherited by birth. Citizenship in the kingdom of God is not the result of being Jewish, nor from being American, I might add. They thought that citizenship came through association, through rituals such as circumcision, and by ceremony. They failed to understand that the lesson of Abraham was that he was justified by faith. Salvation is by grace through faith. Rom. 4:3 says “Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness.” Salvation comes through faith in what Christ has done for us, not from some ritual or ceremony or nationality. They thought it came by birth, by association, by nationality, by ritual, and by ceremony.

You folks here this morning, assuming you would have raised your hands, on what basis do you claim to be citizens of the kingdom of God? Was it through baptism, was it through communion, was it through some sort of membership or ritual or ceremony? If that is what you are trusting for your salvation then you are in the same camp as the Sanhedrin.   Salvation is found only by grace through faith. It is a gift of God, given to us through faith. And faith is believing and trusting in Jesus Christ as Lord. Faith is not just believing that Jesus existed. Or that God exists. The Bible says that the devils believe in God and tremble and yet they are not saved. But I can assure you that though most church goers believe in some form of God, they do not tremble. There is no fear of God before their eyes. They have continued in their sin. They have not renounced their sin in shame and humility. Instead they flagrantly continue to trample underfoot the precious blood of Christ that was shed to cleanse us from sin. Faith is obedience to what God says. That is the lesson to be learned through Abraham. Come out from the world and live as an alien, as a pilgrim, walking by faith, following God’s word, living in the world without possessing it. That is what Steven was preaching, and that is what we all need to consider for ourselves. How do we claim admittance into the kingdom of heaven? It is only through faith and repentance as sinners receive grace.

By Steven’s standard, the Sanhedrin were unsaved, outside of the kingdom of God. And I wonder if by that same standard how many here are trusting in something other than faith and repentance and are by consequence outside of the kingdom.

Number 2, Steven tells them that they rejected the very people God had sent to deliver them. In vs. 9-36 Steven tells an abbreviated history of Joseph and Moses, both of which were a type of Christ. In each case, Steven explains that their brethren initially rejected them. Joseph was thrown into a pit by his brothers and sold into slavery. Moses tried to be the deliver that God had called him to be and his own people turned against him.   In each case the people hated Joseph and Moses without cause, they rejected and rebelled. In each case the people said, “Who made you to be a ruler and a judge over us?” It was essentially the same question that would be asked of Jesus during His ministry.

I wonder how many people in my hearing today have rejected Jesus from being a ruler and a judge over their lives? To call Jesus Lord means to bow to His will, to be conformed to His image, to obey His word, to walk by His Spirit. All of those things mean that we must humble ourselves, that we must die to ourselves and surrender to live for Christ. It means we must stop serving ourselves and start serving Christ. Is that the characteristic of your life? Have you stopped serving yourself and started serving Christ? Or has your feigned love for God provided you with the liberty to live like you want to live, in the false assumption that the love of God allows you to live anyway you want without consequences?

I would suggest that the Lordship of Christ is a key component in conversion. Before you are saved, you served the flesh, you served your passions, you served the world’s agenda. But after you are saved you are to serve God, you should serve the church, you should serve your neighbor. There must be a conversion, a change, a new life. You are supposed to be a new creation, old things are passed away. Or do you refuse to bow to Christ as Lord? Do you, like the Sanhedrin, say “who made you to be a ruler and a judge over us?” “I can do whatever I want. I can live how I want and God will just have to take me the way I am.” I’m sorry, but that is not the gospel. Jesus said whosoever will be my disciple must take up his cross and follow Me. Have you died to yourself? I don’t care how religious you are – have you died to your will to do God’s will? That is the litmus test.

Number three, Steven told these law abiding citizens that in fact they had disobeyed the law in vs. 37-43. They accused Steven of speaking against the law, but in fact they had repeatedly broken the law when it suited their purposes. That is why Jesus called them hypocrites. He said you hypocrites tie heavy burdens on everyone else’s backs, but you are unwilling to lift even a finger.

Steven quotes from Amos 5:25, saying ‘IT WAS NOT TO ME THAT YOU OFFERED VICTIMS AND SACRIFICES FORTY YEARS IN THE WILDERNESS, WAS IT, O HOUSE OF ISRAEL? YOU ALSO TOOK ALONG THE TABERNACLE OF MOLOCH AND THE STAR OF THE GOD ROMPHA, THE IMAGES WHICH YOU MADE TO WORSHIP. I ALSO WILL REMOVE YOU BEYOND BABYLON.” They were guilty of outwardly claiming to worship Jehovah, but in their hearts they were serving idols.

O church, listen to me! Idols aren’t some little figurines that we put on a shelf and rub 3 times when we want to make a wish. Oh no! Idols are much more seditious than that today in the church. Our idols today are our careers, our work, our boyfriend, or girlfriend, our idols are Hollywood movie stars, rock stars, sports stars, our hobbies or entertainments. Our idols are anything that we devote more time and allegiance to than we do to our Lord. If the Lord is not first in your priorities, then you are guilty of idol worship. And you cannot serve God and mammon. You cannot have a divided loyalty. God will not take second or third or fourth place in your life. Jesus said the most important commandment was that you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. That is a new covenant commandment by the way. Jesus has to have first place in your heart. That is why the church today is accused of being full of hypocrites. Because the world can see that we claim to be worshipping God, but actually we are serving idols and that is hypocrisy.

Number four, Steven said that contrary to him profaning the temple as they accused him of, they were guilty of desecrating the temple. In vs. 44-50 Steven reminds them that they were guilty of profaning Solomon’s temple by bringing in idols which led to it’s destruction as punishment from God. He says in vs. 48 that God does not dwell in temples made with human hands.

These very men were guilty of profaning the temple by making it a house of merchandise. That is why Jesus on two separate occasions cleaned out the temple with a bull whip, overturning the money changers tables and driving the vendors out. These very men made money from that operation, and so they would have still smarted from Christ’s rebuke.

But the fallacy is that they believed that God dwelled in the temple. However, Steven makes it clear that God had left the building a long time before. God doesn’t dwell in buildings as if you could contain the maker of the universe in a tiny temple. God dwells in the hearts of His people. His Spirit takes up residence in us, that we might be living stones in the temple of God.

I would ask you then, you that say that you are in the kingdom of God, does the Spirit of Christ dwell in you? If He does, then do you do the works of the Spirit? Is your life evidence of the Spirit living in you? The Spirit of God does not dwell in His people just to make them feel weepy when some worship song plays. He does not dwell in His people just to make them speak in an unintelligible language that does neither the hearer nor the speaker any good. But the Holy Spirit of God dwells in His people that they might do the works of God. That they might bear the likeness of Christ. So that they might speak the gospel to the lost. So that we might understand the scriptures.

I am dismayed sometimes when I hear people that have been regulars at church for some time, and they unknowingly reveal some of their theology in a casual conversation. I am dismayed because I know that I have been preaching the word of God line by line, precept by precept, doctrine by doctrine for so long, and they acted like they were listening, acted like they were in agreement, and yet in their conversation they reveal that they lacked understanding of the basic tenets of the gospel. They show they do not have in them the Spirit of Truth to give them understanding. They reveal that though they have a zeal for God, it is not in accordance with knowledge. And so I assume that they must not really be saved. Nice people perhaps, but lost. There is no evidence of the Spirit in them.

Number 5, Steven reveals in vs. 51-53 that they had stubbornly resisted God and His truth. He says, “You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are doing just as your fathers did.” Oh man! I get accused of preaching too harshly, but I have nothing on Steven. He is saying that though they had the outward sign of circumcision, they had never been circumcised in their hearts. Their hearts were still fleshly, worldly, unchanged. They had never been converted, never been changed. They just added religion on top of a dirty, sinful unrepentant heart.

I’m afraid that is the state of the church at large today. We live anyway we want all week, live like the devil if the truth is known, and then we come to church for an hour on Sunday and it’s like putting makeup on a pig. We put some religion on for an hour or so and then go right back to the slimy pig sty of the world that we love so much. We go right back to the sexually explicit movies, the raunchy music, drunkenness, hateful attitudes, the lusts of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. Nothing has really changed. We are not converted, we’re the same old sinful people we always were, but now we just try to cover it up with a little religion.

The part though I think is really apropos is vs. 53, “you who received the law as ordained by angels, and yet did not keep it.” The Sanhedrin put great value upon the law. The law being the first five books of the Old Testament, the Pentateuch. Yet Steven says that they did not keep it.

I wonder if that is true of the church today? Do we revere the Bible as God’s word, as inspired, God breathed, the actual words of God? And yet we let it sit on a shelf. We are content to let others read it and tell us what it means. We are willing to abrogate it’s authority but we submit to the authority of tradition. Some of you are unwilling to relinquish church traditions that have no basis in scripture whatsoever. You put a higher premium on what some church leader says than what God Himself has said. Some of you are running around seeking a new word of knowledge, a new vision, a new wisdom found in some spiritual experience, while ignoring what the word of God clearly says which was written down for us as a much sure word.

Israel had long before replaced the authority of God’s word with the word of the High Priest, the word of the rabbis. They had the Mishna which reinterpreted the law, and effectively altered the word of God. And I’m afraid that modern Christianity has replaced the simple preaching of God’s word with every conceivable contrivance, so that we learn our doctrine from Hollywood movies, we read so called Christian books which promise to teach us the secrets of financial success and health and prostitute the gospel to do so. Churches used to have 15 minutes of music and 45 minutes or more of preaching and reading the word. Now they have skits and dancing, and endless song after endless song and everyone just sits there looking at a movie screen. There is no need to bring a Bible to the modern church anymore. At best, people are looking at a Bible app on their smart phone, in between checking out facebook. And the preaching of sound doctrine is a thing of the past or denigrated to a brief entertaining social gospel sound byte.

Well, that’s Steven’s last sermon. Some of you are probably hoping it’s my last sermon as well. I hope you don’t feel that way. I hope that you look earnestly and examine yourself honestly to see if you are of the faith. To see if there is enough evidence to convict you of being a Christian, by the same standard that Steven raised in this message. I hope that we would look earnestly into the mirror of God’s word and see if we measure up according to the picture Steven has presented us with.

In closing, I want to mention that there were four responses to this sermon. The first response was from the Sanhedrin. Vs. 54, “Now when they heard this, they were cut to the quick, and they began gnashing their teeth at him.” They were convicted, but they did not repent. Rather they hated him, they gnashed their teeth at him. That means they were pretty mad, so mad that they rushed at him with one accord and threw him off a cliff and cast stones down on him to kill him.

The second response we see there was from Christ Himself in vs.55, “But being full of the Holy Spirit, he gazed intently into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God; and he said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened up and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.” As I said last week, in most other scriptures they always speak of Jesus seated at the right hand of God. But here in response to this last sermon of Steven, and the life of Steven, Jesus stands up. I believe He leads the hosts of heaven in a grand standing ovation for Steven as he yields up his life in service to Christ. He gave everything to serve Christ as an example of how we should live our life.

The third response is that of Steven. Vs. 60; “Then falling on his knees, he cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them!” Having said this, he fell asleep.” Steven was received into the presence of the Lord, saying much the same thing that the Lord Jesus said on the cross, “Lord forgive them for they know not what they do.”

The fourth response was that of a young man named Saul in vs. 58. But if you look at the text you notice that he doesn’t make any response in our text. However that young man named Saul would one day be renamed Paul, after he repented and was converted on the road to Damascus. I’m sure that the death of Steven was something that haunted Paul for all of his days. I’m sure that it spurred Paul to greater heights of service to God.

The only question left then today is what is your response to this last sermon of Steven? Maybe your response is to grind your teeth and run out of here with your hands over your ears. But I would pray that you have taken this opportunity to examine your citizenship in the kingdom of God in light of God’s word. And if so, how do you fare? Are you truly a child of God? Have you been born again by grace through faith? Or do you reject the words of this preacher, just as the Sanhedrin rejected the prophets? Are you a trespasser against the law of God? If you recognize that, then there is hope for you if you will repent of your sins. But if you do not recognize that you are a sinner, then you cannot be saved. Have you defiled the temple? 1Cor. 6:19 says, “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? Therefore, glorify God in your body.” Or have you stubbornly resisted God’s word? How can you say you believe the word of God and yet deliberately rebel against it?

I don’t know how you answered these questions. I don’t know whether you are a wheat or a tare. But the Lord knows, even if you don’t. I hope that you will make sure of your salvation today. Today is the acceptable day of salvation. None of us have been guaranteed tomorrow. This may be my last sermon, or it may be your last sermon. I pray you evaluate your salvation today in the light of God’s word.God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. A broken and contrite heart He will not despise. Make sure of your salvation today.

The most popular message in Christianity today is perhaps best captured in the title of a book by the pastor of the largest protestant church in America, entitled, “Your Best Life Now,” by Joel Osteen. That book stayed at the top of the New York Times bestseller list for 200 weeks. His sermons are televised to over 7 million viewers in over 200 countries. His church services in Texas are held in a former sports arena which held 56000 people at it’s dedication. His net worth is estimated to be 56 million dollars and he lives in a 10.5 million dollar mansion. So yeah, from the perspective of the world’s view of success, I guess Osteen is living his best life now.

But of course his message is that you can live your best life now as well. And just to give you a microcosm of his doctrine, I’ll read you a few quotes from his website. He teaches things like, “God’s people should be the happiest people on earth. So happy, in fact, that other people notice. Why? Because we not only have a fabulous future, we can enjoy life today!” Sounds good doesn’t it? I mean, everyone wants to be happy. He certainly looks happy. So I guess he is saying that God just wants you to be happy more than anything else.

He describes that blissful existence in this statement; “Living your best life now means being excited about the life God has given you. It means believing for more good things in the days ahead, while living in the moment and enjoying it to the hilt.” So live in the moment. Enjoy it to the hilt. Enjoy all that life has to offer, because that will produce happiness, and happiness is the goal in life.

Third, he says no matter how bad your circumstances might be now, you need to believe that you can be happy. Your belief that God wants you to be happy means that you should say, ““Enough is enough. I’m going to start believing God for bigger and better things.” “Dream bigger dreams. God wants to do more than you can even ask or think. Start living your best life now!”

For example, Osteen says, “God doesn’t want your business to merely make it through the murky economic waters. He wants your business to excel!” He says, if you believe enough, and have enough faith to release the power of God in your life, (because he says your faith activates the power of God,) then “you will have the best this life has to offer — and more. You can start living your best life now.”

Well, anyone should be able to see why that is a popular message. Be happy, enjoy life, move from poverty to success, live your dreams, dream bigger dreams, get everything this world has to offer. Because that is what God’s desire is for you, and if you will just believe it, then that will release and activate God’s power for you, so that all your dreams will come true.

That sounds good, doesn’t it? There is even some hints of Bible verses thrown in there for good measure. It is a message that appeals to our carnal nature. It appeals to our flesh, to the desires of the flesh and the lusts of the eyes and the pride of life. But I am here to tell you today that is not the message of the gospel. God’s plan for you is not to give you a bigger paycheck, to give you a bigger house, a nicer car, and to fulfill all your dreams and ambitions. That is not the gospel, nor is it the plan of God for your life. That is not the way to live your best life now.

No, I’m going to suggest today that the example given to us in the life of Steven here in chapter 6 and 7, is emblematic of living your best life now. And though the scripture makes it clear that Steven’s life was full in every way possible and was precious in the sight of God, yet from a human perspective Steven’s potential was never realized, his life was tragically cut short, and his career came to an unfortunate end almost immediately after it started. Steven’s life is the antithesis of every thing that Osteen’s book claims is the plan of God. And yet Acts 7 vs.56 says when Steven found himself at the end of his short life being pummeled to death by stoning, he saw the heavens split open and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. In several other places in scripture Jesus is described as sitting at the right hand of the Father. But when Steven’s life comes to a close, Jesus stands up. I believe that the life of Steven so fulfilled God’s design for living his best life, that when his brief life came to a close at the hands of evil men, Jesus stood up and led all of the heavenly host in a standing ovation.

I don’t know about you, but I want to live a life like Steven. I want the end of my life, whenever it comes, to be the fulfillment of God’s plan for me so that Jesus might stand up and say, “Welcome home, good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of your Master.” By the way, the name Steven is from the Greek Stephanos, which means “victor’s crown.” He was victorious in the sight of God and he certainly received that crown upon his martyrdom.

Contrary to popular Christianity’s message, we can either spend our lives trying to find happiness here on earth by accumulating earthly treasures, or we can spend our lives in service to God and reap eternal rewards in heaven. I don’t think we can do both. I believe that they are diametrically opposed. One life makes God your servant, working diligently to fulfill your dreams and ambitions, and the other life makes you God’s servant, working diligently to fulfill His plan and purpose. One life leads to the victor’s crown given by Christ himself, and one life leads to gaining temporal treasures here on earth which can never bring true happiness and fulfillment but only eventual death.

So what I want to show you from the scripture today is that in spite of the fact that Steven died a martyr, in spite of the fact that we only have one message preserved for us of his sermons, in spite of the fact that his young life seemed to be tragically cut short, Steven lived a full life, full in the best sense of the word. In fact in chapter 6 there are five times that Steven’s life is characterized as being full, being complete. He is described in vs. 3 as full of the Holy Spirit, and full of wisdom, in vs. 5 as full of faith, and in vs. 8 as full of grace and full of power. Five characteristics of a full life, a life pleasing to God, a life that prompted Jesus to stand and celebrate his victorious life. And I think that these five characteristics are possible for each of us here today, that we might live our best life now, just as Steven did.

So we are going to look briefly at these five factors of a full life as evidenced by Steven. But there is a prequalifying element of Steven’s life that must not be overlooked. And that is that Steven was first of all a servant. That is what they were selecting the seven men to do back in the opening verses of the chapter. The apostles wanted to select 7 men who would serve the tables, serve the widows and serve the needs within the church. To be a servant.

The primary quality of a servant is that they must first of all be humble. Jesus Himself was an example of that, and I believe that Steven followed His example. Phil. 2:7 says that Jesus “emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.” Moses, the greatest prophet that ever lived was described in Numbers 12 as the most humble man that ever lived. If you want to be great in the eyes of God, if you want to be filled to the brim by all the goodness of God, then you must first humble yourself. James 4:10 “Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you.” “Therefore,” James says in chapter 1 vs. 9,in direct contrast to the teaching of Joel Osteen, “ let the brother of humble circumstances glory in his high position; and the rich man glory in his humiliation, because like flowering grass he will pass away.”

So the prerequisite to a full life is submission to serve Christ and not yourself. And as a result of that subordination, then the first component of a full life is to be full of the Holy Spirit. This is such a major factor in the life of Steven that it is mentioned twice as a characteristic of his life. He was first of all selected because he fit the requirement of the apostles in vs. 3 that he must be full of the Holy Spirit, and then in vs. 5 he is listed as the foremost of the seven and it indicates that being filled with the Holy Spirit was especially a characteristic that he possessed.   So number one Steven was full of the Holy Spirit.

What does it mean to be full of the Holy Spirit? We alluded to it in the characteristic of a servant – that is to be a servant of Christ rather than a servant of your flesh. It means to be controlled by the Spirit of Christ, rather than controlled by the weaknesses of the flesh. Listen, all Christians have been given the same Spirit. The Spirit is a person, so you either have Him or you don’t. The Spirit is not a power or a force that you can get more or less of. But you can be more or less submitted to His control. And when you let go completely of your own will, and seek to do His will, then you are under the control of the Spirit. You are filled with the Spirit. So the way to be full of the Spirit is to die to the flesh, to die to the world. Gal. 5:17 “For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please.” So rather than do as Osteen says, that we need to dream bigger dreams and get more and more worldly possessions in an attempt to find happiness, if we want to live a full life that is pleasing to God then we must die to the world and the lusts of the flesh, so that we might be full of the Holy Spirit, led by the Holy Spirit, under His control. Gal. 5:24 “Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”

Secondly, the characteristic of Steven’s full life is to be full of wisdom. We need to know first of all that being full of wisdom is the outcome of being full of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit gives us a wisdom that is not of this world. It is the wisdom of God and not of men. 1Cor. 1:20 says, “Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?” And in 1Cor. 3:19 “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness before God.”

So wisdom comes from God, which comes as a result of being under the control of the Holy Spirit, which means being submissive to the word of God. Paul told Timothy that the scriptures are the source of God’s wisdom. 2Tim. 3:15 “from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.”

Next week we will look at the wisdom of Steven in his message, which shows the incredible depth of knowledge that he had of the word of God, starting with the Old Testament and how that was fulfilled in Christ. But though it is unlikely that Steven had any formal training, his wisdom was unanswerable in his debates with the Jews. Vs.10, “But they were unable to cope with the wisdom and the Spirit with which he was speaking.” Steven not only knew the Author of the scriptures, but the Spirit of the Author indwelt him, so that he was full of a wisdom which the wisdom of the world could not debate.

Thirdly, the next component of a full life as exemplified in the life of Steven is to be, according to vs. 5, full of faith. What does that mean? Does that mean what Joel Osteen suggests, that if you just want something bad enough, name it and claim it, believe hard enough, then God will be obligated to grant you what you want? Is that it?

I should say not. But rather it is to follow in the pattern of the other components we have already seen. That means to be fully yielded in faith to trust God, and be content with whatever lot He chooses for you, rather than to try to control God. If we are controlled by God, under His leading, led by His Spirit in all that we do, then we can fully trust Him to do what is best for us and for His kingdom. It means, to paraphrase the words of an old country song, to let Jesus take the steering wheel. To trust Him to provide what is necessary for our needs. To believe that He knows what is best for us. To trust Him enough to wait on Him, rather than try to force Him to accommodate us. That is a life full of faith. Completely trusting Him, rather than trying so hard to do get Him to do what we want Him to do.

Prov. 3:5-8 “Trust in the LORD with all your heart And do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He will make your paths straight. Do not be wise in your own eyes; Fear the LORD and turn away from evil. It will be healing to your body And refreshment to your bones.”

I am reminded of the Psalmist David’s comment in Psalm 131:2 “Surely I have composed and quieted my soul; Like a weaned child rests against his mother, My soul is like a weaned child within me.” That is what it means to be full of faith, completely trusting, leaning on the Lord. Not striving with God by some means of forced faith to get what you want, or get what you think is best, but to rest in the assurance that God knows best and He will do what is best for those that love Him.

Fourthly, a full life is a life characterized by being full of grace, vs. 8. Full of grace means what exactly? We hear a lot about grace today in the church. Grace means gift of God, and we all want to receive gifts, don’t we? But as we consider the words of David, as we quiet our soul, when we stop being infantile in our neediness, always wanting something from God, then we come to the point of being satisfied with God. Where we can crawl up on His lap so to speak and be content. We come to the point where we are full of His grace. So as Paul said in 2Cor. 12:10 “Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”

And when we are full of grace, then it stands to reason that we give grace. When we realize we have all we need in Christ, then that spills out in generosity towards others, to show grace towards others. We become gracious, long suffering, patient, forgiving, merciful. Those are all the product of a life full of grace. Grace is not some selfish pursuit of what God will give me, but what I can give back to God. When you are full of grace, ladies and gentlemen, then it starts to spill over into the lives of the church.

That leads us to the last characteristic of a full life, we are full of power. “Oh boy, finally! Let’s start running around now healing people, casting out demons, calling down fire from heaven.” Is that power? Is this talking about the power to get all the things that I want out of life? No, I’m afraid that spiritual power starts out a whole lot more practical than that. Let’s look again at 2 Cor. 12, this time starting in vs. 9 Paul said, “And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”

Here is what it means to be full of power; it means to be emptied of my strength, of my resources, of my wisdom, of my will, and then when I trust in Him I can trust in His power to accomplish in me and through me what is pleasing to Him. It means according to 2Pet. 1:3-4 “that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.”

Did you get the last part of what Peter said? We like to camp out on the first part, the part about God granting us everything pertaining to life. That is where Joel Osteen stops. “God’s power has granted everything pertaining to life, now all you have to do is claim that in order to unleash God’s power in your life.” But that is missing the point. Peter says, God’s power has granted everything pertaining to life AND GODLINESS. So that we might partake of the divine nature. That means that we have the power to live godly lives, the power to live according to God’s nature, not according to the lusts of the flesh. But rather escape the corruption of the world. Bottom line is that God has granted us the power to live godly lives. To live sanctified, separated lives, consecrated wholly unto God. That’s what we were saved for. To live godly lives in service to God. Not to live out our idea of our best life now. But to live out God’s plan for our lives.

That plan may one day call for you to give up this life in service to Him, just as Steven did. We may not all end up as martyrs, but we are all called to take up our cross and follow Jesus. To die to the world so that we might live for Christ. To crucify the flesh. To die, that we might live forever. That is what it means to live a full life. Whatever Joel Osteen and the like are selling is not seen anywhere in the scriptures, especially in the lives of saints such as Steven. They were willing to give all to serve Christ. They are written to be examples for us, that we might live lives that are pleasing to God.

When you live a life that is first of all submitted to serve Christ as a servant, when you are truly full of the Holy Spirit, full of wisdom, full of faith, full of grace and full of power, then you too may receive the crown of righteousness, the victor’s crown which Steven received.

As Steven faced his accusers who end up stoning him to death it says in vs. 15, “And fixing their gaze on him, all who were sitting in the Council saw his face like the face of an angel.” What is Luke talking about? I don’t think that Steven’s face had some unearthly glow. Angels have seen God. Angels continually gaze on the face of God. So to have the face of an angel is to have a countenance that reflects a perfect trust in God, because you know God perfectly. Steven was so full of the presence of God, so submitted to God in every area of His life, that he faced his accusers with a serenity that can only come from an intimate relationship with God. He could trust God. He had given God all of his life and consequently the fullness of God was sufficient. It was enough. He was satisfied with Christ and willing to face anything, because he knew with the certainty of the angels the sovereignty and the love of God.

I believe that the serenity of Steven is available for us as well. I trust that you will submit your soul, your life, your all to Jesus Christ to serve Him, to sacrifice everything for the joy of knowing Him. And if you do that, He promises to fill you completely. To live inside you, filling you with His Spirit, His wisdom, faith, grace and power. Let us pray.

As we have been looking at the formation of the first church in our study of Acts, we have seen that various demonically inspired attacks on the church were occurring through persecution, through hypocrisy, and through intimidation. But in each situation we have seen that rather than these attacks defeating the church, it only served to make it stronger, make it increase, and make it more effective. We see the church becoming as a result of various trials more united in doctrine, more purified in spirit, more bold in preaching the gospel, and more effective at winning the lost.

Now as we enter chapter 6, we see the devil continue his relentless attacks on the church and it’s disciples, and yet in spite of that, the word of God increasing. It reminds me of that secular saying you sometimes see in gyms, “whatever doesn’t kill me, makes me stronger.” In a similar fashion, God uses trials and tribulations to strengthen the church. Our sovereign God even uses things which are meant to us for evil, for our good. As Romans 8:28 says, “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” The trials and attacks on the church will not prevail against it, even as the head of the church, Jesus Christ, promised, but will only serve God’s purposes to purify and prove and profit the church.

So it is the case in the passage we come to today. Satan works through the selfish desires of men to provoke them to jealousy, to cause factions to develop in the church, to cause grumbling to begin in what up to this point has been the honeymoon period of the church, and yet God will use it for good, to bring about ever more consecration, more effectiveness, and more participation. He will use it to multiply the ministry of the apostles in an even greater way.

And this is the desire of God for all men, that they grow into maturity in Christ. Far too many people think that coming to Christ is the end of their journey rather than the beginning of new life, the beginning of a journey of faith. If you ask the typical person about their conversion, chances are they will spend an inordinate amount of time telling of all their exploits and sordid details of their life before they came to Christ, and then in a dramatic flourish, wrap it all up with a description of the moment that they were born again. And then that’s it. When you ask them what they have done since then with this new life that they have in Christ, a lot of people can’t add much more than they now belong to such and such church, and they go there every Sunday or so. That is the extent of their conversion experience.

But that was never the full intent of God saving us. God didn’t save us just so we could go to church, but so that we might become the church. The church is not a organization, but an organism. It is made up of living stones, Peter says in 1Peter 2:5, which “are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” So the principle then is that once we are made alive in Christ, we become united in a spiritual body with other believers, which congregation constitutes a temple of God, where we offer up our very own lives as sacrifices to God for service. That is true worship. I’m afraid that the idea of worship in modern Christianity has been tragically distorted today. Worship is not just showing up once a week and singing a few songs and clapping your hands. But worship is bowing your knee to Christ as Lord, consecrating your life in service to God, sacrificing your life for His purposes and serving His body, doing His will. That’s what Romans 12:1 says is our purpose now that we are saved, “to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.” So our salvation is not the ending point, but the starting point of our walk of faith.

So that is sort of what was starting to happen in the church in Jerusalem. There had been an explosion of growth, maybe 20,000 people were now part of the church. And it says in the closing verses of chapter 5 that the apostles were continuing to preach the gospel in the temple daily and from house to house. But what was also happening was a tendency on the part of some of the congregation to come to church, to hear the message, and to receive the ministry of the apostles, but yet to stop at that point. They were sort of stuck at the level of infancy as a new born in Christ, and were not pressing on towards maturity. They saw church as how it benefitted them, and they had not progressed to the point of benefitting others.

You know, this progression kind of parallels the great commandment of Christ, the summarization that He gave of the law. Jesus said the greatest commandment was to love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul and all your strength. That was the foremost commandment. But then the second great commandment is like unto it, that is that you love your neighbor as yourself. And that is sort of represented here in this problem that surfaces in the church. They are all together worshipping God and listening the preaching of the apostles, but some were falling short of the application of the gospel, which is to love one another, even as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her.

And see that is the progression of maturity that was lacking at this point. The point where you don’t just go to church, you start being the church. Where you don’t just receive grace, but you start showing grace. Where you don’t just come to be served, but to serve. And that is where God wants us to be, and where we start bearing fruit. Where we don’t seek spiritual gifts for how they might edify us, but we seek spiritual gifts that edify the church, that build up the body.

So this is the problem in the church at Jerusalem. Let’s break it down somewhat and then see how we might apply what we learn from this to our church, to our lives.

Luke says in vs. 1 that at the time when the church was increasing, it was growing, things were happening, the problem surfaced. As I said, God will use even this problem to further the church and His purposes, but at this point we see that grumbling and murmuring spring up because there is a complaint on the part of some in the congregation that their needs weren’t being met the way they thought they should. It takes the form of a complaint, of murmuring and grumbling. I think that Satan had filled the hearts of some of the congregation there with jealousy. Oh, their motives sound righteous enough. I mean, who can fault them for being concerned about the needs of widows? But I don’t think that their complaint was much more than a self righteous covering for jealousy on the part of the Hellenistic Jews towards the Hebrews.

This is actually similar to what happened with Ananias and Sapphira. They were really jealous of the attention that Barnabas and others received from the church when they brought in their proceeds from selling their property. There was nothing wrong with bringing in money and giving it to the church. That is a good thing. What was sinful about it was that they were jealous of the attention that others received, and they wanted to get in on it, and so they lied about how much they were giving. But the root of their sin was jealousy, which lead to hypocrisy and pride.

There was nothing wrong with caring for widows either. James says that pure and undefiled religion is caring for the widows and orphans. So that is a good thing. But if the Hellenistic Jews had really cared that much about the widows not receiving as much as the Hebrew widows, then why didn’t they do something about it themselves? Why didn’t they take it upon themselves to personally provide for the Hellenistic widows? Well, the answer is that the widows needs weren’t really the issue. The issue was that they somehow felt shorted in the church, they somehow felt slighted because they were not native Hebrews but had been raised in Greece and spoke Greek, and they developed a certain degree of jealousy towards the native Hebrews. And so I think they used the issue of the widows as a pretext for their grumbling, which was really directed at the apostles leadership. That was the real issue. I can’t know the exact reason, but it was probably ethnically motivated. The native Hebrews would have been people who lived in Jerusalem. The Hellenistic Jews were people who had been dispersed throughout Greece and the surrounding areas. They had been visiting Jerusalem during the feasts, had been saved perhaps on the day of Pentecost or when Peter preached following the healing of the lame man. And so they had not gone back home but stayed in Jerusalem. Some may have had legitimate needs that were provided for when people brought in money to the church during the initial services. But here it is a few weeks later, or maybe even a few months later, and maybe they weren’t getting the money given to them that they once received. And maybe they became jealous of the people who were still receiving financial help from the church and they wanted to attribute it to some sort of favoritism on the part of the apostles. Rather than realizing that by now they should be giving rather than receiving, they became jealous of those that were receiving. They were jealous because some people had more than they had.

And so they murmured against the apostles. That is what happened when the children of Israel left Egypt, remember? They ended up murmuring and complaining and grumbling against Moses because they were not eating as well as they would like. They said they had eaten better when they were slaves in Egypt, and now Moses had brought them out to the wilderness to starve. They complained against Moses leadership. And that murmuring spirit caused God to discipline them and ultimately did not let the original generation enter the Promised Land.

So that is what was going on in the church. Everything is going great, God’s word is abounding, people are coming into the church, and then suddenly selfishness and petty jealousy works it’s way into the congregation and the whole congregation goes from being of one accord and having all things in common, and being of one spirit, to suddenly being divided, being jealous towards one another and complaining about the leadership of the church. Sounds like a pretty typical church, unfortunately.

So let’s look at how the apostles handled this problem. They show a sense of discernment that is really amazing, and could only be wisdom given by the Holy Spirit. Their answer to this complaint, which is really against them as the leadership of the church, is found in vs. 2; “So the twelve summoned the congregation of the disciples and said, “It is not desirable for us to neglect the word of God in order to serve tables. Therefore, brethren, select from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we may put in charge of this task. But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.”

I love these guys. They were just uneducated, humble fishermen, but now they have been filled with the Holy Spirit, that means controlled by the Holy Spirit by the way, and so they now have the wisdom of Solomon. And that wisdom is amazing. Rather than getting defensive, rather than striking the complainers dead on the spot, rather than even confronting them in their sin of jealousy, they put the ball squarely back in the court of the complainers.

But first of all they establish their priority. They say right off the bat, that their priority is the ministry of the word and prayer. That is the priority of a pastor, by the way. I used to be confused when I was first starting out in ministry by people telling me that if I wanted to be a pastor then I had to have a pastor’s heart. I wasn’t sure what a pastor’s heart was, but I was led to believe that it was characterized by someone who enjoyed going to hospitals and visiting sick people and liked funerals. I know how that sounds, but that is what I thought. And it took me a while to understand that is not the primary ministry of the pastor. That sort of thing may happen in the process of being a pastor. But it is not the primary purpose of the pastor. The primary purpose is to preach the word of God. And the study of the word and prayer is the means by which God accomplishes that, by submitting to the word of God and seeking to be filled by God so that we might speak the word of God. Everything else a pastor encounters in ministry flows from first being filled with the word of God and praying for God’s wisdom and strength to do what He tasks us to do. Recognizing that it is not about my articulation, my ability to capture and hold and audience, my skill at oratory, my compassion to the sick, my ability to be a good listener, or my training in counseling. None of those things are worth anything if I am not preaching the word of God, the whole counsel of God.   That is my first priority, to preach the word, be instant in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke and exhort with all longsuffering and patience.

So I love the apostles because they won’t accept the complaint made against them. They say it is not desirable that we should wait on tables and neglect the word of God. You know, I have wrestled with that one from time to time. I used to be in the restaurant business. And there was a time in the beginning of this church when I had to work part time jobs in order to support myself. And to tell you the truth, I could still benefit from that today many times and still find myself doing side jobs occasionally to try to make ends meet. But there came a time in the ministry of this church when I said that it was not desirable to neglect the word of God in order to serve tables. And when I made that commitment, to give the Lord all of my time and resources and trust Him to provide, then not only did my finances improve, but my preaching improved, and the church was benefitted.

Paul said in 1Cor. 9:14 “So also the Lord directed those who proclaim the gospel to get their living from the gospel.” And I will not apologize for that. But more importantly I cannot let myself get distracted by the pursuit of money or trying to live according to some standard of living that the world puts out there as normal. I must keep my priority in line with God, and let God determine my standard of living.

So the apostles said this is what we are going to do, this is our priority, the ministry of the word and prayer, and this is what you are to do. Select 7 men, of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom whom we may put in charge of this task. So they essentially say, there is a physical need here in the church? Great, select some people from among you to take care of it. But we are not going to be distracted from our duty. Your duty is to love one another, to serve one another, to think more highly of one another than you do yourselves. That is the commandment, to love one another. To serve one another. So then do it. Select 7 godly men from among the congregation to take the lead in this.

Now there is a debate in theological circles as to whether or not these men were appointed as the first deacons or was this some other position. But the fact is that the title of deacon is not used. But diakoneō is used, which means to serve, to be a servant. And that is the same word is sometimes rendered as deacon later in the epistles. We do know that they were called the seven in Acts 21, as Philip was at that point an evangelist, but he was still called one of the seven.

So I tend to think that these men were more than deacons, because as we have seen Philip was an evangelist, and Steven was a preacher and worked great signs and wonders, and we will be looking at his brief but powerful ministry next week. I think that they were specially appointed representatives of the apostles themselves, who were granted a similar ministry, with similar gifts as the apostles were given. Furthermore, though we don’t know anything about the other five, we do know that Philip and Steven had been part of the 70 disciples that Jesus commissioned and sent out ahead of Him. So these were men that had been with Jesus just as the apostles had.

But what I think is instructive here is not perhaps readily apparent in the text, but it is there nonetheless. And that is this, these men were the foremost members of the congregation, who rose to fill the need of the body from the ranks of the body, and as such were examples for the rest of the church to emulate. This was the means by which the apostles worked to bring the body of the church from the position of mere spectators, to engaging in the life of the body.

And when I say that they were examples for the rest to follow that is backed up by the word that bookends the passage in vs. 2 and vs. 7, which was disciples. The early Christians were not yet called Christians, they were called disciples. And so these men first of all were disciples of Christ, and so they became examples of servants that the rest of the church could emulate and follow.

That is why the apostles set such high standards for this position. By the way, they were not necessarily waiters, who waited on tables. That is not what is being described here. What tables indicates is money tables. As the money was collected into the church it was disseminated to the needy, the widows being most emblematic of the needy that were in the church, but not necessarily just widows, but anyone that needed assistance.

But notice the standards that the apostles set for this position. First of all, they specified that it was to be men. God has ordained that men are to be the leaders of the church. It doesn’t mean that women can’t serve the church, but these leaders, these diakoneo, these servants, should be men. And that is a pattern that is followed throughout all the epistles. It was the pattern of Jesus who commissioned 12 men to be His apostles, and 70 men to be His disciples. And I do not think it is up for debate. I don’t think it’s just a cultural issue. Paul makes it clear that it is a theological issue in 1 Timothy 2:12, where he says, “I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man” speaking of in the church. The men are to be the spiritual leaders in the home and in the church, and when that gets out of order, then you are asking for trouble. I’m sorry if that offends your cultural sensibilities. I didn’t write the Bible, I merely tell you what God says in the Bible.

Secondly, they were to be men from in the church. “From among you…” See, the apostles are trying to teach them that the work of the ministry is to be performed by the church body, the saints. It’s not just clergy that do the work of ministry. But God has called every part of the body to participate in the working of the body. There are a variety of gifts, because there are a variety of things to be done in the church. The apostles are bridging the gap between the laity and the clergy. There really is not supposed to be a situation where the clergy does everything and the laity just shows up. But the church is a living organism, made up of living stones which are built up together into a temple unto God.

Thirdly, they were to be men of the church, of good reputation. This is so practical. How can people emulate someone who doesn’t have a good reputation? How can you follow the example of someone who has a bad reputation? And it’s not just a good reputation in the church either, by the way. It’s a good reputation in the community, in their business, in the marketplace. So that they will not be a stumbling block to the gospel. That is why purity is so important. You cannot claim God and live like the devil. You cannot be a leader in the church and continue in sin. Your testimony is important to the church body, that you do not bring shame upon the cause of Christ.

Fourthly, they were full of the Holy Spirit. How can a man have discernment? How can a man have wisdom? Only when he is filled with the Holy Spirit. We aren’t talking about some holy roller running around speaking gibberish or talking about some weird vision he has seen. We are talking about someone who lives a life under the control of the Holy Spirit. That’s it, plain and simple. He is not characterized by a life in the flesh, a worldly life, but a life dominated by the Holy Spirit. To be filled with the Holy Spirit is like a ship under sail, moved along by the power of the wind. That is being filled with the Holy Spirit. God will not contend with the spirit of the flesh. We crucify the flesh so that we might be filled with the Spirit, be under the control and guidance and power of the Spirit.

Fifthly, they were to be men of wisdom. Wisdom comes as a result of being filled with the Spirit. Relying upon the word. Crucifying the flesh. Not dependant upon the carnal wisdom of this world, but submissive and obedient to what God has told us in His word. Wisdom is the application of knowledge. That is simply being obedient to the conviction of the Holy Spirit through the word of God.

Now those are the kind of leaders you want in a church. Those are the kind of servants you want in a church. Those are the kind of men that you can emulate, that would serve as examples to the rest. I saw a post yesterday which quoted John Wesley, who said, ““If I had 300 men who feared nothing but God, hated nothing but sin, and determined to know nothing among men but Christ, and Him crucified, I would set the world on fire.”   If I were to change that at all, it would just be to scale it down a little bit. If I were to have just 7 men who feared nothing but God, hated nothing but sin, and determined to know nothing among men but Christ and Him crucified, I could turn this community upside down. We could pack this beach on Sunday morning. God give us a few good men who fear God, men of good reputation, men that are filled with the Holy Spirit and wisdom, and we will turn this community upside down.

So they nominated 7 men, Stephen, Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas and Nicolas, a proselyte from Antioch.   You know what is special about this list? They are all Greek names. They are all Hellenistic Jews. So here is the wisdom of the Holy Spirit to answer the complaint of the Hellenistic Jews. You want your widows to be cared for? Here then is seven men of your own, men who are from Greece and the surrounding nations, men of good reputation, men filled with the Holy Spirit and wisdom, and they will show you how to be servants of one another. They will show you by example how to serve one another, how to love one another, how to put the needs of others higher than your own. These Hellenistic Jews would come from the back rows of the congregation and come up to the front, serving one another, serving not only the Greek widows, but all the needs of the saints. They were to be the first examples of spiritual maturity in the church, moving from being served, to serving, to feeding, to caring for the needs of others. To loving your neighbor as yourself.

So the apostles show their approval of these men by laying hands on them. What does that mean? It doesn’t mean that some sort of power fell on them. It means that they showed unity with them. What does a handshake mean in our culture? It means that you welcome them, you identify with them, you are at peace with one another. The right hand was the hand that you held a sword in, so to give someone the right hand of fellowship was first of all a symbol of peace and goodwill. And secondly that you were identifying yourself with them. That is what was indicated by laying on of hands. It wasn’t some mystical transfer of power. But it was a symbol of the church’s authority extended to include these men as well as the apostles into leadership.

So what was the result of all of this? Did the devil get what he wanted by instigating jealousy in the church? Did he accomplish his goal of division, and so divide and then conquer the church? Obviously, the answer is no. In fact, because the apostles did not rely on man’s wisdom, but were filled with the Holy Spirit, God used what the devil meant as evil for good, for the good of the church.

Vs. 7, as a result of this trial, this dependence on the leading of the Spirit, and the submission of the church to the authority of the apostles, it says that instead of the church being hurt by this complaint, that “The word of God kept on spreading; and the number of the disciples continued to increase greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests were becoming obedient to the faith.” When these 7 godly men stepped up to serve the church, the church increased in effectiveness even more.

So in closing, let me just recap what I said earlier about these men that are examples of spiritual maturity. God used them to bridge the gap between the congregation and the apostles. The ministry would be multiplied by the addition of seven godly men, who understood that we are called to be the church, not just come to church. And the congregation would be blessed and increased by the example that these men showed to the rest. I pray and I trust you will pray with me that God will raise up people like these seven, here in this church. Servants from among you. People of good reputation. People filled with the Holy Spirit and wisdom. If we are going to accomplish the ministry of the church, the mission of Christ to win the world, then we need people such as these to come up from the ranks and take their place as servants in this church. That they might be examples to others. That we all may attain such a standard, to be servants of Christ and His body.

As we have been studying the book of Acts, much has been said about the work of the Holy Spirit. He was the One who the apostles were told to wait for, and His coming was what inaugurated the new church in Jerusalem in a baptism of divine power. Jesus said in John 16:13-15 “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you.”

So as we have seen, the Holy Spirit did indeed come in great power and authority, attesting to the truth of God’s word with signs and wonders and miracles. Immediately, the early church saw the result of the Holy Spirit’s power by the fact that thousands of people were saved. The Spirit of Truth convicted men’s hearts upon hearing the truth of the gospel, so that they cried out, “what shall we do?” Upon hearing the message of the apostles the men of Jerusalem’s hearts were cut to the quick with conviction of their sinful condition and they cried out in repentance and faith to be saved. That happened as a result of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and the proclamation of the truth concerning Jesus Christ and His gospel.

Now we know that the devil hates the truth. Jesus said in John 8:44 concerning the devil that “He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” So as the church is being built on the truth of the apostles through the power of the Spirit of Truth, the devil sought to sow lies among the church. To plant tares among the wheat. And we saw the evidence of that in the beginning of chapter 5 with Ananias and Sapphira. Peter accused them of a great sin, the sin of lying to the Holy Spirit. They claimed to be giving all to God, when in fact it was a lie. And Peter said it was not him they were lying to, but they were lying to the Holy Spirit. So God’s judgment fell upon them right in the church and they fell down dead as a warning to everyone, as a warning to those who would subvert the truth of God, either by doctrine or by their life. Because the truth is the foundation of the church. If Satan can shake that, if he can twist that, then it will cause the whole building to tumble.

That is why God desires purity in the church. Truth of doctrine, purity in worship, and purity in the lives of those that claim the name of Jesus. As Paul said in 2Cor. 7:1 “Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.” God saved us to be holy, to be purified from the defilement of flesh and spirit, that we might complete holiness in the fear of the Lord as we walk in the world, so that we might be a testimony to the world of the power of God to transform sinners into saints. That was the testimony that the early church had in Jerusalem. And that was why the church was growing and people were being added to the church daily.

So then as a result of the purifying power of the Holy Spirit, the church is strengthened in the truth and made even more effective in evangelizing the world. But at the same time, the truth is at war with the devil’s lie. And in the remainder of chapter 5, we see this battle between truth and the lie played out in the church, through the persecution of the church. We are going to see in this chapter five consequences of truth as it is employed by this young church in evangelism.

First of all, let’s look at the authentication of the truth. Starting in vs. 12, “At the hands of the apostles many signs and wonders were taking place among the people; and they were all with one accord in Solomon’s portico. But none of the rest dared to associate with them; however, the people held them in high esteem. And all the more believers in the Lord, multitudes of men and women, were constantly added to their number, to such an extent that they even carried the sick out into the streets and laid them on cots and pallets, so that when Peter came by at least his shadow might fall on any one of them. Also the people from the cities in the vicinity of Jerusalem were coming together, bringing people who were sick or afflicted with unclean spirits, and they were all being healed.”

In order to authenticate the truth that the apostles were preaching, God granted special power to the apostles to do signs and wonders. These were uneducated, unqualified men in the eyes of the people. They were preaching a gospel that was foreign to the hearers who were steeped in Judaism. And so God verified that the word that they were preaching was from God by signs and wonders. This was particularly the distinction of an apostle. Paul said in 2Cor. 12:12 “The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance, by signs and wonders and miracles.” That was the distinction of the ministry of a true apostle. They were sent by Christ to be His representatives, to speak His gospel, and so He gave them authenticating signs.

That is what the writer of Hebrews says was the purpose of signs and wonders as well. Heb. 2:3-4 “After it was at the first spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed to us by those who heard, God also testifying with them, both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to His own will.” So God testified that the word they were speaking was from Him by miraculous signs.

Throughout all of Bible history, God authenticated the message of His prophets and apostles by signs and wonders, to signify a new era, a new revelation of His word. In Exodus, Moses was given signs and wonders to authenticate that he spoke from God. In the same way, Elijah and Elisha were given the power of signs and wonders to inaugurate the new era of the prophets. Jesus Christ went about healing and working miracles as validation of His ministry that He was sent from God and teaching the words of God. And so in the beginning of a new era, the age of the church, God gave the apostles the same ministry, the same miracle working power so that people would recognize them as being of Christ and that He might validate their gospel as the truth of God. Because the doctrine of the apostles was to be the foundation of the church. It would form the truth that would be written down as Scripture, which is the foundation that the church would be built upon. So God verified it, validated it, and authenticated it by miracles.

However, it was a limited dispensation. As we go on to the latter parts of the book of Acts, there is a fading away of the ministry of miracles. Here in chapter 5, multitudes are being healed. All were being healed. But by the end of Acts, physical healing is no longer the means by which the Holy Spirit authenticates the gospel. The scriptures which have been written by that time are the means that the Spirit authenticates teachers. We don’t always see everyone healed in the latter parts of Acts. We don’t see everyone delivered from prison in the latter parts of Acts. But rather we see apostles dying for the faith, imprisoned and left there to die by the hands of their persecutors. We see people get sick and not always healed. And so it is a special dispensation, a special gift that was given to the apostles and a few other select ministers of their ilk, for the purpose of authenticating the truth of their message for a limited time and a specific purpose.

But even today, though we may not have the power given to the apostles to heal or do miracles, yet the greatest miracle of all is still in full effect as a means of authenticating the truth of our doctrine. And that is the miracle of a transformed life. The conversion of a lost sinner into a child of God is the greatest miracle of all, and one that mere physical healing could only allude to. God is the same, yesterday, today and forever. He still has the power to heal. And God still heals. But do not be deceived, there are no more apostles. We saw earlier that apostles had to be witnesses of the teaching of Christ and His resurrection. So do not be deceived by those false prophets that claim to have the gift of healing, or worse yet, that say you can be healed of any disease if you just have enough faith. Jesus and the apostles raised dead people to life, who had no faith whatsoever. God does the healing, not men. So today, we validate the truth of preachers by the scriptures, not by claims of signs and wonders.

Secondly, we see the attack on the truth. As I said earlier, Satan hates the truth. And in this case, he makes a frontal attack. He works through the religious establishment, the high priest and the Council, who are jealous of the apostle’s power and results and the fact that the entire city was galvanized by their message. And their envy provokes their attack on the truth – they have the apostles arrested and put in jail.

The religious establishment was offended at the truth. The gospel is by design offensive, and so self righteous people will be offended when you tell them that they are sinners. So they locked the Apostles up, to try to shut up the truth. But the truth will not be silenced. God sent an angel to let them out. It’s ironic that God sent an angel to let the apostles out of the prison. The high priests and the Council were comprised of Sadducees, who did not believe in the resurrection, nor a spirit, nor an angel. So God sent an angel, so that the apostles could continue preaching the resurrection. It’s also ironic that the attack was meant to stop miracles from occurring, and in fact it caused another miracle. Satan’s attack backfired. It produced a miracle that could not be denied.

In the morning, the gates were still locked, the guards were still at the door, but the apostles were not there. When they could not find them, some one came and told them that the apostles were right back in the temple preaching again. “Then the captain went along with the officers and proceeded to bring them back without violence (for they were afraid of the people, that they might be stoned).” Satan can attack the church, but as Christ said, the gates of hell will not prevail against it. God can use even that which is hateful for His good, to further the truth.

Thirdly, we see the affirmation of the truth. It’s very interesting to me that when the angel set them free he gave them a divine charge; “Go, stand and speak to the people in the temple the whole message of this Life.”   The apostles were a living demonstration of the principle that Jesus taught in John 8:32 “and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”

It’s also interesting that when they received that charge, they did not hesitate. They did not put it off for a more convenient day. But they started preaching in the temple at daybreak. Wow! And here I was thinking that 8am was too early for Sunday mornings. Perhaps we need to start earlier. But seriously, the apostles recognized the urgency of the message. What opportunities to witness are lost because we fail to realize the urgency of the gospel message to a dying world.

But when they are brought back to the court of the Council, this is where the apostles have a chance to change their message. But they do not. If anything, the power of God to rescue them from prison has emboldened them even more to affirm the message that they have been preaching is the truth, and they cannot change it, and they cannot stop doing it. They say that they had to obey God rather than men. Whether it is accepted or not, whether it is even legal or not, will not impact their message.

Peter had already indicted the leaders for killing Jesus in chapter 4:10. Now he even more boldly affirms that Jesus had been raised from the dead by God, and exalted into heaven. This to men who did not believe in a resurrection.

The words Peter uses to describe this exalted Jesus is a Prince and a Savior. We should all be familiar with the meaning of Savior, but the word Prince bears further scrutiny. It means “a pioneer, one who leads the way, an originator.” Jesus is the pioneer of life. He was the first born of the dead. But He was also the pioneer who leads us in the walk of faith, walking in the Spirit, walking according to the Word of God. Hebrews 2:10 calls Jesus the Pioneer, or the Author of our salvation. Our salvation is not an ending point, it is the birth point. It is not a parking lot, but a launching pad as we follow in the footsteps of Christ. In Heb. 12:2 Jesus is called the author, the Prince of our faith. In other words, He leads us into paths which test our faith and cause it to grow, to lead us into righteousness for His name sake. He leads us into maturity in our faith.

Also notice that Peter’s affirmation of the truth speaks of the need of repentance which God has granted to those that submit to the Lordship of Christ. And that repentance brings about the forgiveness of sins. Faith and repentance, are the keystones of salvation. But be sure of something, while faith is believing in the knowledge of the truth, repentance is acting on that knowledge in obedience by turning from sin. Vs. 32, “And we are witnesses of these things; and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey Him.”   They are witnesses of the truth, the Holy Spirit is a witness to the truth, and He is given to those who are obedient to the truth that they might be a witness. The witness is we once walked according to the lusts of the flesh, now we walk according to the truth of the Spirit.

Eph 2:1 “And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.” But then contrast that with the walk of faith in vs. 8 “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.” Faith is always yoked with obedience.

Fourthly, we see as the consequence of preaching the truth some avoiding the truth. The temple and the Council was controlled by the Sadducees, but the Pharisees were respected and honored by the people. And there is a Pharisee there present in the Council who is so widely respected that he is able to affect their decision and preserve the leaders position with the people. Gamaliel was the foremost teacher of the Pharisee. And by the way, he was Paul’s teacher.

But though his counsel was accepted, it was not wise. On the surface, his advice sounds good. But when examined it reveals that he had rejected Jesus as the Messiah, but had lumped him along with the false Messiahs. He also assumed that if something fails then it is not of God, or conversely, if something succeeds, then it is of God. That is man’s wisdom. It is not the wisdom of God. From their perspective, Jesus had failed because He had been crucified. From their perspective, Christianity would fail, because it was dispersed in the coming persecution. Mark Twain once said in a bit of wisdom, that a lie runs around the world while the truth is still putting on it’s shoes.  False religion does not lack for disciples and missionaries and evangelists. False teachers often have successful enterprises called churches. But worldly success is no indication of the truth of the gospel.

But the most foolish advice given by Gamaliel was to do nothing. To take a wait and see attitude. To try to remain neutral. And this is exactly the devil’s strategy used to keep so many people on their way to hell. Satan urges them to find a neutral position with God, neither too involved in Christianity, or too much against it. Accept the likeable parts, but don’t adhere to the sticky parts, in effect, avoid making a real commitment. And that is a damnable attitude. Jesus said in Matt. 12:30 “He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters.” One day every man or woman will give an account of what they did with Jesus. And they that will not bow the knee now, will bow their knee then, but it will be too late for their salvation. They will mourn when they see Him who they had pierced.

Gamaliel was a very smart man. He knew the Scriptures back and forth. He was very well respected as a religious leader. He had a great audience of admirers. And yet his counsel was to avoid the truth, and so he condemned his soul and theirs to hell by his wisdom. Beware of religious leaders who sound convincing, and yet their doctrine is not backed up by sound doctrine based on the whole counsel of God, or as the angel said, the whole message of this life. For whoever rejects the truth is dead even while he yet lives.

One final effect of the truth was the apostles continuing to announce the truth. Rather than the persecution shutting the apostles up, it caused them to be even more bold in preaching the gospel. Peter’s message so angered the Council that they were cut to the quick, and wanted to kill them. But God used the foolishness of Gamaliel to cause the Council to let the apostles go free. However, not without scourging them. In vs. 40 we read that they flogged the apostles and told them not to preach any more in His name and they released them.

But notice in vs. 41 the apostles response to that flogging. “So they went on their way from the presence of the Council, rejoicing that they had been considered worthy to suffer shame for His name.” Wow. I wish that could be said of me when I am reviled for the message that I preach. I must confess that it is often not rejoicing that comes out of my mouth when I am attacked. I wonder how you would measure up? I think the problem for most of us is that we might recognize the apostles’ flogging as persecution, but when trials come against us, we often fail to recognize it as such. We respond as if it were only flesh and blood. We fail to recognize that Satan is the instigator behind many attacks perpetrated through flesh and blood. But instead of recognizing it as demonic, we see a coworker, or a relative, or a friend or a neighbor. And we forget that we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers that work through the flesh of fallen men and women.

Someone once said, that the purpose of life is to glorify God as we go through trials which build character as we are obedient to the truth. Therefore we should rejoice in persecution or in trials. James said “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

I must confess that if I would have been there with the apostles I would have rejoiced when I was released from prison by the angel. That would have been pretty cool and validated my sense of self worth. But I would have had a hard time understanding why I had to undergo flogging. And let me tell you, flogging is not like getting a spanking when you were a kid. Flogging is being stripped of your clothes and being beaten with a bull whip until your back and legs are ripped to shreds. And they rejoiced that they were considered worthy to suffer in such a way for Christ. That alone was a testimony to the world, to see these men who had been beaten to a pulp come out of there praising God for it.

Persecution and threats and whippings did not make the Apostles quit, but it only served to make them even more bold. They were witnessing daily, preaching daily in the temple and from house to house. They used every opportunity to announce the good news of Jesus Christ. DL Moody once said, “the more we use the means and opportunities that we have, the more will our ability and our opportunities be increased.”

Listen, when we come to know the truth, and learn obedience to the truth from the things we suffer, even as Christ did, then we will not be quitters. The apostles weren’t quitters. Everyone of these men save John would eventually die as a martyr for the truth. Some of them would be burned alive. Some would be hung on a cross upside down. Some would be cast from the roof of the temple and stoned. Some would be beheaded. Almost all of them would be imprisoned and beaten many times. But the truth would make them free indeed. Paul spent a large part of his ministry in chains, and yet the word was unchained. The written words of Paul have had more impact than he could ever have had by simply preaching from town to town. God’s ways are not our ways. God has chosen the weak things to confound the mighty.

It’s amazing to me that God did not use angels as the soul ministers of His gospel. I mean why does He deign to use men? Why not just give the ministry of the gospel to His tried and true angels? They have immense power. They are not weak in flesh as we are. Certainly the world would pay attention to an angel speaking from a chariot of fire. But God in His wisdom has chosen man. He chose man to be the way that Christ would come into the world, to be born as a man and suffer as a man. He chose the lowliest of people, fishermen from Galilee, uneducated, rough men, to be His apostles, to carry the message of His gospel throughout the world. Why?

Because men can support their message by their experience and angels cannot. We were depraved, lost sinners when God redeemed us and changed us. We were weak in the flesh and now we have been made alive in the Spirit. We had no interest in God, now we are children of God and do His will. We have a living testimony that angels can never have. Because angels are not redeemed, angels are not converted. But we are. And so we must begin to praise Jesus by our words and our life, while we still are in this life, that we might serve to bring others to Christ.

God used men, not angels to spread the gospel. He may have used angels to release the apostles, but he uses men to preach the gospel. Jesus did not take the form of an angel to perform redemption, but He took the form of a man. In order that redeemed, transformed man should be the utility by which God transforms the world. It is a ministry committed to committed men and women. We too are sinners, but saved by grace and transformed into saints. God has chosen you to be His instrument for bringing the gospel to the world. That God should use man to be such a sacred testament to His power to save must be a blow to satanic pride. The use of feeble men brings glory to God in a way that angels could never do.

1Cor. 6:19 tells us, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body.” This is the announcement of the truth of Christ’s gospel. Your life glorifies God. You are not your own, but you are bought with a price. Your life is not your own. You are the temple of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth. Now then, hear the charge of the angel of God to you today, “Go, stand boldly and speak to the people all the words of this life.”   The people of this world are perishing for a lack of knowledge. We have the truth, and God has sent us to proclaim it to the world. I urge you to not neglect this great commission that God has entrusted you with. “Go, stand boldly and speak to the people all the words of this life.”

We looked last week at persecution against the church and how paradoxically persecution actually benefits the church. We found that persecution produces identification with Christ, it produces proven faith, persecution produces allegiance to God, not man, persecution produces effective praying, and so forth. Basically, we showed that persecution tends to strengthen the church and increase fruitfulness in the church. History reveals that persecuting the church only causes the church to become purer and more powerful and more effective.

Now, as we will see illustrated in this passage, Satan changes his strategy. If direct attacks do not destroy the church, he will change tactics. Not only is Satan a murderer, going about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour, but he is also a liar, and a deceiver, and so he disguises himself as an angel of light. In this strategy, he attacks inside the church, even through the church, where he is more effective at achieving his aim. Satan attempts to prevail by subterfuge what cannot be won by frontal attack. And so Satan tempts the members of the fellowship to sin, thus fostering rebellion against God from within the very ranks of the church, and using sin to corrupt the purity of the church, which is the secret of her effectiveness.

The fact that there is sin in the church should not come as a surprise to anyone. It is after all completely evident to the people outside the church. That is why non believer’s consistently say that the thing which turns them off more about the church is not old fashioned music, or even the preacher’s message, or the lack of young people activities, but anecdotal evidence suggests that what turns unbelievers off more than anything else in regards to the church is that it is filled with hypocrites.

And to a certain extent they are correct. None of us are what we should be. There’s sin in the church because there are sinners in the church. But sinners who mourn over their sinfulness and repent of it, trusting in the grace of God for their redemption do not make hypocrites. But rather hypocrites are people who pretend they are righteous, while they continue to live in sin. The Greek word for hypocrite means an actor on a stage. Therefore, hypocrites are people who put on an act in order to receive applause from men. And nothing is more damning to the church’s effectiveness, and it’s witness, and it’s fellowship than hypocrisy. Our Lord was most incensed against the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. He saved His most scathing attacks for those that talked the talk, but did not walk the walk. And the devil knows that sowing hypocrisy in the church will destroy it from the inside.

Jesus said in Matthew 13, that the kingdom of God (which is the church) is like a mustard seed that grew into a great tree. But people hearing that parable in those days understood that mustard seeds do not grow into great trees, but grow into mustard bushes. So Jesus is saying first of all that the mustard seed, the church, grows abnormally large. And then He says it grows so large that the birds of the air came and nested in it’s branches. What does that mean? Well, in another parable when Jesus taught about the various type of soils, He identifies the birds of the air as the devil and his demons that swoop down upon the seed cast into the soil and eat it up. So birds nesting in the branches of the tree indicates that demons will nest in the branches of the church. They find refuge there, they find rest there, because the church does not deal with unrepented sin.

As I said, this is the strategy of the devil. He finds it more effective to attack the church from within than from without. And he does that by tempting us to sin and harbor that sin, producing hypocrisy. And hypocrisy is one sin that Jesus spoke most vehemently about.

Now up to this point, the new church in Jerusalem had been going famously. It was growing, it was vibrant, it was powerful. But suddenly our attention is drawn to this egregious example of pride and hypocrisy in the church, and the Holy Spirit acts swiftly to cut it out of the body. Because unrepentant sin is like leaven, that is if it’s left in the dough it will leaven the whole lump. Unrepentant sin is rebellion towards God, which 1Samuel 15 says is as the sin of witchcraft. It destroys fellowship with God, it destroys unity in the body, it destroys your testimony, and ultimately it destroys lives. And that is why God moves to deal with this sin of hypocrisy in a mighty way before it destroys this infant church.

Boy, if you want to put a damper on your church growth program, you would think that God striking people dead would do it, wouldn’t you? I mean, from our point of view that is the wrong thing for God to do if you want to build a church. But yet God does this for exactly that reason. He knows that if it is to truly be His church, so the gates of hell will not prevail against it, then He must deal with flagrant sin, rebellious, unrepentant sin, and if it takes these two to make an example, to put the fear of God into this church, then that’s what it takes. Because God said we are to be holy, even as He is holy. It is His church. His Holy Spirit indwells the church. The Son of God shed His precious blood to purchase the church. And God knows that for it to be effective, for it to endure, for it to prevail, He must deal with the enemy within, the enemy of impurity which corrupts the church.

Let’s look then in detail as to what happened. The story really starts in the latter part of chapter 4. Barnabas has done what many others were doing in the church, they were selling property and bringing in the proceeds and laying it at the apostle’s feet. No one had told them to do this. This was just the result of their unfeigned love of God. They loved God, so they loved His body. They loved His people and so they wanted to participate in serving them, and they did it by sacrificial giving.

And there had obviously been some recognition in the church of these people that did this. The church was rejoicing in these people’s generosity. People that were displaced from their homes or jobs or families due to their faith were being blessed by these folks sacrificial giving. There must have been a certain amount of accolades and recognition due to these magnanimous gifts. There surely would have been a certain amount of recognition that these people were spiritually mature, and in the case of Barnabas at least, some were elevated to a place of leadership in the church. Barnabas would go on to be one of the great missionaries sent out by the church, responsible for nurturing no less person than the apostle Paul, and also John Mark.

So this couple in the church named Ananias and his wife Sapphira want to get in on this. Let me tell you, there is no righteousness so sweet as righteousness noticed. The church is no stranger to this malady of self righteousness today, even as we see it illustrated in these two people in this infant stage of the church. They wanted to be seen as spiritual, as dedicated, and committed. But in fact, they had ulterior motives, planning to claim something that was a lie.

Now we need to realize that these two people were believers. The text in ch.4 makes it clear that all of the people in the fellowship were of one heart and soul. But at some point the sin of envy, or jealousy, came into this couple’s hearts as they saw the accolades, or respect given to people like Barnabas. And that little bit of envy gave birth to another sin which was pride. They wanted to be seen as spiritual examples. They wanted to be able to go around with people thinking they were especially spiritual.

It’s interesting to note their names. I think they give us a clue to their personalities. Ananias means “Grace with God.” This guy even had a name which denoted his favor with God. And perhaps he leaned a little too heavily on God’s favor, even presuming upon the grace of God to overlook his presumptuous sin. And the wife’s name, Sapphira, is a take on a sapphire stone, which had come to mean beautiful. That probably is not the best name you want to pick for your child. It can’t exactly help a child have a healthy self image if everyone is calling them beautiful all day long. I can’t help but think that both of these people had a pride problem.

And this is purely speculative on my part, but I would not be surprised if they did not see this move as a means to gain a position in the church. You know, there were upwards of 15,000 to 20,000 members in this church at this point. And so it’s not surprising that someone would attempt to gain leadership status through some sort of underhanded approach to win the people’s favor. The sin of hypocrisy often lends itself to a desire for preeminence found in leadership or teaching.

So, in vs. 1 Luke tells us that in response to what Barnabas and others had done, this couple conspired to sell some property that they owned but keep some of the proceeds and yet tell the church that they were in fact giving them the full amount. There was no compulsion to sell their property. They were simply motivated by pride. They wanted to be seen as something they were not. They directly contradicted Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 6:1, “Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven.”

Which sin would you have picked to be the first sin that the Lord disciplined in the church? Maybe you would’ve picked immorality. Maybe you would’ve picked stealing. Maybe you would’ve picked some form of blasphemy. Maybe you would’ve picked some relationship characterized by anger, hostility, lack of forgiveness. Those are all part of life in the church. But the sin that the Holy Spirit places here to teach how God deals with sin in the church is the sin of hypocrisy, pretending to be something you’re not.

That’s why Peter said in 1 Peter 4:17 that it is time for judgment to begin with the house of God first. The church is to be a shining example to the world. God wants to clean out the old leaven which is always a used as a picture of sin in the Bible.. He doesn’t want sin corrupting this new church in it’s infancy. Because as Paul said, a little leaven leavens the whole lump. He says in 1Cor. 5:6, “Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed.” In the Passover festival, the Jews were to clean out the leaven from their houses. That was meant to be an illustration of searching your heart for sin and getting rid of it. Not harboring it. David said in Psalm 139:23-24 “Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me and know my anxious thoughts; And see if there be any hurtful way in me, And lead me in the everlasting way.”

But Ananias comes to the church and lays the money at the apostles feet in brazen hypocrisy. Premeditated hypocrisy. Unrepentant hypocrisy. You know there are all kinds of ways to sin. But there are some sins that are more dangerous than others. Spontaneous sin, or sin of the passion of the moment is one thing. But deliberate, intentional sin that refuses to acknowledge it as sin is another thing altogether. It’s like the difference between manslaughter and premeditated murder. It’s the most dangerous sin in the life of a Christian, and it’s most dangerous to the church.

And so Peter is given discernment by the Holy Spirit to recognize this. You know, I can’t claim to have Peter’s level of discernment. But I will say that discernment is a characteristic of a godly leader.  And I do believe that God often gives me a measure of discernment or intuition that enables me to see things where otherwise I might be deceived or fall into a trap. I think God given spiritual discernment is the only way a preacher can truly teach the truth of the gospel. And I think you have to rely on that God given wisdom in order to lead the church. But though I may often find myself thinking inwardly that what someone is saying to me is not right, or that it comes from wrong motives, I do not pronounce deadly judgment upon them. I let God be the judge, and I let God deal with them, unless He clearly tells me to confront them.

Notice that Peter does not enact corporeal punishment himself here either. But he does show discernment. He rebukes Ananias publicly. And I think he does that for the benefit of the church. If Ananias just fell over dead from a heart attack without clarification from Peter, the church would likely have erected his statue in the front vestibule. He would have looked like a benefactor who died an untimely death. But Peter, acting on behalf of the Holy Spirit, wants this to be understood, to be an example, a lesson for the rest of the church, that they do not lie to the Holy Spirit. And that is what Peter accuses Ananias of. He says you lied to the Holy Spirit, you have not lied to men but to God.

So Ananias fell down dead at that moment, right there in the front of the church. And Luke says great fear came over all that heard of it. Then three hours later, Sapphira came in. I don’t know why she was late, I guess she was fixing her hair or something. Had to look beautiful, you know. But she confirms the same lie that her husband had given, not knowing that he had just died. And so Peter rebuked her for testing the Holy Spirit and she also fell down dead in the midst of the congregation. Once again, in vs. 11, Luke tells us that the result was that great fear fell on all the church. Twice Luke tells us that great fear fell on the church. That was the goal.

Now fear is another thing that you would think would be bad for church growth. But actually it serves the purpose of God. That the church would have a holy fear of God. You know, as a preacher, every time I talk about the fear of God I am usually encouraged to downplay the aspect of fear to that of just some sort of reverence or awe. But here in this passage, you cannot escape from the holy dread of Godly fear. Heb. 10:31 “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”

Listen, Romans 3:18 makes it clear that the primary characteristic of the unbeliever is that there is no fear of God before their eyes. Then conversely does not that tell you that the characteristic of a Christian should be that they have a fear of God? We should have a holy fear of God. We cannot, nor should we want to live in sin, in flagrant rebellion against God. If He is our heavenly Father, then He says that He chastens those He loves, and He scourges every son.

I don’t know what your childhood may have been like, but I really loved my dad. And I know that my dad loved me enough to lay down his life for me if necessary. When I was a little boy and my dad would come home I would run and leap up into his arms and throw my arms around his neck. I knew that he loved me. But on those days when my brother and I drove my mother crazy, and wouldn’t obey, and deliberately rebelled against her, she would say, “just wait until your dad get’s home.” And on those days when dad would come in the front door I wouldn’t run to him. I was afraid because I knew that I was probably going to get a spanking. It didn’t mean that my dad didn’t love me anymore. It meant that I had a problem and I needed to get straightened out before I could have fellowship with my dad. But afterwards, when all the crying was over, I would find my way back to my dad, and crawl up on his lap, and bury my head in his chest sobbing and he would tell me that he loved me and I would tell him that I loved him too. Now to some people today that probably sounds like a form of child abuse. But I would retort that that kind of attitude is what has produced the kind of society that we live in today. There is no fear of God before their eyes, and as a result the world is in chaos, families are in chaos, because people do whatever they think is right in their own eyes.

God’s family is not designed to be like that. God’s plan of discipline of His family, the church is found in Heb. 12:5-10 “MY SON, DO NOT REGARD LIGHTLY THE DISCIPLINE OF THE LORD, NOR FAINT WHEN YOU ARE REPROVED BY HIM; FOR THOSE WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE DISCIPLINES, AND HE SCOURGES EVERY SON WHOM HE RECEIVES.” It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness.”

That’s what God’s discipline is designed to produce – holiness. 2Cor. 7:1 says, “Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.” See, if we were to examine ourselves, and put away filthiness, put away fleshly defilements, put away sin, and desire holiness, then God will have no need of discipline. But when we refuse to confess our sins, refuse to acknowledge it as sin, and continue in sin, then God will discipline us for our own good in order to produce holiness. So rather than continuing in sin we are to be perfecting holiness in the fear of God. To be striving to be holy, even as He is holy. This is what we were given the power of the Holy Spirit to enable us to do. To do righteousness, to be holy in all our behavior, to be set apart, consecrated only unto the Lord.

Some of you undoubtedly are saying, “Well, I can’t believe a loving God could do something like that.” But in saying that, are you not guilty of defining God? Are you not guilty of making a god in your own image? According to what you want God to be? I would remind you that God is jealous of His church. James 4:5 “He jealously desires the Spirit which He has made to dwell in us.” The church is to be the spotless bride of Christ. And so He is just in His vengeance against those that would bring sin and shame into His church.

This is not an isolated example of God’s severe discipline against sin, but this an ever present reality of the early church. According to 1 Corinthians 11:30-32 there were true believers that God was putting to death because of the way they came to the Lord’s Table. “Some of you are weak and some of you are sick, and some of you sleep.” You’re dead because of how you desecrate the My table. Some of you, Paul says. That means some of you Christians pay the ultimate price for your rebellion.

In 1 Cor. 5, Paul was writing to address an immorality issue that had continued in the church and everyone knew about it, and the person refused to confess it as sin. And so Paul writes in 1Cor. 5:5 “I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.” Do you understand what Paul is saying there? He is saying, I’m going to remove him from the protection of the church, so that he might be destroyed by Satan. This man is going to be destroyed physically, so that he might be saved in his spirit in the judgment day of Christ. This man was saved, and so he was going to enter into heaven, but he would suffer the punishment of God here on this earth by allowing the devil to destroy him.

So we see here in this passage another miracle of the Holy Spirit, empowering the church, but not one that gets all the attention like speaking in tongues, or healing. But this is the power of the Holy Spirit nonetheless. It is the power to discipline the church. The Holy Spirit has that right, and that responsibility, so that the church may be the holy and spotless bride of Christ. He has the right to purify the church.

So what was the result of this purification, this godly fear that fell upon the church? Did it kill the church? Did people stop coming to church for fear that they would be struck dead on the spot? Did the church shrivel up and die because they were too legalistic, or too condemning? No, actually the opposite happened. The church increased in it’s effectiveness. The purity and zeal for God in the church reached a new level and the whole city was aware of it. There suddenly weren’t very many hypocrites that wanted to associate with them, that’s for sure. Look at vs.12-13 “At the hands of the apostles many signs and wonders were taking place among the people; and they were all with one accord in Solomon’s portico. But none of the rest dared to associate with them; however, the people held them in high esteem.”

So here is the result in a nutshell. As a result of purification the apostles were enabled to do even more miracles, the church was unified in doctrine and in fellowship, and unsaved people did not dare associate with them. That means that there was no social benefit to being a church member. And people were afraid to try to pretend that they were righteous when they were still unsaved. But, and this is important, but the people held them in high esteem. The unsaved community watching this church had nothing bad to say about them. They weren’t cursing the church because they were a bunch of hypocrites. No, they held them in high esteem because they could see them practicing what they preached. They saw the purity and commitment and devotion of this early church and it was a testimony to the unsaved world as to the power of the Holy Spirit to transform men and women, to conform them to the image of Jesus Christ.

And then notice another result of the Holy Spirit’s purification of the church. Vs.14 “And all the more believers in the Lord, multitudes of men and women, were constantly added to their number.” The church continued to grow by leaps and bounds. The church’s effectiveness was not hindered, but helped as they continued in the fear of the Lord because it’s light burned ever more brighter.

Listen, in closing I would just ask you today to examine yourselves today in light of this standard of purity and holiness that God expects from us. Ananias and Sapphira were Christians. And even though their motives were suspect, they were giving money to the church, weren’t they? They were involved in fellowship. Wasn’t that a good thing? No, the fact is that God is not concerned about outward signs of religion. He is concerned about the heart. And God sees our heart. David said, a broken and contrite heart O Lord you will not despise.

The sin of Ananias and Sapphira was not just that they kept back some money. It was that they lied to the Holy Spirit. And I would ask you today, are you guilty of lying to the Holy Spirit? Are you telling God that you are His, you have surrendered all, when in fact you are holding back a portion for yourself? Are you holding on to some sin, holding onto some thing that is not honoring to God? Have you come here today with your head held high, attempting to put one over on the church, and in effect you are guilty of not only sinning against God but lying to the Holy Spirit by in effect telling saying that you are good, you are righteous, when in fact you refuse to repent of sin that you are harboring in your life?

If that is the case, then I would “urge you by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:1,2) Don’t leave this place today in a spirit of rebellion. Confess your sins one to another that you may be healed. (James 5:16) That the limb which is lame may not be put out of joint.

Come all the way to God. Come all the way to salvation. In Titus chapter 2 we have the full range of salvation delineated for us. Not just one aspect of salvation, but the full range of salvation is given for us in Titus 2:11-14 which says, “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus, who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds.”

That is salvation. All of it. “Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.” For our God is a consuming fire.

None of us would willingly invite persecution, would we? Our instinct towards self preservation is so ingrained in us that our natural tendency is to avoid anything that might cause us pain or discomfort. If you’re like me, you spend a lot of time praying that God would deliver you from whatever trial you might be encountering. But the fact is that God often uses persecution and trials for His plan.   What seems injurious to us, is often used by God to conform us in the image of Jesus Christ.

That is why James says in chapter 1 vs. 2, “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance, and let endurance have its perfect result so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

It’s interesting to notice that at the very beginning of the church, when unparalleled growth was occurring, 10,000 to 20,000 people have possibly been saved and brought into the church, it’s ironic that this is also the time that God allowed persecution to come upon the church in order to complete what had been begun at Pentecost. Though God never tempts us with evil, He allowed evil men to bring persecution upon this fledgling body of believers and used it to produce maturity and a greater degree of usefulness and fruitfulness.

Peter in His address to the Sanhedrin makes it clear that persecution of Christ was used by God to work out His plan. Vs. 27, “For truly in this city there were gathered together against Your holy servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose predestined to occur.”

In the same way, according to the sovereign plan of God, He uses trials and persecutions brought on by evil men to accomplish His purpose; to produce endurance, to prove our faith and to bring us to completeness in the image of Christ. So in this passage today we are going to look at 9 ways that persecution brings about God’s purposes. Nine ways that God uses persecution to perform His purposes. And as we look at these, it is my hope that it would cause us to look at persecution and trials differently, so that we might fulfill James command to endure these trials and consider it all joy, because we know that it will be used by God for His glory, and our good.

First, we should rejoice because persecution produces identification with Christ. Vs.13, “Now as they observed the confidence of Peter and John and understood that they were uneducated and untrained men, they were amazed, and began to recognize them as having been with Jesus.” One of the benefits of persecution is that it draws the line doesn’t it? When Christianity is on easy street and it’s considered popular to be a “Christian”, then many times the lines get blurred between true Christianity that is modeled after Christ’s example and those who just give lip service. But when persecution comes, and suddenly it’s not popular to be a Christian, when professing Christ can get you fired from your job, or even fined or arrested for talking about Jesus, then the fair weather Christians fall away pretty quickly and those that are truly His disciples become evident.

To the Sanhedrin who had arrested Peter and John, it was apparent that these men had been with Jesus. They spoke with the boldness that He spoke. They acted in the power of the Holy Spirit even as Christ had. They showed discernment of the scriptures even as Christ had. And so it was apparent that they had been with Jesus. Hey, is that something that might be said about you, by people you are working with? Do your neighbors say that it’s apparent that you are someone who has Jesus? That should be our goal, to live lives that mirror the life of Jesus, so that people see the resemblance by the way we act, and the way we talk. And persecution has a way of drawing that out, or better yet, instilling Christ’s attributes in us. As Paul says in Phil. 3:10 “that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death.” That means that as we submit to suffering for the sake of Christ, and we die to ourselves, we come to know Him more fully, and we receive the power to live as He lived.

Secondly, persecution produces proof. Vs.14-16 “And seeing the man who had been healed standing with them, they had nothing to say in reply. But when they had ordered them to leave the Council, they began to confer with one another, saying, “What shall we do with these men? For the fact that a noteworthy miracle has taken place through them is apparent to all who live in Jerusalem, and we cannot deny it.” What kind of proof does persecution produce? Persecution produces the proof of your faith.

Back in the reference we looked at in James 1:3, the word translated testing is from the Greek word “dokimion” which means proving. That is what testing through trials is referring to. God uses testing to prove your faith, so that you have a more sure faith that is able to endure even greater conflicts, do even greater deeds and win even greater battles in this spiritual warfare. A good illustration of that word is found in the story of David when he was about to go to battle with Goliath, and King Saul wanted David to wear the King’s personal armor. And remember, David tried it on and said, “I can’t wear this armor, for I haven’t proven it.” He meant that he had not tested it out in battle. He couldn’t rely on it. But God uses persecution to produce trials which produce a proven faith. Persecution provides evidence of our faith to an unbelieving world that is watching us and even more importantly, it produces a proven faith in us that enables us to live a more victorious life.

Thirdly, persecution produces allegiance to God not men. Vs.18-20 “And when they had summoned them, they commanded them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John answered and said to them, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to give heed to you rather than to God, you be the judge; for we cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and heard.”

There really is no such thing as popular Christianity. The gospel by it’s nature offensive to man’s desire for self determination. Peter, in 1 Peter 2:8 says that Jesus as the cornerstone is a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. And Jesus said in Matt. 21:44 “And he who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will scatter him like dust.” The gospel is designed to divide the sheep from the goats, light from darkness, truth from error. It is designed to separate righteousness from sin. And God uses persecution to produce that separation.

Today in an age of seeker friendly churches, preachers have tried to take out anything from Christianity that might be offensive in their efforts to woo people into church. But in so doing, the have prostituted the gospel for the sake of gain. And the real danger is that hell is richer for it, as people are lulled into a false security that they are in Christ, when all they have done is align themselves with manmade religion.

But when persecution comes, it suddenly costs something to follow Christ. And then we often find ourselves having to choose between pleasing men or pleasing God. And there must be only one real choice for the child of God. We must give heed to God rather than men, no matter what it cost us.

And that segues nicely into the next principle, persecution produces preaching, not pandering. At the end of vs.20 we read that Peter says, “we cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and heard.” John would say later in his epistle, 1John 1:1 “What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands, concerning the Word of Life– and the life was manifested, and we have seen and testify and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested to us– what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.”

Listen, there is no hope in preaching a half truth. There is no hope in preaching a social gospel. Jesus said in John 8:31, ““If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” The word of God is truth, and only in that truth are we made free. When we water it down, when we deduct things that are onerous for fear of offending someone, then we risk leaving them still dead in their sins. If they are to have true fellowship with the Father, then they must accept the Word of Christ as faithfully delivered by the apostles. We dare not offer a dying world a nice tasting placebo which has no power to save. They need to know the truth of the gospel in order to deliver them from death.

Fifth, persecution produces praise. Vs.23-24 “When they had been released, they went to their own companions and reported all that the chief priests and the elders had said to them. And when they heard this, they lifted their voices to God with one accord and said, “O Lord, it is You who MADE THE HEAVEN AND THE EARTH AND THE SEA, AND ALL THAT IS IN THEM…” It seems like an oxymoron to say that persecution produces praise, doesn’t it? How does persecution produce praise? Well, for one it reminds us that God is sovereign over all. He is the creator, and all things have their life and being in Him. And so there is nothing that happens that is outside of His provenance. God is sovereign.  He is able to cause all things to work together for good to those that love God and are called according to His purpose. (Rom. 8:28)

A good illustration of that was when Joseph praised God even when his brothers meant him harm. He said, “You meant it for evil, but God used it for good.” We can praise God that He counts us worthy to suffer for His name sake. And in Act 16, after Paul and Silas were thrown in the stocks in jail they began to sing songs of praise and God caused an earthquake. When we suffer for Christ, it produces praise to Christ that isn’t merely lip service. Praise in the midst of suffering pleases the heart of God.

Sixthly, persecution produces prayer. Peter’s prayer is continued in vs. 29-31, “And now, Lord, take note of their threats, and grant that Your bond-servants may speak Your word with all confidence, while You extend Your hand to heal, and signs and wonders take place through the name of Your holy servant Jesus. And when they had prayed, the place where they had gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God with boldness.”

In James 5:16, the KJV says, “Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” Persecution produces fervent prayer and righteous men, which produces results. God hears and answers that kind of prayer.

Augustine said, “Pray as if everything depends upon God, and work as though everything depended on you.” Sometimes the work that is demanded is just laboring in prayer. Sometimes it is laborious to pray. And yet perhaps that is when it is most effective. R.A. Torrey said, “Pray for great things, expect great things, work for great things, but above all, pray.”   Nothing lies beyond the reach of prayer except that which lies outside the will of God. Pray when it hurts, and pray until it hurts. Pray until you see results.

Number seven, persecution produces power from God. Vs. 31, “And when they had prayed, the place where they had gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God with boldness.” I can’t help but wonder why the place started shaking when they prayed. But I have to imagine that it was shaken because the forces of darkness were shaken. Eph. 6:12 says, “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” God has given us two weapons to use against these spiritual strongholds; the Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, and prayer. When these righteous, persecuted Christians fervently prayed, I believe that God caused the walls of those strongholds to fall down, just as the walls of Jericho fell down. And that produced a shaking that they could actually feel.

Oh, Christians! How I want us to pray like that. I want to see us pray so that God cracks the sky and rumbles forth in power and might to put the enemies of the church to flight, to deliver loved ones from sin, and to bring a spirit of revival upon the church. Notice that when they prayed, God answered with a shaking, but also with power. That is what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit, is it not? It is the power to be what God has called us to be. The Holy Spirit provides the power to do what God wants us to do. And what God wanted them to do, and what He wants us to do, is to speak the Word of God with boldness. Persecution produces power, the power to boldly proclaim Jesus Christ and His gospel in spite of opposition or what the culture considers politically correct.

Eighth, persecution produces unity. It produces unity in the church. Vs. 32 “And the congregation of those who believed were of one heart and soul; and not one of them claimed that anything belonging to him was his own, but all things were common property to them.” Unity is so important in the life of a Christian. But please understand that unity doesn’t overrule truth of doctrine, but it is the result of truth of doctrine. We never should sacrifice doctrinal purity for the sake of unity. But God often uses persecution to bring differing factions together in unity, because persecution has a way of making the plain things the main things. It has a way of making what is trivial, even more apparently so, to the extent that we forsake the trivial. In other words, some things are worth dying for, and some are not. Some things are worth dividing over, and some are not.

In Jesus’ great prayer in the upper room on the night He was betrayed, He prayed for unity. And He prayed that that unity was founded in the truth. Listen to part of that prayer from John 17:16-21. “They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth. I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me.”   Our unity is founded first and foremost on unity in the truth, with the teaching of Christ. As we are united in that, then we will be united together in the church.

That is the secret to unity in marriage as well. Marriage unity is not by finding points of compatibility with one another. Marriage unity starts by each person becoming reconciled to God first, and when that is accomplished, then that will automatically result in unity to one another.

Lastly, persecution produces charity. Vs.34 “For there was not a needy person among them, for all who were owners of land or houses would sell them and bring the proceeds of the sales and lay them at the apostles’ feet, and they would be distributed to each as any had need.” I deliberately use the old fashioned word King James word “charity” to describe Christian love. Christian love is not just an emotional response. It’s not just a feeling. Those things might or might not be present, depending on the circumstances. But true Christian charity is the hallmark of the true church and it is illustrated in sacrifice. Jesus said, they will know you are my disciples because of the love you have for one another.

And how did Jesus define that love? He said we are to love one another in the same way that He loved us. And how did Jesus express His love for us? He laid down His life for us. Christian love is sacrificial love. That is what Christian charity is; sacrificial love for one another. And that is what this first church exemplified. There was not a needy person among them. That is an amazing statement. There were upwards of 20,000 people in this church. And yet there was not a needy person among them because of the selfless, sacrificial giving nature of this church.

Persecution had caused many people to not have homes to go back to once they were saved. Many people did not have jobs anymore once they were saved. But what is amazing is that in this dynamic, Holy Spirit filled church, there was such a sacrificial spirit among them that they were even selling off their property, land and houses and bringing in the proceeds to the church. This isn’t tithing folks. This is cheerful, willing hearts that want to abundantly contribute to the kingdom of God and they understand that is to happen through the church. They aren’t trying to see how little they can give, but they are selling stuff to be able to give even beyond their means.

Listen, the Lord loves a cheerful giver. He doesn’t hold us under the Old Testament law of tithing in the New Covenant. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t give because we are under grace. We should give more because we have been given more. Your checkbook is a testament to your faith in Christ. Did you know that? I don’t care to know what your checkbook reveals. But believe me, God knows. God sees the heart, and He sees the secret things. And one day, the God who sees the secrets of men’s hearts will reward the secrets of men’s hearts.

Well, it’s amazing isn’t it, how God uses persecution to bring about His purposes in His people. I don’t know what kind of trials that you may be going through. But I can assure you of this – if you are living godly, then there will be some form of persecution, some form of trial in your life. Jesus said, In this world you will have tribulation. But remember the words of Peter, who was no stranger to persecution, and who would one day be martyred for his faith. 1Peter 4:12-19 “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal among you, which comes upon you for your testing, as though some strange thing were happening to you; but to the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing, so that also at the revelation of His glory you may rejoice with exultation. If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. Make sure that none of you suffers as a murderer, or thief, or evildoer, or a troublesome meddler; but if anyone suffers as a Christian, he is not to be ashamed, but is to glorify God in this name. For it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God? AND IF IT IS WITH DIFFICULTY THAT THE RIGHTEOUS IS SAVED, WHAT WILL BECOME OF THE GODLESS MAN AND THE SINNER? Therefore, those also who suffer according to the will of God shall entrust their souls to a faithful Creator in doing what is right.”

I don’t know what kind of trials or persecution you may be going through, or what the future holds. But let me close by reminding you of the words of the ancient hymn, “How Firm a Foundation,” so when persecutions come, we may know that it is all in the plan and purposes of God. And He says to us;

“Fear not, I am with thee, oh, be not dismayed,

For I am thy God and will still give thee aid;

I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,

Upheld by My righteous, omnipotent hand.

“When through the deep waters I call thee to go,

The rivers of sorrow shall not overflow;

For I will be with thee thy troubles to bless

And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.

“When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie,

My grace, all-sufficient, shall be thy supply.

The flames shall not hurt thee; I only design

Thy dross to consume and thy gold to refine.

Today, all over the country, in fact, all over the world, religious people are attempting to celebrate the resurrection of Christ. There are all kinds of religious rituals and ceremonies being conducted by millions and millions of people in celebration of Easter. But the question I would raise today, is what is the significance of the resurrection for us today, besides the obvious historical nature of it? What is the effect of this day of remembrance? I’m afraid that the resurrection represents just a holiday to most people, a holiday that has no power beyond simply remembering an event that happened 2000 years ago in the life of Christ. To merely recount the familiar historical story of the empty tomb is to miss the significance of the power of the resurrection. It is to miss the present day application of the power of the resurrection. And if we are not careful to consider the present significance of the resurrection rather than just revisit the account of Jesus’ resurrection then we are in danger of possibly missing the whole point of the resurrection. To simply retell the same story year after year, Easter service after Easter service, without applying the truth of it, the purpose of it, is to only add condemnation to ourselves for hearing the truth, but in effect rejecting the purpose of the resurrection, which is to give new resurrection life to those who believe in Christ.

In other words, the power of the resurrection is not just limited to the fact that Jesus rose from the dead and ascended to heaven. The power of the resurrection is the promise of new life for all that believe in Christ and die to their sins. Jesus promised us abundant life. Eternal life. The resurrection is the power over the fear of death. It provides the certainty that the sting of death is taken away. It provides the certain hope that because He lives, we will live. That because He was raised from the dead, we will be raised from the dead. But the resurrection is not just hope for after we die, but it also produces hope for new life now. As we die to sin, we are raised to new life. Rom. 8:11 “But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.” And in “Rom. 6:4 we read, “Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”

Now that is the message that Peter and John were preaching in chapter 3. They were proclaiming the startling news that Jesus Christ, whom the Jews had put to death just a few weeks earlier, was actually alive, and the power through His name was available to all who believed to save them from their sins. It was the power of that resurrected Savior that was present at that time to bring about the healing of the lame man who sat in his suffering at the gate Beautiful for 40 years. This is the message of Peter and John. Look at vs. 2, “they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead.” That was their message. That the Jews had put Jesus to death, but God had raised Him from the dead. He was alive, and in His power this man was made well. And that same miracle power was available for new life for everyone that repented and believed in Him. And it was available for all who believed in a risen, living, saving Christ who was seated in heaven at the right hand of the Father.

Now that message should have been welcome news to the world, especially to the Jews. And it was good news to some. That is what the word “gospel” means, the good news. On the day of Pentecost 3000 repented and were saved by faith in Christ, by believing that He was risen and living and seated at the right hand of the Father, making intercession for us.   But not everyone believed. And as we begin this chapter, we see the first stirrings of animosity towards the new church by the established religious leaders of the day, the priests, and the Sadducees; the religious ruling party of the Jews.

So in this chapter we are going to look at five proofs of the resurrection. Five ways in which the power of the resurrection is illustrated. First, we see that the power of the resurrection provoked animosity towards the church. Jesus said don’t be surprised if they hate you, because they hated Me first. So that is the first point presented in this chapter; the power of the resurrection provokes animosity. It is amazing that the gospel is frowned upon by modern society, isn’t it? It’s amazing that something that delivers people from death, delivers people from addictions, from strife, from sin, that teaches it’s converts to do good instead of evil, is considered by many people in our society today to be something to be suppressed and shut down. And the first church experienced this to an even greater degree than we see happening today, though we are fast approaching the time when Christians will be considered public enemy number one. Already in many other parts of the world, Christians are losing their lives because of their faith in Christ. And we see this reported almost every day in the news.

Peter and John were arrested by the temple guard, directly after healing this lame man. A crowd had gathered when they witnessed this man that was once lame now jump and leap around the temple praising God for being healed. And Peter used that opportunity to tell the multitude that it was not due to some power that he or John had that made him well, but it was the power of the resurrected, living Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, who had made him well.

And as they were speaking, the temple officials arrested them and put them in jail. I sometimes wonder how long I will have the freedom to preach the gospel from the beach as we have done for 8 years now. The cultural climate towards the gospel is getting more and more antagonistic all the time. One day, I fully expect the town officials to come out there and shut me down, perhaps even put me in jail. Though I hope it won’t come to that. More than likely they will tell me I have to cease and desist and threaten to fine me if I do not stop.

The world doesn’t care if you worship a dead prophet. The world doesn’t care if you worship a good man, a good teacher. But the world hates a person who proclaims Jesus was raised from the dead, because that speaks of a living God, a powerful God, a God that reigns and demands out obeisance. And man doesn’t want to be ruled, but to maintain the right of self determination over his destiny, over his will, and rebels at bowing his knee. So therefore there is animosity towards the power of the resurrection. Ironically though, the church is refined and strengthened by persecution. We grow more under duress than we do in times of ease. Pruning, whether in the church body or in our individual lives, produces more fruit, not less.

Secondly, the power of the resurrection produces boldness. The power of the resurrection emboldened Peter and John to preach the gospel, to confront the Sanhedrin and condemn them, even though just a few weeks before Peter had denied and abandoned Christ at His trial. How did it embolden them? It wasn’t because they had found some sort of comfort in performing elaborate rituals signifying the resurrection. It wasn’t because they had established a holiday commemorating the resurrection. It was because of the confidence of having seen Christ’s once crucified, dead body raised up in newness of life, in a glorified body that was not subject to death, and they had seen the same body of Christ ascend into heaven. That reality had changed their lives. It had changed their perception of what harm could come to them. Whereas once they had run away at the thought of persecution, now they had boldness to proclaim Christ because they knew that same resurrection power of Christ was in them.

Ironically, it was the same court, the same high priests that had tried Jesus and condemned Him to death that was now the very court that they stood in front of. The same court that caused Peter to deny Jesus three times in order to avoid being caught up in His crucifixion, the same court that John had ran from, was now the very same court they found themselves examined in. But now they are filled with boldness where they once were filled with fear. They knew that as Christ had overcome suffering and death, so that same promise was for them as well. They need not fear what man can do.   As Jesus said in Luke 12:4-5 “I say to you, My friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that have no more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear the One who, after He has killed, has authority to cast into hell; yes, I tell you, fear Him!”

So even as the resurrection gave boldness to the apostles, so those of us that have faith in the risen Savior can also claim that same boldness, knowing that we need not fear those that can kill the body, because God has given us eternal life.

Thirdly, the power of the resurrection provides the filling of the Holy Spirit. Peter and John were now bold where once they were timid, because now they were filled with the Holy Spirit. And they were filled with the Holy Spirit because of the resurrection. Jesus rose from the dead, and ascended to heaven, that He might send to us the Comforter, the Helper, which is the Spirit of God indwelling human flesh. Jesus said in John 16:7 “But I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you.”

And that is exactly what we see happening here. Peter and John are filled with the Holy Spirit as the text says in vs. 8, so that they are able to answer the high priests and the Sanhedrin, which was the Jewish equivalent of the Supreme Court. This is the direct fulfillment of the promise Jesus made to His apostles in Luke 12:11-12 “When they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not worry about how or what you are to speak in your defense, or what you are to say; for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say.”

This begs the question, by the way, “what is the filling of the Holy Spirit?” The answer to that question is demonstrated right here in this passage. It is the power to proclaim the gospel, it is the word of God which is given to you to minister the gospel, it is the boldness to act as God directs you to act, it is the power to do what God wants you to do. That is what it means to be filled. It is illustrated by the wind which fills the sails of a ship, empowering it to move under the direction of the captain.

Please understand something. The Holy Spirit is a person. He is the Spirit of Christ. He dwells in the hearts of those who have been saved. At salvation, you receive all of Him. He cannot be divided, He is a person. He indwells the saints with His presence. So there is no way to get more of the Holy Spirit. So how are we then filled with the Holy Spirit? There is only one way, and that is for there to be less of the flesh. The flesh is in competition with the Spirit. So we put to death the flesh to be filled with the Spirit. You abandon all trust in yourself. You humble yourself, let go of the steering wheel, and call upon God to direct you and help you. It’s about letting go of your wisdom, of your desires, of your passions, of your ambitions, and leaning full on the wisdom and guidance and direction of the Holy Spirit to sustain you and empower you. The Spirit will give you the power to do what God commands you to do. That is what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Peter being filled with the Holy Spirit takes this examination, this trial, and considers it an opportunity to preach the gospel to the very tribunal that put to death His Savior just weeks before. And He presents the gospel without equivocation. In answer to their question of in what power or name have they done this miracle of healing the lame man, Peter answers them in such a way as to delegitimize their interrogation by reminding them that what they had done was a benefit to a sick man. The Council might not have liked the message, but they could not deny the good result of the miracle. A lame man had been made well. Now that was a statement of genius. Peter’s asking, are we on trial for making a sick man well? In other words, is it a crime to do good? Peter is establishing that they have no guilt in this matter. They have done good to a sick man, which is what the law required, by the way.

So then Peter, in the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, turns the tables on the Council. Though we are on trial for doing good to a sick man, you on the other hand, put on trial a good man and committed a terrible crime. He said, you crucified Jesus Christ the Nazarene an innocent man. Pilate said three times during the trial of Jesus that he found no fault in this man. The charges they brought against Jesus had been trumped up. But this righteous man, this good man, they had crucified because they did not want Him to rule over them. They were the rulers of the religion of the Jews and they were willing to commit murder in order to preserve their power. All the family of the high priest were there that day. All of the governing council known as the Sanhedrin was there at this trial just as they had been at Jesus’ trial. And Peter accuses them of murdering an innocent man. But Peter proclaims Him even more than a man, he declares Him the Messiah, the Christ. Christ is the Greek word for Messiah. So when Peter calls Him Jesus Christ of Nazareth, he is nailing down the fact that Jesus was the Messiah, and that it was confirmed by God through the resurrection.   See, that is another proof of the resurrection, that God would not allow His Holy One to see decay in the grave, because He was holy. He was righteous, and He had no guilt.

The Council though Peter rightly condemns as guilty. This is a pattern of Peter and the Apostle’s preaching. They preach guilt first, then grace. And the unbelievable thing is that Peter offers grace to these guilty murderers of Christ. I think if I were Peter that day I would have seen if the power of the Holy Spirit was present for me to call down fire from heaven. But as Peter would eventually write in his second epistle, chapter 3:9 “The Lord…. is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.” Even towards these hard hearted, self righteous murderers of the Son of God Himself, there is the opportunity for repentance. God offers grace even to the most vile sinner, even to these murderers of Christ.

And that leads us to the fourth power of the resurrection, which is it provides salvation. Peter says in vs. 12, “And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven, given among men, by which we must be saved.” Salvation is only possible by faith in the living Christ whom God raised from the dead, as a testament to the efficacy of His atonement. Only Jesus satisfied God’s requirement. Listen, the offer of salvation is as wide as whosoever will may come. (Rev. 22:17) But also the offer of salvation is so narrow that entrance is only by one name. Only by Jesus Christ is salvation possible.

That is what Jesus died on the cross for, to save sinners. To seek and to save those that are lost. The problem was that the Council and the High Priest did not consider themselves sinners. They considered themselves as belonging to the kingdom of God by right of their birth. They considered themselves as righteous by virtue of their good deeds, by keeping the law. They considered themselves worthy of the kingdom by their positions as priests. And as such they were truly lost, because they failed to see the need of their salvation.

I wonder how many here today are outside of the kingdom of heaven because they have never confessed that they were sinners, that they were lost? The Bible says that all have sinned and fallen short of the kingdom of God. That there is none righteous, no not one. That all of our righteousness is as filthy rags before God. Coming to church can’t save you. Being born into a so called Christian home cannot save you. Being sprinkled or baptized will not save you. Trying to turn over a new leaf will not save you. There is only one way that you can be saved. And that is realizing you are a sinner, repenting of it, and trusting in the salvation offered through Jesus Christ, the Holy and Righteous Son of God who gave His life as a substitute on the cross for our sins. There is salvation in nothing else, in no one else.

And listen, don’t miss that emphasis there in Peter’s statement. “By which you must be saved…” You must be saved. Or you will die in your sins and face eternal death. The wages of sin is death. You cannot escape hell but by one means, that is through Jesus Christ. In the Old Testament, there is a great illustration of salvation that is presented in the plague of poisonous vipers that came upon the children of Israel who had rebelled against God so they were bitten and about to die. And God instructed Moses to raise a brass serpent upon a pole and said that if any would look upon that serpent they would be saved from death. All of the people that were bitten were under the penalty of death, they were in the process of dying. But for those that looked up at the serpent on the pole, God forgave them and healed them so that they lived.

That’s a picture of salvation. Jesus was lifted up on a pole, a cross, and everyone that has been bitten with the sting of death need only to look upon that cross and be saved. We all are under the condemnation of death, because we all are sinners. But Jesus has died for us, so that we might be made alive in Him, if we will just turn from our sins and have faith in Christ.

Those hard hearted high priests and council members as far as we know never accepted Jesus as the cornerstone of their salvation. They rejected Him. And so we can only imagine that the prophecy of Jesus was fulfilled to them, for rejecting the Son of God. Jesus had prophesied in Matt. 21:42-44 “Did you never read in the Scriptures, ‘THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone; THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD, AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES’ Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it. And he who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will scatter him like dust.”

But there was one man there that day who was changed by the power of the resurrection. And that was the lame man. He was leaping, jumping, praising God for the miracle He had done in his life. And this man illustrates the final power of the resurrection, that the resurrection produces transformation. Because Jesus is alive, we can have life and have it more abundantly. That was the point of this lame man’s healing, to illustrate the living power of Christ to transform the lame to one that could walk. To give life to the dead. To transfer righteousness to those that were sinners. That lame man welcomed the news that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead, that we might have life in His name. That we that were sick unto death might be made well.

The Sanhedrin did not want to recognize that they were sick. That they were dying in their sins just as surely as their forefathers had died from the snake bites in the wilderness. But this poor lame man knew well his dreadful condition, which he had from his mother’s womb. We too are sick from our mother’s womb. David said in Psalm 51:5 “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, And in sin my mother conceived me.” But as the power of the risen Christ was able to make the lame man whole, to transform him from lame to walking, from dead in his sins, to new life in Christ, so that same resurrection power is available for anyone today, that recognizes that they are lame, unable to walk in righteousness. If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

And then transformed, we are able to be a testimony to others. This man that was lame and made whole was the catalyst that caused 5000 men to be saved at the preaching of Peter which followed his healing.  A whole multitude saw the transformation of this lame man and gave God the glory, and turned to Him by faith in Christ. Folks, that is the power of a transformed life. I don’t want to take anything away from witnessing in foreign mission fields or outreaches, there is a place for that. But I would submit to you that there is no testimony like the testimony that you can have to your own neighbors, your own family, those that see you every day on the street or at work. That was the nature of this man’s effectiveness. He had been begging by that gate for 40 years. Thousands of people had seen him sitting there day after day with misshapen, shriveled legs, having to be carried to the gate and picked up in the evenings. He was an object of pity, perhaps even loathing by some. And now by the power of Christ he was well, he was leaping, running, walking, praising God.

Listen, the power of the resurrection is not just about celebrating the resurrection of Jesus at Easter, the power of the resurrection is lived out as a testimony every day by those that have been saved. I would ask you today, have you been saved? Has your life been transformed by the saving power of Jesus Christ to give you new life? Have you died to your sins, to be raised in the newness of life in Christ? Is that your testimony? Can your neighbors, your family, your coworkers attest to the miracle of your transformation? Does that witness cause others to want what you have? If not, then I would suggest you consider your salvation. As Paul said in 2Cor. 13:5 “Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you–unless indeed you fail the test?”

I trust that you do not fail the test. I hope that no one leaves here today rejecting the Savior who gave His life so that you might know the power of His resurrection. So that you might have life and have it more abundantly. So that you might walk in newness of life. So that you might have the power over sin. So that you might be made well. So that we might be bold to proclaim the gospel. So that we might be filled with the Holy Spirit. So that we might overcome adversity. So that we might live transformed lives in our homes and communities in order to spread the good news of the gospel.

Last week I spoke of the Great Awakening which transformed thousands of lives across this country when America was in it’s infancy, around the mid 1700’s. And a man came up to me after the service last week and told me of a poem that was written by one of the men who was touched by that great revival – a contemporary of the great preacher George Whitfield. This man named Lawrence Trimble wrote a poem called Awaken which describes the power of a transformed life.

One man awake, Awakens another. The second awakens His next-door brother.  The three awake can rouse a town By turning The whole place Upside down.

The many awake Can make such a fuss  It finally awakens  The rest of us.  One man up, With dawn in his eyes, Surely then Multiplies.

Because of the power of the resurrection, Peter and John were accused of turning the world upside down. Let us go and do the same.

Today I want to talk to you in a different manner than in the way I normally preach. As you know, I usually exegete a passage, going verse by verse. But today I want to share some things that have been on my mind lately, ideas which are promoted by this passage, but not necessarily found through the exposition of each verse.

This week I have found my soul distressed by several different circumstances that I have heard about, that I might term “failures of the faith.” Not that the true faith of God can fail. God cannot fail, and the purposes of God cannot fail. He is Sovereign, He is over all, and all things exist through and for Him. He existed before the world began, and will endure forever. His truth endures forever. God cannot fail.

But human beings do fail. Just this week I have been reminded or in some cases confronted with several people who were once part of our fellowship who have fallen, or are in the process of falling away. It is disheartening, even heartbreaking to see these people fall away. I heard lately that one mainstream denomination which has about 11,000 churches recently published a report that claimed over 294,000 professions of faith in one year. But in another report some time later, they could only account for 14,000 of them in fellowship. According to research done by an evangelist named Ray Comfort who reported on the previous statistics of that denomination, 80 to 90 percent of new conversions end up falling away from Christ.

As a pastor, I am particularly broken hearted over people who once professed a living faith in God, who we invested so much in, and who now have turned away from the Lord. Some of them may not see themselves that way, but their lifestyle reveals that they are no longer following Christ. Whether they are truly saved or not is not my purview to know for certain, but it is a dangerous thing to turn away from God and follow after the lusts of your heart, and trust in your own wisdom, contrary to the Word of God.

I feel I am constantly in this battle for the hearts and minds of the people who come under my preaching. I rightly feel a certain degree of responsibility for the outcome of their souls. So I preach my heart out in an effort to win them to the Lord. But for the most part, it seems that far too many people are either unmoved by the preaching of the Word, or at least once they leave the church service there seems to be little thought as to the application of the doctrines which they have been taught.

And so as I struggle to understand this inclination to fall away from the truth, and eventually from the faith, I have searched the scriptures to try to find the answer to the callousness and hardness of people’s hearts. Additionally I have researched and studied pastors and preachers from past generations to see if there is something missing from church doctrine today which is accelerating this decline into apostasy.

And what I have found is that the need of the current church culture today is highlighted in this message we are looking at by Peter in Acts 3. It is revealed in studying the messages of John the Baptist and Jesus Christ Himself. And research shows that it is the hallmark of every notable Bible preacher of history, as well as the keynote of all true revivals in history. That is, in order to make their salvation sure, there is a fundamental need to bring people face to face with a Holy God, convicted of the vileness of their sin, and condemned by the judgment that The Righteous Judge will justly bring upon all unrighteousness. They need to understand that God hates sin, and that the wrath of God will be poured out on all sin. Then based on that reality, to preach repentance of their sins that they might be saved.

Unfortunately, that is rarely the message of the church today. The problem with modern Christianity is that there is an effort on the part of the church to make the gospel appealing by removing things from the message which people might find offensive, like God’s law, His righteousness and the judgment to come. And in it’s place another message is substituted; that God loves you, and if you choose Christianity it will produce joy, happiness, peace, contentment, and blessing in your life. The only thing you have to do to receive those things, according to the new gospel message, is believe in God. If you believe, then you receive grace – the gift of God which produces joy, happiness, peace, contentment and blessings. Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it?

The problem is that is not the gospel. That’s not the gospel message that Peter preached in either his first message in chapter 2, nor his second message in chapter 3. But the result of Peter’s first message was that 3000 people were saved. That’s the Holy Spirit’s count, by the way. Those are real conversions. Then at the conclusion of Peter’s message in chapter 3 there is an additional 5000 people that are saved. Again by the Holy Spirit’s count 5000 real conversions, not just professions of faith that seem to fade away after a year or so.

So what is the difference between Peter’s messages in Acts 2&3 and the message being preached in many churches today? The difference is Peter preached guilt before he preached grace. Peter preached that the judgment of God was coming. He impressed upon them their guilt for crucifying the Son of God. He impressed upon them the vileness of their sin, their hopeless condition, and the judgment that they rightly deserved.   Peter preached virtually the same message twice in chap. 2 and 3.

And then Peter preached repentance. Once their sinful condition was well established, once they knew that such sinfulness rightly demanded the punishment of death, then he preached the need for repentance. And after they had repented they received grace which brought about transformed lives. In Acts 2:38 Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” And in the next sermon, in Acts 3:19 Peter says, “Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.”

So I suggest to you that true repentance is the ingredient that is missing in many of today’s professions of faith. Far too often today the supplicant is attracted to the message of “life enhancement” on the basis of merely believing in God, and when they afterwards in due time experience some of the hardships and trials that Jesus said is part of this life and to be expected in this life, then they fall away because their reality does not match what they were led to expect.

But although repentance is necessary for salvation, true repentance is contingent on a couple of essential things. For one, true repentance is contingent upon a true theology of God. These people that were saved under the preaching of Peter had more than just a superficial belief in God. We use the word “believers” today to describe converts and yet unfortunately, many don’t really believe in the God of the Bible. They believe in a god of their own imaginations. They believe in a god that is only slightly bigger than they are. And so consequently they have a faulty theology.

By the way, speaking of believing in God. I understand that this Wednesday is National Atheist’s Day. Wednesday is April 1^st, April Fools Day. Psalm 14:1 says, “The fool has said in his heart there is no God.” So be sure to wish all your atheist’s friends happy April Fool’s Day this Wednesday.

But as we examine our text, we see that these men that heard Peter speak were devout men and women. In other words, they believed in the true God. They worshipped the God of the Bible. And yet they were unsaved. Everyone (with the exception of the aforementioned fools) believes in God to some extent or another. The Bible says that even the devils believe in God and tremble. So merely believing in God doesn’t save you. Worship does not save you. The Muslim’s believe in God, yet they are not saved. Because saving faith in God means that we believe that Jesus is the very representation of God in human flesh. Hebrews. 1:3 says, “[Jesus] is the radiance of [God’s] glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.”

John 1 says “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made which was made.” Jesus Himself told Philip in John 14, “that if you have seen Me you have seen the Father.” And Col. 1:15 says “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.”

The fact of who is Jesus is the cornerstone of salvation. The Jews Peter was preaching to believed in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as Peter proclaimed in 3:13. This crowd even believed in the historical Jesus. They knew He had lived in Palestine until His crucifixion just a couple of months earlier. They had no doubt He was a real human being. Yet they were not saved because they failed to recognize that He was the Son of God. They did not recognize Him as the Messiah, and so they crucified the very God of Heaven.

Listen, it is critical to your salvation that you believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God, otherwise you cannot be saved. You cannot merely believe in a historical Jesus. You cannot simply believe in some sort of greater force in the universe. You must believe that Jesus was a man who lived 2000 years ago, who was born of the Spirit of God, who was fully God and fully man in one being.

Look at the degree to which Peter describes Jesus in order to teach this essential principle. First of all Peter calls Him the Servant in vs. 13. That is a direct reference to Isaiah 53, the famous prophetic chapter concerning the Messiah that would have been well known to any God fearing Jew. It is the quintessential teaching of the Messiah that foretells His suffering and atonement for the sake of the world. Then in vs. 14 he calls Jesus the Holy and Righteous One. They knew only God was holy. And Jesus Himself said that no one is good except God alone. So therefore, Jesus is God. And then in vs. 15 Peter calls Him the Prince of Life. It could also be translated the Author of life. John 1: 3-4 again, “All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men.” So Peter essentially calls Jesus the Creator. Then in vs. 16 Peter states His name as Jesus, which means Jehovah is salvation. Peter says it is by faith in that name that this man was healed and is in perfect health.

So the first contingency is the proper theology that Jesus Christ is God in the flesh. The second contingency is a proper recognition of man’s sinfulness. You cannot have true repentance unless you first have a proper understanding of your standing in the eyes of God as a sinner. This is born out by the Scriptures starting in Genesis. In response to Adam and Eve’s sin, God said they would surely die, and He cast them out of the Garden of Eden, and furthermore, He removed them from His presence. God cannot tolerate sin. He cannot have fellowship with sin. God’s judgment against sin was revealed again in the flood when He destroyed all flesh, men and animals except those on the ark, by a world wide flood. He revealed His judgment against sin again in the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah because of their extreme sinfulness by raining down fire and brimstone from heaven, destroying every living thing in those cities. All of these examples illustrate God’s wrath against sin.

Then in Exodus God gave the Law to establish His standard of righteousness, and detail what constitutes sin and it’s punishment. In Rom. 3:19 Paul says, “Now we know that whatever the Law says, it speaks to those who are under the Law, so that every mouth may be closed and all the world may become accountable to God because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.” In other words, under the Law every one is guilty, and the penalty for that sin is death. Gal. 3:24 says, “Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith.” The Law teaches us that we are sinners, guilty before God, without hope. We cannot keep it, we cannot achieve righteousness through it because we fail to keep it all perfectly.

“But wait a minute Roy! We are not under the Old Covenant! We’re under grace.” I would just ask you a question, are we under Christ? Is not the gospel the gospel of Christ? I would suggest that the gospel of Christ is founded upon the Law of Moses, even as Peter says that Moses is a type of Christ in vs. 22. “Moses said, ‘THE LORD GOD WILL RAISE UP FOR YOU A PROPHET LIKE ME FROM YOUR BRETHREN; TO HIM YOU SHALL GIVE HEED to everything He says to you. And it will be that every soul that does not heed that prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people.”

To illustrate that principle, look if you will to Matthew 5. Jesus said, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees (who prided themselves on keeping the law) you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. Then in vs. 21 Jesus begins to explain the Law. But He doesn’t explain it away, He expands it. He starts with “you shall not murder.” And Jesus says in vs. 22 “But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.” So Jesus is saying that for just calling someone a fool you deserve to be thrown into hell.

Then Jesus expounds the law regarding the sin of adultery. In vs. 28 he says, “but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Therefore Jesus said in vs. 29, ““If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.” So Jesus says, just looking at a woman in lust is deserving of hell fire.

Then Jesus deals with the law concerning divorce. And He says in vs. 32, “that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of chastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.” Now Jesus is really upsetting everyone; He says that divorce is equal to adultery, which is worthy of hell. Jesus pretty much sentences 99.9% of the church to hell and He has only covered 3 laws. There are still 610 more to go.

Then Jesus talks about swearing falsely and making false statements. And He says in vs. 37, “let your statement be, ‘Yes, yes’ or ‘No, no’; anything beyond these is of evil.” By extension, that which is evil deserves hell. And in vs. 38 Jesus explains the law of an eye for an eye, so He says in vs. 39, “But I say to you, do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also. Whoever forces you to go one mile, go with him two. Give to him who asks of you, and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you.”

Then starting in vs. 43 Jesus wraps up His discourse on our obligation to the Law: “You have heard that it was said, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Turns out Jesus’ interpretation of the Law condemns us even more than the Law of Moses does.

Listen, the purpose of the Law is to show us God’s standard of righteousness, and our level of sinfulness. That there is a great chasm between the righteousness of God and us that no one can leap over. That we are hopeless before the law, condemned by our sin, and under the penalty of death. That as Romans 3:10 says, “there is none righteous, no not one.” That every mouth may be stopped. That it would render us all without a defense. That we might see our helpless, hopeless situation without the grace of Christ. That we might know that we need a Savior, and be willing to give everything to gain Christ.

The great evangelist D. L. Moody said, “Ask Paul why [the Law] was given. Here is his answer, ‘That every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God’ The Law stops every man’s mouth. I can always tell a man who is near the kingdom of God; his mouth is stopped. This, then, is why God gives us the Law—to show us ourselves in our true colors.”

The Prince of Preachers Charles Spurgeon said, “Lower the Law and you dim the light by which man perceives his guilt; this is a very serious loss to the sinner rather than a gain; for it lessens the likelihood of his conviction and conversion. I say you have deprived the gospel of its ablest auxiliary [its most powerful weapon] when you have set aside the Law. You have taken away from it the schoolmaster that is to bring men to Christ . . . They will never accept grace till they tremble before a just and holy Law. Therefore the Law serves a most necessary purpose, and it must not be removed from its place.”

And the late theologian Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones is quoted as saying; “A gospel which merely says, ‘Come to Jesus,’ and offers Him as a friend, and offers a marvelous new life, without convincing of sin, is not New Testament evangelism. (The essence of evangelism is to start by preaching the Law; and it is because the Law has not been preached that we have had so much superficial evangelism.) True evangelism… must always start by preaching the law.” He goes on to say, “The trouble with people who are not seeking for a Savior, and for salvation, is that they do not understand the nature of sin. It is the peculiar function of the Law to bring such an understanding to a man’s mind and conscience. That is why great evangelical preachers 300 years ago in the time of the puritans, and 200 years ago in the time of Whitefield and others, always engaged in what they called a preliminary law work.”

Peter presented the law to those Jews that day. They were guilty of failing to honor the Lord their God. They had crucified the Lord of Creation. They were guilty of murder. They were guilty of false witness. So Peter’s sermon condemns them even as the Holy Spirit was convicting them of their sin. And yet in the grace of God Peter offers to them the gospel. It is called the gospel because it is good news. Just as it is good news to a condemned man waiting for the morning gas chamber to hear the officer of the prison say that the Governor has commuted his sentence. He has been pardoned. He has been freed not only from the condemnation of death but given a new life. That is the gospel. We that are vile sinners, without hope, lost, rightly condemned to hell have been offered pardon, our penalty paid by the death of Jesus Christ.

What is Peter’s remedy that he offers these poor hopeless sinners that crucified the King of Kings? Vs.19-21 “Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord; and that He may send Jesus, the Christ appointed for you, whom heaven must receive until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time.”

What does it mean to repent? Well, it doesn’t just mean you are sorry for the mess you find yourself in. It doesn’t just mean that you are sorry that you got caught. It means looking at the perfect law of God and mourning over your sinful condition. It means understanding that you are without hope, and without excuse. It is seeing yourself in the light of God’s righteousness and holiness and knowing that you are a sinner and only by the grace of God are you given a chance to repent. It means to forsake your sins, to turn from your sins, to mourn over your sin, and to turn instead to righteousness.

Oh, folks, the reason that men and women fall away from the gospel with such ease and peace of mind today is that they have no idea of the Biblical standard of God’s righteousness. They have no idea of how heinous their sin is in the sight of God. One of the greatest revivals that this country has ever seen was in the early 1700’s, in a time called the Great Awakening. Jonathan Edwards was a preacher of a small church in Massachusetts who was one of the principle participants in this revival along with George Whitfield. And perhaps Edward’s best known sermon was one that he titled, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” Just the title alone is enough to send the modern church congregation running for the doors with their hands covering their ears. They want to hear nothing of an angry God. To hear nothing of the fear of the Lord. To hear nothing of the judgment to come. And yet this is the message, not unlike that of Peter’s message, which God used to bring about a great awakening, a great number of true conversions.

I’m afraid one of the lost arts of modern society is the ability of critical listening. To listen to the sermons of old is a test of one’s ability to listen attentively and critically, which seems to be lost to the church as well in our modern era of sound byte sermons. But nevertheless, I would like to read a small portion of Edward’s sermon so that you can get a glimpse of what type of preaching against sin prompted true repentance and spawned one of the greatest revivals in this country. He read his sermons also by the way. If you think that you have trouble with my sermons, then perhaps hearing some of his will make me seem so much more kindly and considerate. We’ll pick up somewhere in the middle on his second point.

2.[All sinners] deserve to be cast into Hell; so that divine Justice never stands in the Way, it makes no Objection against God’s using his Power at any Moment to destroy them. Yea, on the contrary, Justice calls aloud for an infinite Punishment of their Sins. Divine Justice says of the Tree that brings forth such Grapes of Sodom, Cut it down, why cumbreth it the Ground, Luke. 13. 7. The Sword of divine Justice is every Moment brandished over their Heads, and ’tis nothing but the Hand of arbitrary Mercy, and God’s meer Will, that holds it back.

3.They are already under a Sentence of Condemnation to Hell. They don’t only justly deserve to be cast down thither; but the Sentence of the Law of God, that eternal and immutable Rule of Righteousness that God has fixed between him and Mankind, is gone out against them, and stands against them; so that they are bound over already to Hell. John. 3. 18. He that believeth not is condemned already. So that every unconverted Man properly belongs to Hell; that is his Place; from thence he is. John. 8. 23. Ye are from beneath. And thither he is bound; ’tis the Place that Justice, and God’s Word, and the Sentence of his unchangeable Law assigns to him.

4.They are now the Objects of that very same Anger & Wrath of God that is expressed in the Torments of Hell: and the Reason why they don’t go down to Hell at each Moment, is not because God, in whose Power they are, is not then very angry with them; as angry as he is with many of those miserable Creatures that he is now tormenting in Hell, and do there feel and bear the fierceness of his Wrath. Yea God is a great deal more angry with great Numbers that are now on Earth, yea doubtless with many that are now in this Congregation, that it may be are at Ease and Quiet, than he is with many of those that are now in the Flames of Hell.

So that it is not because God is unmindful of their Wickedness, and don’t resent it, that he don’t let loose his Hand and cut them off. God is not altogether such an one as themselves, tho’ they may imagine him to be so. The Wrath of God burns against them, their Damnation don’t slumber, the Pit is prepared, the Fire is made ready, the Furnace is now hot, ready to receive them, the Flames do now rage and glow. The glittering Sword is whet, and held over them, and the Pit hath opened her Mouth under them.

5.The Devil stands ready to fall upon them and seize them as his own, at what Moment God shall permit him. They belong to him; he has their Souls in his Possession, and under his Dominion. The Scripture represents them as his Goods, Luke. 11. 21. The Devils watch them; they are ever by them, at their right Hand; they stand waiting for them, like greedy hungry Lions that see their Prey, and expect to have it, but are for the present kept back; if God should withdraw his Hand, by which they are restrained, they would in one Moment fly upon their poor Souls. The old Serpent is gaping for them; Hell opens his Mouth wide to receive them; and if God should permit it, they would be hastily swallowed up and lost.

6. There are in the Souls of wicked Men those hellish Principles reigning, that would presently kindle and flame out into Hell Fire, if it were not for God’s Restraints.” (Jonathan Edwards, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God)

Like the congregation of Edward’s church, these men and women that heard Peter preach his message in chapter 3 knew that they deserved the punishment of Hell. They were well familiar with the condemnation and penalty of the Law. The now saw the true nature of their predicament, and the punishment that was due them. And so they eagerly took the offer of grace that was procured through Jesus blood, that they might be saved from the wrath to come.

Well, you might say, that sounds very dramatic Roy. But you don’t really scare me, for I believe we are under grace and not the law, and I believe God loves me unconditionally, and if God loves me, He could never send me to hell. And for that person I would point out Hebrews 10:26-31 which says “For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and THE FURY OF A FIRE WHICH WILL CONSUME THE ADVERSARIES. Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him who said, “VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY.” And again, “THE LORD WILL JUDGE HIS PEOPLE.” It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”

I will just close this morning by urging you to examine yourselves in the light of today’s message and see if you are of the faith. As Paul said in 2Cor. 13:5 “Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you–unless indeed you fail the test?” Are you merely believing in a God of your own design? Have you understood the true nature of your condemnation as a sinner before a Holy and Just God? Have you ever repented of the sins that you have committed? Do you know beyond a shadow of a doubt where you will be at the moment you pass from this life? Today is the day of salvation. God is graciously extending time for you to repent. 2Pet. 3:9 says, “The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.”

I will close with one last statement from Edward’s sermon. “And let every one that is yet out of Christ, and hanging over the Pit of Hell, whether they be old Men and Women, or middle Aged, or young People, or little Children, now hearken to the loud Calls of God’s Word and Providence. This acceptable Year of the Lord, that is a Day of such great Favor to some, will doubtless be a Day of as remarkable Vengeance to others….Therefore let every one that is out of Christ, now awake and fly from the Wrath to come.” (Jonathan Edwards, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God)

“Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to the cross I cling, naked come to thee for dress, helpless look to thee for grace, foul I to the fountain fly, wash me, Savior, or I die.” (Rock of Ages)

Someone once said that every miracle in the New Testament is a parable, designed to illustrate physically what God can do spiritually. Today we are looking at such a miracle in this passage in Acts. It certainly wasn’t the only miracle that was done in those days. And yet Luke singles out this particular miracle to illustrate an important spiritual principle.

We know that it wasn’t the only miracle because in the previous chapter, Acts 2:43 it says that “many wonders and signs were taking place through the apostles.” And looking ahead, we see in chapter 5 vs. 12 it says again that “At the hands of the apostles many signs and wonders were taking place among the people;” to the extent, according to vs. 15, “that they even carried the sick out into the streets and laid them on cots and pallets, so that when Peter came by at least his shadow might fall on any one of them.”

So many miracles were being done at that time by the apostles. The question is why is this one highlighted and described by Luke and not the others. And we will attempt to answer that question today. But as I have said before, to use a fishing analogy, it is a lot easier to put a fresh hook on a new line than to unsnarl an old one. And unfortunately, the subject of healing and miracles have become so snarled in bad doctrine that we need to spend some time unraveling this whole subject of healings and miracles before we can make the correct spiritual application of it from this passage. We need to first understand the nature of the miracles that were occurring at the hands of the apostles. How are we to understand these miracles? Are they something that we should be expecting to see today? Do we also have the power to perform miracles? Certainly there are a number of people around, especially on television, that are claiming to be performing miracles.

Well, first of all, let’s consider the purpose of miracles. As I said at the beginning, when miracles are presented in scripture, they usually are given to illustrate a spiritual principle. That is the extended benefit of historic miracles to us today. But what was the immediate benefit of the miracles that happened then, besides the obvious alleviation of suffering? The answer is that miracles, the ability to do signs and wonders, was the means by which God authenticated the message of the apostles. Lots of people over the ages have professed to be speaking from God. But the apostles were specifically commissioned to speak the words of Christ, to declare His gospel to the world. And to do that, Jesus gave them the power to perform miracles to confirm that that were speaking from God.

Jesus commissioned the apostles after His resurrection in Mark 16:15 “And [Jesus] said to them, ‘Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned. These signs will accompany those who have believed: in My name they will cast out demons, they will speak with new tongues; they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”

Now this passage has caused a lot of people to think that signs and wonders are the prerogative of every believer. But what needs to be understood is that this statement is a highly condensed summary of Jesus’ last message given specifically to the eleven apostles. Notice that there is a change from the singular pronoun in “he who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved,” to the plural pronoun in “these signs will accompany those who have believed; (Jesus is now speaking of the apostles) in my name they will cast out demons, etc. The plural pronoun sets this statement apart from the preceding one concerning all believers. In the first statement Christ is declaring a principle of salvation. In the second statement He is declaring the authority given to the apostles.

So then a few verses later in Mark 16:20 we see that commission by Christ fulfilled: “And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them, and confirmed the word by the signs that followed.” That is the key to understanding the purpose that the apostles did these signs, to “confirm the word by the signs that followed.” They were given the power of signs to authenticate their message as being from God.

Unfortunately, as I have stated for the last couple of weeks, there is so much misunderstanding of the ministry of the Holy Spirit today, and a lot of it originates in these first few chapters of Acts. Because Jesus said “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit is come upon you…” And immediately after that we see the apostles speaking in other languages and performing miracles. And there are a lot of preachers and teachers out there that want to make the assumption that the power that Jesus is speaking of is the power to speak in tongues and heal.

That’s not it at all. That is not the power that the Holy Spirit is promised to give to all believers. The reason that the apostles did these signs was to authenticate that their message was from God. But the real purpose of the Holy Spirit was to give them the words to speak, the word of God, and then as it says in Mark 16:20 to confirm that word by the signs which followed.

This is so important to understand, especially in our day. Because false teachers and false prophets are going around today and especially on television speaking lies and using false signs to confirm their word. See the devil knows how to authenticate his false prophets as well. We see something similar when Moses went to Pharaoh. Moses did signs to confirm that his word was the word of the Lord. And what did the Pharaoh’s magicians do? They did similar signs as well. Satan is using many of these so called charismatic signs and wonders that we hear about today to confirm the word of his false prophets. He uses false signs and wonders to get people to accept a false teaching. So the church’s focus always needs to be on the word of God. That is why we have written down for us a more sure word, that today we can use to validate everything and examine everything by the word of the Lord. Today we don’t follow signs and wonders, but the word of God.

But nonetheless, the fact that it is counterfeited by the devil does not invalidate the legitimate use of signs by God to confirm His word. However we need to recognize that God gave this ability for a limited time to a limited number of persons. Namely, the apostles and one or two disciples that were closely associated with them. The New Testament doesn’t mention miracles by anyone other than an apostle or one or two people closely associated with them, namely Philip and Stephen who both were deacons appointed by the apostles in the church in Jerusalem. No one else is identified as doing miracles in the church. It was an apostolic gift, given to authenticate their message as being from God.

These are then what Paul calls “the signs of an apostle”. In 2Corinthians 12:12 he refers to himself as having done the “signs of a true apostle” which, he says, are “signs and wonders and mighty works…” This is confirmed by Hebrews 2:3 , where the writer says that the Lord first preached the gospel, “and it was confirmed unto us by them that heard him, God also bearing them witness by signs and wonders and various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to His own will.”

Now I say all of that in order to establish the context for the miracle that we are looking at today. To unravel the snarled fishing line, if you will. So that we will realize that the apostles weren’t just going around healing everyone that they saw sick or infirmed. Jesus, by the way, did not heal everyone that was sick either. There were many dead people in the cemetery on the day that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, but He only raised Lazarus. And there were so many sick people gathered around the Pool of Bethesda that the sick man could not get into the pool before someone else, and yet Jesus healed only him. In fact, there is a very good likelihood that Jesus had passed by this very lame man outside of the Beautiful Gate mentioned here in Acts 3 many times in the course of His ministry at the temple, and yet He had not healed him. This man was healed by Peter to validate his message as having been from God and afterwards when he preached his message to the crowd gathered around, it says 5000 people were saved.

Now there are a number of things that are noteworthy in the telling of this story that we should consider. First of all, vs. 1 says that Peter and John were going to the temple at the ninth hour, the hour of prayer. Prayers were said in the temple at 9 in the morning, at noon, and at 3pm, or the 9^th hour. Whether or not the disciples were going there to pray at that time is a matter of debate. Some think that there was a slow transition on the part of the Christians out of Judaism. But I happen to think that they went there because they knew that a lot of people would be gathered there at that time, and they wanted to preach the gospel to them. I think if they learned any thing from Jesus, it was to find little merit in the traditions of Judaism. But as Jesus practiced, the apostles would use synagogues and the temple to preach the gospel. And once the gospel is carried to the Gentiles, there is still going to be this pattern of going to the Jewish synagogue to preach and present the gospel, even in Gentile territories. And also, according to chapter 2, there was a great number of their church that were staying in the temple in Solomon’s portico. They didn’t have a home to go to. They had been on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the feasts, and when they were saved on the day of Pentecost they stayed there in the temple daily receiving the apostle’s teaching. So Peter and John had multiple reasons to go there at that time.

So as Peter and John are going to the temple, they pass through the gate called Beautiful. This gate was so called because it was 75 feet tall and made of pure bronze and overlaid with plates of gold. It would have gleamed in the sunlight. And when the crowds would come to pray at the temple they would pass through this gate which they probably preferred above others because it seemed to promise prosperity. So it was an opportune place to be if you were a beggar. The Jews were taught that the way to achieve righteousness was to give alms to the poor or to the temple. And so as these people are streaming in, this lame man positions himself there at the gate to take advantage of the possibly stricken consciences of the people who are coming in for prayers and the evening sacrifices.

When Peter and John pass by, the man began to ask them to give him alms. Alms are an offering, a gift. And Peter, along with John, fixed his gaze on him and said, “Look at us!” That reminds me of how my mother used to speak to me when she was trying to tell me something important. She would say, “Look at me while I’m talking to you!” She knew that if I wasn’t looking at her, I probably wasn’t really listening to her. I may have heard her, but I wasn’t paying attention.

I think people do that in church a lot of the time. I know, I used to be really good at it. I’ve probably attended thousands of church services in my time, most of them as a preacher’s kid growing up in the church. So especially when I was a kid, I was adept at flipping some sort of mental switch that tuned out the preacher while I went into some kind of dream mode. The only time I would come back to reality was when the preacher would start to tell a joke or a story. Then I would listen. Maybe some of you have that ability as well. I think it’s pretty common, actually. I think it is important to listen attentively. It’s something that takes some discipline, perhaps, but it is important to pay attention.

So Peter gets the man’s attention. He thinks that Peter wants to give him some money. But Peter says, “I do not possess silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you: In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene—walk!” This is really the key to understanding the point of this miracle. If we take this to be illustrative, like a parable, then we can see a key principle here in this miracle. And that principle that Luke is presenting here is that the power of the Holy Spirit that was promised to the church is the power to walk in the Spirit and not according to the flesh. That is what this miracle is teaching. The power of the Holy Spirit was not given to enable everyone to be able to speak in a unknown tongue. It was not given so that we can all have perfect health and be healed of every disease. It was not given so that we might be able to move mountains or walk on water or call fire down from heaven. The power of the Holy Spirit is given that we might be able to be the children of God, and then act like children of God. He indwells us, giving us the power to live the life of Christ through these carnal bodies. To be able to walk by the Spirit and not by the flesh. That is what this miracle is illustrating. That is why Luke picks this miracle above all others that are done around this same time. That is why Luke places this event immediately after the filling of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost; to illustrate the purpose of the Holy Spirit.

Now let’s look more in detail so that we might show how this miracle illustrates that purpose. First of all, Luke says the man is lame from his mother’s womb. Lameness could have been caused by a lot of things, but it basically means the guy couldn’t walk due to some sort of illness. His legs might have been crippled or deformed. And that is a perfect picture of our plight before salvation. God set forth His laws, His requirements, His standards of righteousness, and yet no one is able to keep them. It is like telling a lame man that he has to walk. He may know that he needs to walk, but he is unable to do so. That is the case with the law. We know that the this is the standard for righteousness, but we cannot do it, anymore than a lame man can walk. In our natural state we cannot please God because we cannot keep His commandments. Rom. 3:10-12 says “as it is written, ‘THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE; THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS, THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD; ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS; THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD, THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE.’”

This is the plight of every person born on the earth. And furthermore, we were born that way. We’ve been this way from our mother’s womb. Romans 5:12 says that we received the sin nature from our father, who received it from his father, and so forth all the way back to Adam. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. So this poor lame man, who was lame from his mother’s womb is a picture of sinful mankind.

And there is a second picture that is illustrated in this miracle. This lame man has positioned himself outside the temple. He sits by the Beautiful Gate, the gate that seems to promise financial blessing. And so he sits there his whole life, seeking silver and gold, seeking the financial benefit that he thinks that the temple promises. How many people today are attracted to the external blessings of the church and yet in reality are outside of the kingdom of God? How many people look to some form of the prosperity gospel as an inducement to claim Christianity? I used to think that way. I once was a very successful antiques dealer. And I remember telling people that my success was due to my Christianity. I thought that my health and my beautiful family, my financial success, my Mercedes, and my nice house were testimony to the blessing of God upon my life. I measured my relationship with God based on how “blessed” I was. I thought that I could be a witness to others, that I could tell them they too could have a life like mine if they would just come to Christ. You can only imagine how my faith was shattered when I one day I lost all those material things. Then I had to decide if I would still serve a Lord who allowed me to lose all that I had thought were His blessings.

You have heard the song, “Looking for love in all the wrong places…” Well, this man is looking for the wrong things in the right place. He is looking for material rewards. Really, he is looking for carnal things in a spiritual place. The temple is an illustration of the kingdom of God which is the church. As the church, we are the temple of Christ, the physical manifestation of the invisible Christ. The church is the kingdom of God, the spiritual reign of Christ on the earth. And so if it is spiritual, it means things not seen. No one can see a spirit. The spiritual reign of Christ in our hearts is what it means to be in the kingdom of God. That’s what it means to be the temple of God. The body of Christ. It means that Christ is using my body to live out spiritually the purpose and will of Christ.

Yet today many Christians are being taught that Christianity means that you can live your best life now. They think Christianity means that God is going to love you whatever you do – however you want to live, you can live. We are taught that because God loves you, He wants to fulfill your dreams and ambitions. He wants to give you all that you desire, all the desires of your heart. And so we find ourselves like this lame man, seeking the benefits of the flesh, in the place of the spiritual. Seeking the carnal instead of the spiritual.

But Peter and John get the man’s attention and then they say, “Silver and gold have I none, but what I do have I give to you.” Peter and John say that they don’t have silver or gold. I guess they wouldn’t make good role models for Joel Olsteen or Joyce Meyers, would they? The apostles aren’t going to try to win the world with a soup kitchen mentality. Listen, I don’t mean to say that we are to neglect doing good and sharing with those that are in need. That is a godly principle that we see illustrated by the early church in the last chapter as they sold houses and possessions in order to feed those that were in need in the church. But the point that needs to be emphasized is the church is not tasked with a social gospel, but with the gospel of salvation. The purpose of the miracle was to authenticate the message, the preaching of the gospel, so that 5000 people are saved. Far too often today the church finds that the social gospel is culturally acceptable. So the church finds it easier to practice a social gospel than it does to preach a gospel that requires repentance from your sins. But that is not the purpose of the church.

So Peter grabs this man’s hand and pulls him up, saying, “In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene—walk!” Now that is an illustration of salvation. In the name of Jesus Christ we that were lame can now walk. In the name of Jesus Christ, we that were sinners have now been made righteous. In the name of Jesus Christ, we that were cut off have now been drawn close. In the name of Jesus Christ, we that were helpless have now received help. In the name of Jesus Christ, we that were born in our sins, have now been born again. In the name of Jesus Christ, we that were hopeless have now received hope.

What does it mean, “in the name of Jesus Christ?” Is the name of Jesus some sort of incantation that we can say that magically produces miracles on command? Is it some sort of mystical ending to our prayers which guarantees that God will grant us our wishes? What does it mean? Well, imagine the early explorers of a country traveling to a foreign land, and when they come ashore they might say something like, “We have come in the name of King George.” It means that they are acting on the authority of their king. In the same way the apostles were the ambassadors, the representatives of King Jesus. They spoke with the delegated authority of His commission. And they have authority because of the power of the King’s position. They had power in the name of Jesus because of who Jesus is. He is the Creator, according to Hebrews 1. He is the Mighty God, according to Isaiah 9. He is the Savior of the World, according to 1 John 4. He is the Word which was in the beginning with God and was God, according to John 1. It was this very God that became flesh and dwelt among us, that He might offer Himself as a substitute for sinners, that we might be saved from death and transferred into the kingdom of light.

Listen, so often we think of salvation as being saved from something; saved from death, saved from condemnation, saved from a bad situation. And to some extent that is true. But did you ever think that you are also saved for something? Eph. 2:10 says, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.” So we are saved for good works, that we should walk in them.

Now that is exactly what this miracle illustrates. Peter says, in the name or in other words, by the power of Christ, walk! Walk in newness of life. Walk in faith. Walk in the Spirit. I cannot count how many times it says in the Bible that we are commanded to walk in the ways of God. That is what the law required, and what we could not do. Over and over again in the Old Testament scriptures it says to keep His commandments and walk in His ways. That was the intent of the law, and yet we were lame from our mother’s womb and could not do it.

But something wonderful happens in the New Testament. In the power of the name of Jesus Christ, who bore our sins on the cross, we received by faith and repentance the transference of His righteousness, so that we might walk in righteousness by the indwelling power of the Spirit. In Ezekiel God declares that He will make a new covenant in the last days. And in that new covenant according to Ezekiel 36: 25 He says, “Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.”

Do you hear that folks? “I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statues, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.” That is the miracle of salvation and the power of the Holy Spirit. God takes this sinful body, and these weak, lame legs that cannot walk, and puts new life in them, puts His Spirit in me, that I might be able to walk in His statues and keep His ordinances. This is why God sent the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. This is what Jesus was talking about when He said you will receive power. The power to walk in His statues by faith in Jesus Christ.

The writer of the Hebrews quotes a similar statement from Jeremiah, in Heb 10:14-17 “For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. And the Holy Spirit also testifies to us; for after saying, “THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE WITH THEM AFTER THOSE DAYS, SAYS THE LORD: I WILL PUT MY LAWS UPON THEIR HEART, AND ON THEIR MIND I WILL WRITE THEM,” He then says, “AND THEIR SINS AND THEIR LAWLESS DEEDS I WILL REMEMBER NO MORE.” What that passage is saying is that salvation and sanctification go hand in hand. Jesus has perfected those who are being sanctified and He does so in this new covenant through the testimony of the Holy Spirit writing His laws upon our hearts and upon our minds, so that our desire is to walk in His ways.

Oh, ladies and gentlemen. This is such an important message for the carnal church today that claims salvation and yet scorns righteous living. That cannot be. We are saved and we receive the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit that we might walk in the same way Christ walked. Romans 6:4 says that we are to walk in newness of life. Romans 8:4 says that we are not to walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 1 Cor. 7:17 says we are to walk in our calling in the church. 2 Cor. 5:7 says we are to walk by faith and not by sight. Gal 5:16 says, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. Gal 5:25 says, “If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.” In Eph. 4:1 Paul begs us to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called. Eph. 5:8 says walk as children of the light. Col. 1:10 says, walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; Col. 2:6 says, “Therefore as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, 1Jo 2:6 says the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked.” I could go on and on. But I hope you understand what the Spirit is saying through this miracle. We were given the power through the Holy Spirit to walk as Jesus walked, holy and righteous and pleasing and glorifying God in all that we do. We have the power indwelling us, if we have been saved, to do all that God has designed us to do, if we will just be obedient to His leading.

So folks, in closing, let me say that is how God has designed the church to be His witnesses to the world. By the power of our walk. When the crowds had gathered around Peter and John because they saw this formerly lame man leaping and jumping for joy on his new legs, they then received the word of the apostles and 5000 of them were saved in one day. The success of our church is not going to be the result of some program or some outreach, or even by our soul winning efforts, but it will be the result of people witnessing the power of God to change sinful men to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. When your coworkers, when your families and neighbors witness the transformation in your life, when they witness your new walk in righteousness, then they will be compelled to follow your walk and accept your Christ. That’s what it means to make disciples. Let us walk out of here today in the power of the Holy Spirit, walking in the ways of God as a testimony to the world. We then can fulfill Christ’s commission to the church, to make disciples. We can tell people, walk like I walk, because I walk like Christ walked. That’s what it means to make disciples. To walk like we walk, by the power of the Holy Spirit.

There is much misinformation in Christian circles today as to the nature and purpose of the church. Many books and articles have been written on the subject of church growth. Many different strategies have been proposed for the building up of the church. And as a result I think that in the last generation the church has changed more than at any other time in history. However, I’m afraid that it has not always been for the better. I’m sure that many of the great ecclesiastical leaders of history would not approve or even recognize what is happening in many churches today. In fact, I think that when we lose sight of God’s blueprint for the church and try to figure out according to our own wisdom how we might improve upon His plan, we often do great harm to the church and to the name of Christ.

Our passage today sets forth the first example of the church that we find in the New Testament. We have spent the last couple of weeks or so describing how the Holy Spirit coronated this church with a great display of His power in order to validate and authenticate it as being from God. Peter said in his message that it was obviously a mighty work of the Holy Spirit which had come from God to establish His spiritual kingdom on earth in the last days. And so as this church is set forth in scripture as the premiere illustration of God’s church on earth, it would behoove us to faithfully follow it’s pattern in our practice as well. Because I believe that this scripture definitely reveals that this is God’s church. And since God is the designer, then we should seek to follow the pattern of His design as we see it laid out for us here in this passage.

Now there are a five fundamental marks of a true church as set forth in this passage that I would like to point out for our instruction here today. It is not a comprehensive list, perhaps, but it is an essential list. There are things that can be added, but we cannot take any of these away and still have a faithful and true church according to the pattern set before us.

Let’s consider then these five fundamental characteristics of the church. Number one is almost too obvious to mention, but unfortunately it’s importance is often overlooked. It is essential that the church is saved. I think that principle’s importance is reflected in the fact that under divine inspiration Luke bookends the passage with a reference to the fact that the church was saved. The first reference is in vs. 40 “And with many other words [Peter] solemnly testified and kept on exhorting them, saying, “Be saved from this perverse generation!” So then, those who had received his word were baptized; and that day there were added about three thousand souls.” And then at the close of the passage is the other bookend: vs. 47, “And the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved.”

The church is the congregation of the saved. “Ekklesia” is the Greek word from which the word church is translated, and it means the called out ones. Called out to an assembly, a congregation. And I think it’s important to understand that church membership is only possible when the Lord adds them to the church that are saved. (vs.47) It isn’t something conferred by vote, or applied to, or that baptism procures. It is something you are born into, and you must be born again by the Holy Spirit. The word saved indicates that you are delivered from something. We are saved from wrath, from the judgment to come against sin, and from the wages of sin which is death. That’s what it means to be saved. To be changed from death to life, from darkness to light, from sons of the devil to sons of God. It is a supernatural conversion that is accomplished by repentance from your sins and faith in the work of Jesus Christ, resulting in new life and indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

So the church is made up of called out, saved, converted men and women. That is fundamental to understanding then the purpose of the church, especially today when we are witnessing a church movement that is deliberately trying to appeal to what they call the “unchurched.” Basically what that means is that they are trying to redesign church to accommodate the unsaved. But that is not what the church is designed by God to be. The church is designed as the body of Christ. And as Paul said what communion can light have with darkness? When we understand that the church is the calling out to assembly of those that are saved, and that Christ has placed them into His body, then it should change our perception of what the church is supposed to be. It doesn’t need, nor should it desire to become relevant or acceptable or attractive to the world. It needs to be attractive to Christ. It needs to be acceptable to God, holy and blameless as the virgin bride of Christ.

So that’s of first priority in the church; it is the body of the redeemed. Secondly, the church’s next essential characteristic is that they are devoting themselves to the word. Vs. 42, “They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching…” Some versions may say the apostle’s doctrine. They both mean the same thing. What is the apostle’s doctrine? It is simply the gospel of Jesus Christ. Peter’s message is a great example of it. He starts with scripture and explains the gospel of salvation based on the Old Testament text in Joel. Then he expounds upon that doctrine with other supportive biblical texts. It’s expositional teaching. It’s exhortation. It’s admonition. Paul broke it down for us in 2Tim. 4:2 “Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.”

The apostle’s doctrine is simply this; the congregation of the saved is strengthened, exhorted, equipped, taught and led by the teaching and preaching of the word of God through the ministers of God. Nothing less will do. John Calvin said, “Those who think that the authority of the doctrine is impaired by the insignificance of the men who are called to teach, betray their ingratitude; for among the many noble endowments with which God has adorned the human race, one of the most remarkable is, that he deigns to consecrate the mouths and tongues of men to his service, making his own voice to be heard in them.”

In the great commission that was given to the apostles, the Lord told them to “go and make disciples of all nations, and teach them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.” Sound doctrine is the heart of the life of the church. Not ritualistically observing the sacraments, not children’s programs, not music, not so called modern worship. If the church is not teaching the doctrines of the word, then they are failing in their primary responsibility. And a Christian should not stay in a church that doesn’t make that a priority. The church is not designed to be a Christian country club. But it’s designed to teach the truth and apply it to our lives so that we might be obedient to what Christ has commanded us to do.

Thirdly, the church is not only to be devoted to the apostle’s doctrine, but to fellowship. (vs.42) We are the Beach Fellowship. Sometimes I’ve had someone say, “why don’t you add the word church to your name?” Well, my answer is that would be somewhat redundant. Fellowship is church. Now to be accurate, they are two different words. But you cannot have one without another. The Greek word for fellowship is “koinōnia”, which means fellowship, communion, participation and intimacy. It is really a unique word as used in the New Testament. It sometimes is used to describe fellowship, other times it is used to describe sharing as in taking up an offering, other times it is used to talk about participating in the Lord’s Supper, that is why we refer to the Lord’s Supper as Communion.

Paul said that of first importance we are called into fellowship with the triune God. 1Cor. 1:9 “God is faithful, through whom you were called into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” And 2Cor. 13:14 “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.” As the church, as the body of Christ, we have fellowship with Christ who is the Head of the church, with the Holy Spirit who is the life of the church, and with God who is the creator of the church.

And then fellowship is communion of the Lord’s Supper, which is a picture of the fellowship we have with one another in the body of Christ. Paul said in 1Cor. 10:16 “Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ?” We become one with Christ and one with the body of Christ, each other, symbolized in the eating of the bread and drinking of the cup.

And last but not least, fellowship is participation in the unity of the apostle’s doctrine. 1John 1:6-7 “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth; but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.”

So fellowship then is not determined by finding a congregation that is similar to our economic standing. It is not finding a church where there are a lot of young people because we happen to be young, or finding a church with a lot of older people because we are older people. But church is the body of Christ which is made up of various members, different kinds of parts, but all of them unified by a common doctrine, and working together for a common purpose, to be the visible manifestation of Christ to the world individually and corporately.

The fourth characteristic of the true church is the breaking of bread. This is my wife’s favorite. If we were making up committees, this is the one she would want to be on. She loves baking. Her hobby is to bake something everyday. No wonder I have such a hard time keeping my weight down. My wife thinks that the meal that she cooks on Wednesday nights for our Bible study is a major part of our ministry. And in a way she is be right. It certainly seems like this was a characteristic of the first church.

Now most commentators are going to say that this breaking of bread refers to the taking of the Lord’s Supper. They say that there was a love feast that was like a communal meal, and then at the end of it there was an observance of the Lord’s Supper. Maybe they are right. I don’t know. I can’t seem to prove it one way or another by scripture. However, I do know that both Jude and Paul speak rebuke to those in the churches that were abusing the Lord’s Supper. But what I will argue is that there are familiar expressions that the apostles used in referencing the Lord’s Supper or the Lord’s Table, but this phrase “breaking of bread” is not one of them. It is used in scripture only once before, and that is the meal that Jesus took with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. So while I wouldn’t discount that it could include the Lord’s Supper, I do not think that is necessarily what it’s talking about. I think it is merely talking about good old fashioned hospitality. Sharing a meal together is a hallmark of hospitality.

Let me try to explain the context here for a moment. On the day of Pentecost, you had thousands of pilgrims that had come to Jerusalem for the feast of Pentecost. And that day, 3000 of these men and women were saved. And so the first church comprised a large number of people who did not live in Jerusalem, but stayed there after they were saved and lived in the portico of the temple where they were having services. And so there was this unique situation that occurred there. There were a large number of people that were essentially homeless. How long they lived there we don’t know. But every indication is that for quite a while at least, they did not go back to their homes in foreign countries, but stayed to receive the apostle’s instruction and lived in fellowship with the rest of the church.

Now that should give us a better understanding of what was going on. Because vs.43-47 are not a continuation of the list of essential characteristics of the church, they are an explanation of the original five. Look at vs. 44, 45, “And all those who had believed were together and had all things in common; and they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need.” See what I mean? I’m not going to read into vs. 44 and 45 and say that the scripture says that the church needs to have a communist life style. That we all have to sell everything and give it to the church to parcel out. That is not what is going on. If that were the case, then vs.46 wouldn’t make sense, which says they were breaking bread from house to house. They wouldn’t have had any houses to break bread in if they all had sold their houses.

No, like I said, I think the verses 43-47a are an explanation of the 5 primary characteristics listed prior to these. For instance, vs. 43 says “Everyone kept feeling a sense of awe; and many wonders and signs were taking place through the apostles.” This is obviously an explanation or addendum to the statement that they were devoting themselves to the apostle’s doctrine. There was a sense of awe, a sense of reverence, a sense of godly fear at the authority that the apostle’s spoke with. Peter’s message was one having authority. He had the authority of the power of the Holy Spirit. And that was accompanied with signs and wonders. The apostles were given the power of signs and wonders so as to authenticate their message as specifically appointed spokesmen from the Lord. Paul declares that fact in 2Cor. 12:12 “The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance, by signs and wonders and miracles.” Signs and wonders was the means by which God authenticated the apostles as speaking for Him, speaking His words. He gave them authority and power and the words to speak, which became the words that were written down for us, which make up the Holy Scriptures. It was specifically for that time and place as a sign gift to the apostles.

So in like manner, vs. 44 and 45 illustrate for us what was the nature of that fellowship which was so essential to the foundation of the church. The key word there is sharing. That is communion, fellowship. They shared what they had with one another. Those people that were living there, unwilling or unable to go home, were supplied in their needs by the surplus of those who had the means. They sold things that were considered surplus in order to give it to the church for the provision of the needs of the others. This was true sacrificial giving as Jesus described in Luke 3:11 by commanding “The man who has two tunics is to share with him who has none; and he who has food is to do likewise.”

This church illustrated what Paul would later describe in 1 Cor. 12:24, “But God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that member which lacked, so that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it.”

Then in vs. 46 we read they were “Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart.” Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple refers to the unity of doctrine that was being taught to them by the apostles. This is so important in the church, to have unity of doctrine. The Bible says, “how can two walk together unless they be agreed?” You may never have a church where there is absolute agreement over every interpretation of scripture, but there needs to be a unity of major doctrine, and most importantly a submission to the authority of the leaders as they speak the word of God.

Peter said in 2Pet. 1:20-21”But know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.” Now that verse has a lot of implications, but one is that there isn’t really any room for private interpretations of scripture. “Well, I think it means..” or “what does this mean to you?” It is important that we have men in the pulpit who are committed to preaching the truth of God’s word and nothing but the truth, and then we need to check the scriptures to see if those things are so, as the Bereans did to Paul’s teaching, but then they need to submit to the authority of faithful preaching. As I said a couple of weeks ago, the problem in a lot of churches is that the congregation picked a pastor, not God, and they chose a pastor like they were judging a talent contest; based on his looks and his personality and his entertainment factor. They did not pick a man that was known to be a student and a preacher of the word.

And then back to our fourth point of breaking bread, vs. 46 is an extrapolation or explanation of that principle. It says, “Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart.” So they were together being taught in the temple, and then they invited those home with them to have a meal who didn’t have the means to a meal. This then is not speaking of the Lord’s Supper necessarily, but good old fashioned hospitality. It’s taking koininea to the next logical level, sharing a meal. Sharing your home. Sharing your resources with those who have a need.

One of the most telling examples that I see in our church that we are experiencing church as God would have us do, is when I see our people enjoy fellowshipping together after service, or at a restaurant, or at a get together like we did at the Valentine’s Dinner. This is how we get to know one another. This is how we get to the point of sharing one another’s burdens. It doesn’t do true fellowship any good whatsoever when we ask each other politely, “how are you this morning?” And the automatic response is “Fine thanks. How are you doing?” “Oh, I’m doing great, thanks!” And that’s it. That’s as far as we get in getting to know one another. No, our goal is to be able to say as I quoted from 1Cor.12:24 while ago, when one person suffers, we all suffer, when one person is honored, we all rejoice.” And one of the best ways to incorporate all the various members together into one body is to eat together, to share together, to help one another in the day to day trials of life.

The fifth element in vs. 42 of a true church was they were devoting themselves to prayer. Prayer is one of the two offensive weapons that we have been given in the spiritual warfare described in Ephesians 6. All the other armor listed there is defensive. But prayer is not only defensive, it’s offensive. You’ve heard it said that the best defense is a good offense. Eph 6:18-19 “With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints, and pray on my behalf, that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel.” I suppose that most of you are a lot like me – we just don’t pray like we should. We don’t pray nearly as much as we would like to. Jesus was a man of prayer. He prayed many times all night on a mountaintop. And when He came down from the mountain He was refreshed and empowered and filled with the Holy Spirit.

I believe that much of our success on the beach is due to the Jericho March we do each year before the season starts. It’s a time of sustained, strategic prayer for six nights and culminates on Sunday morning with the walls of opposition to the gospel coming down in this community. But folks, we need to pray that way a lot more often than once a year. I think it is the key to everything. I don’t understand it, but I know it works. The problem is that we don’t work at it.

Hey, I got suggestion for those of you that don’t like my preaching all that much. Did you ever think that by praying you could make me a better preacher? Isn’t that what Paul is asking them to do for him in Ephesians 6? “And pray on my behalf, that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel.” I would really appreciate it if you guys would pray for me. It doesn’t get any easier to preach the gospel. And believe it or not, I have difficulty with speaking with boldness. I may be loud, but that doesn’t necessarily make me bold. Pray for boldness, but more importantly, pray that God would give me utterance, that He would give me the message that He would have me preach.

Well, those are the five marks of the true church, the indispensables, if you will of an effective church of God. There is just one more point that is made here that needs to be pointed out. We looked at 5 characteristics, and they all result in one consequence. That is found in vs. 47, “And the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved.” The consequence of a congregation of saved, born again, transformed men and women, who were taught the doctrine of the apostles, and who lived out their lives in fellowship, unselfishly sharing wealth and food and resources with each other, and devoted to prayer, and were sincere and joyful in their faith, the consequence of that kind of transformed lives resulted in God using their public testimony to be a means to bring others to the Lord. That’s the kind of church that is attractive to the lost. It’s not a place that looks like a nightclub or tries to look attractive to sinners. The gospel’s attractiveness is that it offers hope from the despair of sin. The power of a transformed life is the testimony that God can use to attract sinners to the gospel. They come to church not because they can relate to it, but because they are attracted to the hope and peace and joy that we have in Christ because He has overcome the captivity of our sin. That’s why Peter’s first response to those that heard his message and that asked what they needed to do was that they needed to repent. And the need for repentance will be the apostle’s message on through the book of Acts.

Listen, all of us that are saved have been placed in the body of Christ, to perform an essential function for the health and purpose of that body. Christ has given to each of us a part in His body and placed us in the church as He sees fit. Let us then be faithful and diligent to be about the business of the church, because that is what Jesus tasked us with in the great commission; “to go and make disciples, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you.”

Paul breaks down that commission for us in Ephesians 4:11-16 “And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.” Amen.