Explore the Bible: Acts 2:41-42

There are many functions that are carried out by a church that is following Jesus Christ. You can find many lists of what these functions are, as classified by whomever is making the list. If you read enough church studies literature, you see that these lists tend to emphasize the same few functions, although they may use different terminology for them.

When we look at Acts 2:41-47, we see a number of these functions practiced by the very first “church” (even before they called themselves a church). Fellowship, worship (including Communion), prayer, ministry, and evangelism were all practiced by the first believers. Some of these practices continued in their Jewish tradition, since the followers of Jesus would have still considered themselves Jews at this point. Others were new practices instituted by the Lord Himself, or encouraged by the situation of these new believers.

I find it interesting that the first function, however, is devotion to the apostles’ teaching. In the first days of the church, there would be little understanding of just what had happened to convince the disciples that Jesus was the promised Messiah. The early followers of Jesus were Jews, and knew to at least some degree what the Scriptures taught. Their Bible was what we call the Old Testament, for the New Testament was years away from being written. I believe that the apostles did with the Jewish Scriptures just what Jesus had done on the road to Emmaus, opening the Scriptures and showing how they spoke of Him.

The apostles could add another element to their teaching. They had travelled with Jesus, sat at His feet, seen His great miracles, and ultimately witnessed His death, resurrection, and ascension. They could give eyewitness testimony to the life, ministry, and Passion of Jesus. Even at this early date, their stories and teaching probably started to take on the form that would later be written in the Gospels as they taught the life of Christ over and over as new converts joined the church.

We do not have the apostles around to teach us about Jesus in person anymore. Yet we still have their teaching available through the inspired writings they gave us through the Holy Spirit. This is vitally important, because without this teaching we would know little to nothing about Jesus. One hymn tells us that “the Church’s one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord,” but without the Gospel accounts left by the apostles and their associates we would not know the truth about Him, nor would we know what He had done to save us.

A healthy church will balance all of the functions laid out for us in Scripture, but without a devotion to the truth taught in God’s Word we will simply be a group that is busy doing things without understanding why we do them. All that we do must be founded on truth-ultimately the essential truth of the Triune Godhead, but a truth that is mediated to us through the inspired Word given to us by God. May everything we do as Christians and as churches be built on this God-given foundation so we may honor our Lord and see His truth in action through us.

30 Days in the Bible, Day 23: Acts 2:40-47

When Luke described the practices of the early church in Acts 2:42-47, the first thing he mentions is that “they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching.” I don’t think this is an accident. When we look at what the church did in these verses, we see actions that arise out of an understanding of God’s Word. The fellowship, worship, and outreach of the first century church are built on the foundation of God’s revelation of truth to them.

What was the content of the apostles’ teaching? It began with the proclamation that Jesus was the fulfillment of the hope of the Old Testament. The Law, Prophets, and Writings of the Jewish Scriptures looked forward to the coming of the promised Messiah and to a salvation that would reverse the curse of sin. The apostles believed and taught that this Messiah was Jesus of Nazareth.

The Bible of the early church was what we call the Old Testament today. The earliest books of the New Testament wouldn’t be written for another 15-20 years, although some of the gospel accounts probably started circulating almost immediately. Since they still considered themselves faithful Jews, the apostles would have gone to their Scriptures to teach about the meaning of the coming of Jesus. Jesus Himself had gone to those Scriptures to explain to the two on the road to Emmaus the OT teaching about the Messiah.

Over about the next 60 years, the apostles’ teaching was written down in the recognized Gospels, Acts, Epistles, and Apocalypse we now call the New Testament. This teaching explained and filled in the details about the person and work of Jesus and about the role of the Holy Spirit. As a result, we are able to read and study the apostles’ teaching today. When we read and study the Bible, both Old and New Testament, we find ourselves in the same place as those early Christians who based everything they did on that teaching.

If we want our modern Christian fellowship, worship, and outreach to have power and lasting effects, we need to follow the example of the first Christians. What we do in the name of Jesus must be founded and built upon what He reveals to us in His Word. A church may meet together, go through some defined worship practices, and speak a message, but if those are done in human power and wisdom rather than in the power of God’s Word the results will not have eternal value.

Christians and churches today must worship the Lord in Spirit and truth, fellowship with and build up each other, and reach out to our world with the good news of Jesus Christ. We can’t do this unless we hear what God says in His revelation, and put what we learn there into practice. As we continue to dig into the Word individually and as a group, we will find that all we do as Christians will be honoring to Jesus and will draw us closer to Him.  

Fad-free Christianity

This week I listened to a podcast from the excellent Theology Network web site called "A Move of God or a Spiritual Fad?". The talk covered ways to determine if a "movement" was truly from the Lord or if it was just some pretty packaging around an idea that wasn't necessarily Biblical. Much of the content was based on Jonathan Edward's Treatise on the Religious Affections, and it was very definitely a helpful guide to using discernment in choosing what popular trends we ought to follow to enhance our walk with God.

What struck me, however, was the list of "spiritual fads" that the audience and the speaker brought up. I remembered many of the trends, having grown up in the church and being active in ministry for much of the time period they could recall. Each of the items mentioned had been prominent to a greater or lesser degree in evangelical Christian circles, and most had caused some controversy and sparked some debate. There were quite a number of these items mentioned.

It wasn't just the list that struck me, however; it was the fact that all of these trends had died out, None of them had a truly lasting impact on the church or the world. While each had probably done some good, and perhaps helped the church deal with some issues that might never have been covered otherwise, they all have gone away, replaced by the next item on the list. These "spiritual fads" may have felt good or at least different for a time, but they left no lasting imprint for the good of the kingdom of Christ.

I suppose one could add many other items to the list of movements that have disappeared without a trace. You could also add a number of hot topics that have left some residual impact on the church, but which themselves no longer exist. I've been around long enough to have gone through quite a number of church growth fads, and while they have indeed brought some valuable insights and practices into the church, it would be rare to find someone in ministry adopting them in whole now.

I think what we really need to develop in our churches is a "fad-free" Christianity. As a student of church history, I find that the basic elements of evangelism, Christian discipleship, and church growth remain fairly stable. There needs to be an application of these elements to the specific cultural situation in which we find ourselves, but that has always been the case. Paul notes in 1 Corinthians 9:19-23 how he adapted to his audiences, and we do the same today. However, the core of our beliefs and practice is the same as it has always been.

I'm not talking about forms here. For example, worship should be done in a way that exalts God, can be done by the entire congregation, engages the spirit, and is theologically and Biblically sound. Whether you do that with a chant, organ, guitar, or voices, the underlying principle is the same. There are some fundamentals that are necessary for the church to remain faithful to its mission as given by Jesus. Maybe the "fads" belong to this realm, the elements that can change without altering the core of belief and practice.

My concern is really for those who simply move from fad to fad uncritically, accepting whatever the latest idea is because its "new" and "fresh" without examining whether or not it is also true and glorifying to God. Staying true to what the Bible teaches and reminding ourselves that we are just a part of a glorious historical and global people of God will be more helpful in the long run than any passing trend.

The Purpose of the Church

I was listening to a lecture on "What Does a Theological Church Look Like?" by Carl Trueman of Westminster Theological Seminary as I drove to church the other day. In this lecture, Trueman made an thought-provoking analysis of the purpose of the church; he said that in a very basic sense, the job of the church was "to prepare people to die."

Having recently finished a series on the functions of the church, I found his comment intriguing. Certainly we cannot understand it without having a grasp on the whole Biblical teaching on the church. Yet the statement is true on a very fundamental level. This life, no mater how wonderful or terrible it may be, is only a blip on the screen of our life. The Bible teaches us that human beings are destined for eternity. That can either be an absolutely wonderful prospect, or an absolutely terrifying one.

When I read that comment in light of what I just taught my congregation about the church, I see how each of the functions of the church really do prepare people to die. Evangelism is about proclaiming the good news that  death is not the end, and that eternal life is found in Jesus. Worship is aligning ourselves in a right relationship with God, and prepares us to spend eternity in His presence. Fellowship reminds us that our eternal life will be spent with others who share our relationship with Jesus. Discipleship is growing into the people we were created to be, the ones who will be perfected when we stand before our Lord. Ministry begins a life a service that will continue when we reach heaven. The ministry of the church in this life prepares us for the life we will live in eternity.

Trueman's statement also speaks to the preoccupation many churches have with the here and now. They focus on the current plight of people not as a part of reaching them with the love of Jesus, but as the entire purpose of their ministry. Some churches see hell as the troubles and inequalities of life, and heaven as having God meet our needs here and now. They lack, or at least seem to lack, any sense of what lies beyond this life. In a few cases this may be because, despite retaining a Christian name and language, they no longer believe there is anything beyond. In most cases, though, I think it is that meeting current needs is more easily seen as "doing something" for the kingdom of God.

We can engage in many kinds of ministries that may look exactly the same as those of churches focused on the now, but do it with our eyes on eternity. Jesus said, "What is a man benefited if he gains the whole world, yet loses or forfeits himself? " (Luke 9:25, HCSB) We need to make sure that we do not seek to meet people's temporal needs at the expense of their souls. As a church, our mission is to "make disciples," and our goal is to help people find their way into eternity.


How much different would our lives be if we lived them with our goal in mind? To think about eternity and where we will spend it is not morbid; it is to realize that this life is just the prelude to the life we are destined to live as God's children. We should live and serve in such a way that we call others to prepare themselves for their own eternity.

Sunday sermon: The Serving Church"

The final installment in the series on the church deals with the church engaging in gift-based ministry to carry out the Great Commission. The summary can be found at http://pastorsteve.wikispaces.com/file/view/The+Serving+Church.pdf.

Sunday sermon: "The Growing Church"

Today's sermon dealt with the church's function of discipleship. We were reminded that we all need to work to build up each other and our church, and that our standard is always Jesus. The summary is at http://pastorsteve.wikispaces.com/file/view/The+Growing+Church.pdf.

Sunday sermon: "The Calling Church"

This week's sermon speaks about our call to be ambassadors for Christ, calling others into a restored relationship with God through the function of evangelism.  The summary can be found at http://pastorsteve.wikispaces.com/file/view/The+Calling+Church.pdf. If you were present at church last Sunday, you will find some additional material in this summary.

The Disappearing Church

One of the subjects that has attracted my notoriously fickle attention lately is the history of the church in the Syrian city of Edessa. I was first piqued by the legends of the correspondence of Jesus and King Abgar, and then by the earlier Acts of Martyrs of Edessa (which, alas but rather obviously, are not true, although some scholars believe they may reflect a genuine core around which the details were built).That led me to some brief articles on the city of Edessa and the church in that city. The church arose rather early, and went through a number of controversies and dabs at heresy. It remained a fairly strong witness for quite some time, even after the Muslim conquest. What I have found makes me curious to know more.

Yet the Edessene church is no more. Despite a history of strong figures, vigorous theological debate, and steadfastness under persecution, the church eventually gave way to forms of Christianity that would become marginalized, and then to the fate of most of the churches that came under Muslim domination. To borrow a phrase from Revelation, their lamp has gone out.

This phenomenon is not a relic of the past. We have only to look at the once-powerful churches of Europe to see that decline and destruction still happen today. True, the church has not fully succumbed yet, but the trends are not good. This didn't happen from military conquest by another religion, either; it happened by the gradual erosion of faith and doctrine, in some cases carried out within the churches.

The good news is that Christianity has spread throughout the world, and is growing and vibrant in may places. The bad news is that what we have seen happen in European countries could spread to the United States and elsewhere if we are not careful and willing to stand for the truth. Could it be that future generations will look back at Germany, France, and even the US as the Edessas of our era- churches once strong and alive, become nothing but distant memories of a tiny minority? We cannot allow the church to disappear from anywhere she stands, and we should pray and act to see the church of Jesus Christ grow even further in lands where once the church was strong as well as in the frontiers of mission.

Sunday sermon: "The Unified Church"

This week's sermon looked at the importance of fellowship in the church, and examined the meaning of fellowship and the Biblical foundations for fellowship. The summary can be found at http://pastorsteve.wikispaces.com/file/view/The+Unified+Church.pdf.

Work Where You Are Placed

Who decides what each member of a church should do? Who decides who the officers of the church are? Depending on your church and denominational background, we could provide many answers to these questions. For example, I come from a congregational background (specifically Baptist). Therefore, on the surface the answer for my church would seem to be, "The congregation decides." Maybe we hold a business meeting and vote, or delegate the appointment of officers and leaders to the pastor, elders, or deacons.

Yet that would be an incorrect answer. 1 Corinthians 12:19 tells us that "God has placed each of the members in the body just as he decided." (HCSB) Ultimately it is God who decides where each of us should serve in the church. The Holy Spirit specifically is the one who gifts us and calls us to minister in the way He determines.

What does this mean for our churches? I believe that in many churches too many people are operating outside of the areas to which God has called them. While in a few cases this may be due to a desire to find a place in which the person receives more attention or admiration than they might in the place God has gifted them for (and after many years in the church I've known a few of these!), it is more often due to people realizing "something has to be done" and doggedly volunteering to do it. After a while, working in an area that does not match their gifts, they may burn out, and not only leave that ministry but stop working for the Lord altogether.

I believe it is imperative that our churches look to fill positions of leadership and service with those the Spirit has called to those ministries. Each of us has gifts to be used to build up the body of Christ, and we need to use those gifts. I also believe that if God calls a church to engage in a specific ministry, He will provide the people to carry out that ministry. If we do not see "ministers" to take on the challenge of a ministry, we need to at least pray and ask God if we should be doing that ministry at this time.

Do you know what God has gifted you to do, and where in the body He has placed you? How are you taking your part in the body of Christ? There are no small gifts and no small people. Sometimes those who get the most attention (as a pastor, I speak especially to my fellow pastors) may be far less significant to the healthy service and growth of a church than many who labor in relative obscurity, and probably also less significant than we often think we are. But all of us are called to serve, to use our gifts for the glory of God and the building up of our brothers and sisters in Christ.

As we seek the Lord's will for our churches, let's help each member find the Lord's will for them in our churches. When we all work together as a body which is put together by God rather than by human wisdom, necessity, or desperation, we will see our churches grow and impact their communities and their world for Jesus.

Getting Healthy in the Church

If you have spent any time working with a church, especially as a pastor or on a pastoral staff, you probably have a large shelf in your library filled with a plethora of resources related to church growth and health. As I work with churches as a transitional pastor, I come back to these studies time and again. Some of them are faddish recaps of what worked in some church somewhere, but probably have little meaning for my church situation. Some are rather complex evaluations of where your church is and where it is going (often with surveys and consultations available at a "reasonable" cost). Some are much simpler and to the point. (One of my favorites, in fact, is called Simple Church.) There is just a huge amount of information available to those who work with churches today on how to help a church become a growing, healthy body.

Yet for all of this growth in church growth material, there seems to be something missing. Few churches today are growing at all. It has become almost commonplace to hear people say if you want a growing church you need to start a new one. What is keeping us from seeing the kingdom of God, and as a corollary our churches, growing?

I think the problem may well be that many churches fail to seek a balance in what they do as a church. Whatever the pastor's gifts are, or whatever the staff specializes in, or whatever the major contributors give to becomes the meaning of church for that congregation. So some churches emphasize evangelism, but have nothing in place to help the new Christians grow. Others emphasize discipleship, but see few new people come to know Christ. Still others favor pouring themselves into ministry, yet their busy programming schedules aren't matched by increasing numbers of maturing disciples. We could multiply the possibilities here, but they all result in the same thing: a one-dimensional church that is extremely good at what it does, but still does not see the growth it expects.

Maintaining balance in a church is hard, as in "herding cats" hard. This is due to our natural tendency (yes, it is mine as well) to emphasize the area in which we are gifted as the primary function of the church. We are most comfortable when the church we are part of majors in what we do best. Yet when we allow that to happen, we are hindering the church from becoming what it can be in God's plan.

How do we overcome this tendency? The hard way is to follow Paul's advice to "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others." (Philippians 2:3-4) That's right, to encourage health and growth in our church we should desire to see those whose gifts are different from ours flourish in exercising them. I firmly believe that every church that is seeking to do God's will and carry out His mission is given everything they need to do so. That includes people with all the spiritual gifts necessary to enable the church to function in a healthy, balanced way. We need to encourage others to use their gifts in a ministry for which they are gifted.

What will happen if we do this? We may very well find a natural balance to the ministry of the church. If the Spirit give gifts as He wills, and He gives them so we as a body can carry out our commission, then when everyone uses their gifts all of the functions of the church will take place. Evangelism, discipleship, worship, fellowship, and ministry will work together to make our church one which glorifies Jesus and engages in a well-rounded mission for the kingdom of God.

Such a humble attitude toward encouraging others will also make the church a witness to the love and compassion of Jesus. There may be nothing that Satan enjoys more than watching Christians fight. C.S. Lewis writes in The Screwtape Letters about what he calls "party" churches; these are churches where taking sides is more important than showing Jesus' love. His "hero" Screwtape writes (specifically about the Anglican Church, but with application to us) that without the work of the devils the church "might have become a positive hotbed of charity and humility." What would love and humility in our congregations say to our communities? A change in our attitudes and in our ministry could be the breakthrough we need to truly reach those around us for Jesus Christ.

Sunday sermon: "The Christ-Centered Church"

In the month of May, I am preaching a series on the five functions of a healthy church. The first sermon is on worship. Because I believe these sermons are important, I have written up longer summaries of them and posted them on the Pastor Steve's Study wikispace. I will provide links here to these summaries. The first sermon can be found at http://pastorsteve.wikispaces.com/file/view/The+Christ-Centered+Church.pdf.

The "Unchanging" Church

I was talking to one of my fellow pastors today, and he told me about a friend of his who became a convert to Roman Catholicism after reading the works of the church fathers. Such conversions are not terribly unusual (although I think more evangelicals tend to move toward the Orthodox Church), and often result in rather zealous evangelists for their new theological views.

This young man told my colleague that he joined the Roman Catholic Church because he thought it had retained the true teaching of the early church, and in fact that its teaching and practice had not changed in two millennia. Such a view is taught in some Catholic circles, but it is historically naive. Still, it raises a critical question: in what ways do we Christians today have a part in an "unchanging" church?

Part of the issue is rooted in the very nature of the early church. The church from its early days was under sporadic persecution in divers locales. The New Testament was still being written up to almost the end of the 1st century, and the full acceptance of the NT canon would take another century or two. The church's structure was still fluid, and there were few voices of authority to promote orthodox teaching. Rival religions often hung onto the edges of Christianity. There is something in the Fathers to confound any modern church tradition: pedobaptists have to explain the Didache, presbyterians and congregationalists the epistles of Ignatius, and many Christians struggle with the battle between the Jewishness of some writers and the Greco-philosophical bent of others.

I absolutely enjoy spending time reading and studying the fathers of the church. Yet I know that they were fallible men despite their gifts, and that the teaching of the Bible is more important than the teaching of its early interpreters. At the risk of sounding unduly critical, placing authority in the hands of the Fathers is not dissimilar to the way Jews of Jesus' time placed authority in the hands of the rabbis rather than in the Scriptures. Our authority is the Bible; our teachers are the men and women of faith throughout the ages who seek to guide us into truth.

We participate in an "unchanging" church when we hold fast to the Biblical doctrines that were hammered out by those who went before us in an attempt to clarify what the Bible teaches us. There is in this sense an "orthodox consensus" that is centered on belief in God as Father, Son, and Spirit, in Jesus as both fully divine and fully human, in the practice of baptism and Communion (albeit differently understood), and in a firm conviction that all genuine believers in Christ are part of a larger body, one spread throughout the world and throughout the ages. We all share in belief in the early creeds, and that center of our faith holds us together when other beliefs and practices set us apart. There is an unchanging core for Christianity, but it is not found in the fathers; rather, our unchanging center is Jesus Christ as revealed in His eternal Word.