A Healthy, Growing Church
Acts 2:29-47
By Pastor Jordan Hines

Men and brethren, let me speak freely to you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried and his tomb is with us to this day. Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his body according to the flesh, he would raise up the Christ to sit on his throne. He foreseeing this, spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that his soul was not left in Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption.

This Jesus God has raised up, of which we are all witnesses. Therefore, being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he poured out this which you now see and hear. For David did not ascend into the heavens, but he says himself, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool.

Therefore, let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do? Then Peter said to them, repent and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins. And you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

For the promise is to you and to your children and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call. And with many other words, he testified and exhorted them, saying, be saved from this perverse generation. Then those who gladly received his word were baptized.

And that day about 3000 souls were added to them. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Heavenly Father, we praise you.

Lord. We thank you for the gift of your son, Jesus Christ, who, as Peter said, you have made both Lord and Christ and has purchased us with his own blood, who has sacrificed himself to pay for our sins and has risen again and now is with you at your right hand, Lord. In him we want to worship him, we want to glorify him, we want to honor this morning.

And we just pray that you would help our hearts to focus on worshiping your son Jesus Christ, to focus on the preaching of your word that we may grow and that we may learn from it and be the children that you want us to be. Lord, we just pray that you give us desire to see the lost people saved. You give us a desire to build into and help one another grow.

We pray that you give us a desire to serve and to do the things that are right and that please you. We're thankful this morning that we can be here as children of God, as a family in Christ, Lord. And we just pray that our sacrifices and our offerings of praise would be pleasing to you.

Lord, we do thank you for this time and we give it to you now in Jesus name. Amen. Amen.

You can find acts chapter two in your copy of God's word. This morning we are finishing acts chapter two. It's been a four week trek here and we're coming from a context of change as I've entitled this series, the Spark, as God sparks the church and he begins the church.

We talked about the first 13 verses in acts chapter two, about Pentecost, about the Holy Spirit coming down, of the Holy Spirit arriving and affecting what the church would become. And then Peter started to preach. And as Peter starts to preach, the people are being confronted with prophecy and prophecies fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

And they're confronted with the fact that the person in this prophecy is this Jesus Christ who they crucified, who they killed, and the crowd is convicted. And then Peter applies what they ought to be doing in acts chapter two, verse 38 to 40. And he tells them they need to repent, to be baptized and they need to be changed.

And we come to a place now where the spark has happened and we're transitioning into sort of a larger series where we're going to talk about not just how the church started, but what the church is supposed to do. So as we work together as this church at Northridge Baptist Church, we are here to function in the way that scripture says we are ought to. And part of that is in acts chapter two.

So I'm going to start in verse 40 actually and then read down to verse 47 of acts chapter two. And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, be saved from this perverse generation. Then those who gladly received his word were baptized.

And that day about 3000 souls were added to them. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and fellowship, in breaking of bread and in prayers. Then fear came upon every soul and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles.

Now all who believed were together and had all things in common and sold their possessions and goods and divided them among all as anyone had need. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.

Let's pray God. We ask that you would work in this church, work in our hearts. Just as the people in this passage heard the word of God, responded to the word of God, or changed, and you worked in this church, I pray that you would do the same for us, that we would hear the word of God today and every single day, and that we would be changed.

And that as a result you would grow this church, that you would grow us individually, but also that you would grow us together, knit us together in love and kindness towards each other. I pray that you would help us to be a healthy church, just like this is a healthy church. Thank you for your testimony in acts chapter two.

In your son's name we pray this. Amen. There's an interesting phenomenon going on in the church culture in America, and that's the growth of atheist churches.

There's a movement of new churches rising across the country, and guess what they all have in common? They all don't believe in God. Atheist churches and even atheist mega churches are becoming more and more popular as people want the warm feelings of a church experience that they grew up with, but not God. Sanderson Jones, one of the leaders of the Sunday assembly in Los Angeles, said there was so much about it referencing a Christian a christian church's Christmas caroling event that I loved, but it was a shame because at the heart of it, it's something I don't believe in, Jones said.

If you think about church, there's very little that's bad. It's singing awesome songs, it's hearing interesting talks, thinking about improving yourself and helping others and doing that in a community with wonderful relationships. What part of this is not to like? Atheist churches like Joan's Sunday assembly continue to grow in America.

You see, even those who don't believe in God understand the power and draw of the things that he ordains, singing songs and talking meaningfully to each other, caring for one another, being in a committed community and doing works of charity to our neighbors. These activities are attractive to everyone. The reason why is because these activities represent who God is and the expression of himself through his human creation.

The only problem is that the atheistic churches leave the original source out of it. Atheistic mega churches do not acknowledge God. They do not acknowledge the power of God or who he is.

But our text today and our experience today clearly acknowledges God. And first, we're going to see today very simply an active God. This isn't the main point, but it's sort of the point that helps support the passage because we don't have a church without God we have an active God.

This is in verse 43 and verse 47. The statement here at the beginning of 43 is, fear came upon every soul. Fear.

This is reverential fear. It's a feeling of profound respect for someone or something. It's often a deity.

It's a great respect for someone. It's also great respect that moves you to change your actions. When I was in high school, I did woodworking, and I've done a little bit of welding, not a ton.

But you can understand the idea that a table saw or a drill demands respect because of how much power it has, because of the damage it can do or the good that it can do. It is a powerful thing. It's a great thing because it's able to accomplish something.

It's like if I had a glass pitcher and it somehow slipped out of my hand and it shattered into a thousand pieces. You're not just going to step over it and walk all over it, and you're not just going to pick it up really quickly. You're going to be careful.

There's a fear of the power that it has to cut you. We ought to have a reverential fear and respect for God. And now, as believers, our fear is not found in that we are fearing death, but that we respect the power of our God and to respect the greatness of who he is.

And God, this powerful God, shows his power in verse 43 in many wonders and signs that were done through the apostles. The differentiation, the difference between these words is really interesting. The wonders here is still the idea of a miracle, but it's focusing on a change of nature, or the course of nature has been shifted.

God is doing something that's not normal, it's abnormal, it's a deviation, hence Pentecost. A sign here has an emphasis on a message being communicated. This is something that not only is it a powerful change in nature, but it's also something that's supposed to tell us something.

And Peter is echoing the language used in this very passage in acts, chapter two, verse 19 by Joel the prophet, and then quoted by Peter. I will show wonders in heaven above and signs in the earth beneath, blood and fire and vapor of smoke. And he's also echoing Jesus ministry in acts, chapter two, verse 22.

Men of Israel hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves also know, as they have experienced. Peter's purpose in referencing these verses is to verify that the message of the church was a message that was from God for God's glory and was meant to impact the way the church should go forward.

It was meant to change the church as God has given this church growth. Jump down to verse 47 to see another statement of what God is doing in his church. The end of the verse.

And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved. You can find this all over scripture where God does something. And the temptation for us as people is to think, well, we were so faithful in our church attendance, we were so faithful in our ministries, we were so faithful in just being us that God did something.

That's a temptation. No, God was faithful to use us even though we're flawed people. The Lord added to the church daily those who are being saved.

God was the one who was moving and the apostles were obeying. The source of this church growth is God. God was working.

God chose to use people to reach people. God chose to send Jesus a man and a God to reach all mankind. And God continued to add these people.

It's not finished. He's not done. He's continuing to do this.

Church growth here is as dependent on God as a plant is on sunlight or water. See, we can have the water in our, in our pitchers and we can pour the water in. But God is the one who provided that water.

God is the one who provided the sunshine. We're just here to take care of it, take care of the plant. He is the one who provides church growth.

He is the one who gives us any kind of spiritual hope. And without God, we cannot have hope to be a healthy, growing church. Look at verse 42 with me as we look at a healthy, growing church.

Verse 42. We're going to begin looking at several different things that a healthy, growing church should be doing. What does a healthy, growing church look like? The first thing verse 42 is we ought to be a devoted church, says.

And they continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and in prayers. They continued steadfastly. They were already doing these things when they were coming together for Pentecost.

It was a natural response. But now they continued steadfastly. That steadfastly is continuous.

It's ongoing. They have not stopped doing this. They're continuing in doctrine.

This doctrine is very simply just the teachings of the apostles, the teachings that God has used the apostles to communicate the content of the life and ministry of Jesus. It would represent also their heritage as jews. The, the promises made about a messiah.

It would represent the commands given to the church by Jesus and by the Holy Spirit, through the power of the Holy Spirit. It would include the promises of God for the church going forward. It would include the messages that were communicated at Pentecost.

They continued in this doctrine and we continue in this doctrine today. And we are blessed to have this doctrine recorded in the word of God for us today. This doctrine is important.

I think it's not an accent. This was mentioned first. The doctrine here does not change.

The doctrine is the same. It is the foundation. So yes, God gave this powerful work of the spirit and he poured the spirit out on people.

But they continued not in speaking in tongues in this text, but in the doctrine first. And what was trying to be communicated through this special event. And they did this in the context of fellowship.

The breaking of bread is how it's put in this text. This a common understanding. This is an intimate fellowship with the body of Christ.

This is remembering the works of Jesus Christ, death, burial and resurrection. I don't believe at this point in the life of the church. There was a precedent for once a month during communion.

I think it was probably honestly more often. Because if you remember back when Jesus was instituting the Lord's supper in Luke, and again, as Paul reiterates in one Corinthians, he talks about how you ought to be doing this, remembering me, whenever you do this, whenever you break bread with your fellow disciples, whenever you are in fellowship and communion, it wasn't about establishing a tradition. It was remembering.

Any time that you are together with a believer, you're breaking bread. You're thankful that bread, as we'll look at later, represents the body of Christ. This breaking of bread is prime time for discipleship and relationship building.

You've all been in a situation where maybe you're with someone who you just click with and you relate well with, and you're able to spend time with and laugh with and your ability to communicate and to have deep, meaningful relationship and deep meaningful conversation is enhanced because of the fellowship that you have. These people who are brought together under amazing circumstances have an amazing truth to cling on to. This is a time for relationship building and development.

It's also a time for prayer. They prayed for each other, for the church, for the gospel, for this message to go out. And God is blessing them with an environment where they are still able to preach this gospel very openly in Jerusalem.

They are a church devoted, a church committed, steadfast in this. Secondly, they are a united church. In verse 44, verse 44 says now all who believed were together and had all things in common, it's a really simple verse, but it's basically just saying they were together.

They weren't scattered yet they were together. They were united, and it was very purposeful. They were together because they wanted to be together.

And also note, as I mentioned a few weeks ago, God's sovereignty in keeping these people together and not bringing persecution. Yet he's allowing them to build these relationships and to learn from each other and grow from each other before persecution sets in. God the designer, is the one who's providing this opportunity.

These people viewed the church as a body in communication in every way. This body had individual needs. This body existed to complement and provide for the rest of the body.

This body felt the needs of the other members. This body was together. Another example of something we ought to strive to be.

We ought to be devoted to the cause. We ought to be united around the cause with each other, but also we ought to do this sacrificially. Verse 45 says, and they sold their possessions and goods and divided them among all as anyone had need.

They were giving up something that was theirs. What are some things that we can give up? We can give up our time, our money, our energies, our thoughts. We can give up a lot of things for each other.

We can give up of ourselves for other people. These people were giving their possessions, their livelihoods. They were giving up things that I'm sure meant a lot to them.

And they were giving them to someone else. Because their view is reflective of a view that's not focused on earthly possessions, but more on heavenly realities. That this person needs something and I can give it up because they're my brother and sister in Christ, and I'll be with them for all of eternity.

And we are first and foremost brothers and sisters in Christ. We've seen examples of this even in this church. Helping people move, providing meals, visiting people in the hospital, asking people how they're doing, talking to someone about their life, and taking real interest.

We've seen examples of this in this church. There's a common saying, people don't care about what you know until they know that you care. And I pray that people will know that you care so you are able to help them.

This church was sacrificial. This church was also a worshiping church. A worshiping church is an impactful church.

There are some churches where you walk into them and you feel like you're just on the outside and like these people aren't really excited to be here. Like, they look sad. We shouldn't be sad at church.

We're coming to rejoice around the throne of grace with other believers who we get to spend fellowship with for all of eternity. We get to get to know each other here on this earth. We get to be in mission together on this earth.

And one day we'll be spending all of eternity with each other. We ought to be worshiping and showing people that we love the Lord and that honestly just happens by expressing it in your face. But you can't express it in your face if you don't believe it in your heart.

Verse 46 says so, continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house. They ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all people. There's a couple different kinds of worship here.

First, there's corporate worship. They're in the temple. The temple here, obviously steeped in Jewish tradition and heritage, is the favorite meeting place of the early believers.

It's where people congregated to learn and grow. Luke chapter 24, verse 53, says they were and were continually in the temple praising and blessing God. Another common place to meet, especially in the book of acts, was acts, was Solomon's porch in the temple.

Acts, chapter three, verse eleven. Now, as the lame man who was healed held on to Peter and John, all people ran together to them in the porch, which is called Solomon's great, Solomon's greatly amazed. And then acts, chapter five, verse twelve.

And through the hands of the apostles, many signs and wonders were done among the people. And they were all with one accord in Solomon's porch. They're meeting together.

It's important that they're meeting here for a couple reasons. Number one, it's practically big enough to sit that many people and have that many people be together. But also, it's a very public place where people are welcome to come and hear what is being said.

It's a place where the gospel can go forward to people who have never heard it. It's a place where people who, who grew up in this Jewish tradition, in Judaism, have heard these prophecies about the Christ, can understand what it means to trust this Christ. There's an important distinction here as well.

These people were not teaching Judaism as salvation, but their salvation reflected in the context of their Jewish culture and heritage. So they weren't clinging to the hope that they could fulfill the law, they could obey the law. They were clinging to the gospel as a fulfillment of the law, that this Jesus came and he died, and he was that lamb that was sacrificed on their behalf.

They believed in the gospel. They still believed that they had a Jewish heritage that was rich and blessed because God did promise great things to them. Them.

And they met in this very public space in the temple as a church, I believe, to evangelize and disciple. This corporate worship is important for us today. This same sort of truth is echoed for us in Hebrews, chapter ten, verse 25.

Not forsaking the assembly of ourselves together as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another and so much more. As you see the day approaching. Do not forsake the assembly of ourselves together.

See, God knows that we need each other. God knows that we need discipleship and we need growth. And that happens in the context of relationship.

And relationships are hard. Relationships are tough because people are sinners, but we need them. There's corporate worship.

There's also private worship. It says breaking of bread from house to house. There are a couple relational lessons here that we can learn.

Number one, there's close fellowship here. There's things that you learn about people from going to their house that you can't learn from anything else. You learn about what they value, what they care about, about who they care about.

The second relational lesson here is these are vulnerable relationships. They're okay with sharing their home with someone. One of the most intimate places you can be.

This is where you invite people you trust. They're also inviting them to share, enjoy, and enjoy their personal space. I think that's a reflection not just of their house, but also their heart.

There are, I would invite each and every one of you to our house because you are our church family. But if I come across a homeless man on the side of the street, I'm not necessarily going to say, come to our house and stay the night. There are certain things that you can't do with people that are total strangers.

These people are close in relationship. They are a church family. They ate with gladness of heart.

This term is actually really exciting. It's exaltation. It's the utterance of sounds expressing great joy.

Over the last few days, Jenny and I have been babysitting a little guy named Asa. He's actually in the back. Let's not point him out right now, but you can say hi later.

Asa is an adorable little two year old, and he has a younger brother now. That's why we're babysitting him. But every time that he eats, he always expresses it very clearly.

He goes, hmm, so good. And I'm sure that we've had that sort of same experience. Even when we go to, like, a nice restaurant and it's something that we look forward to.

It's just we can't help but express it. Do we have that same kind of expression when it comes to our walk with God? Is our fellowship with God so sweet that we just can't help but exalt who God is? Exalt the character of God because it's so sweet? They understood the blessings of having food. They were glad for it and they expressed their joy in eating it.

They also have simplicity of heart. This is the state of being, of a singular or unified quality. It's not complicated, it's very succinct.

This is why they're here. They're here for each other. This is no ulterior motives.

This is unified around their love for each other. One of the best memories that I think of as a young college student was spring break in 2015, when a couple friends of mine and I went out to Colorado and we went up to Pikes Peak and we rode the trolley that was going up. And unfortunately we weren't able to go to the top because it was too snowy.

But we stopped about 12,000ft and it was snowy. So we got out and we had a snowball fight on the mountain top and it was just a great memory. That snowball fight was something that was simple.

We weren't there to test how much snow there was, we weren't there to test the density of anything in the environment, we weren't there to do anything scientific. We were just there because we cared about each other. We're trying to have a fun, enjoyable vacation together.

The simplicity of heart here is unified around the purposes of glorifying God in relationship. They were there for each other because they loved each other and they loved God. Also says they were praising God.

They were praising God. See, God had worked in their life and they wanted people to know about it. They cared about what God was doing and they wanted to tell everyone, so they did, they told everyone and that's how the gospel goes out.

They were also having favor with all people. Now, this isn't necessarily what you expect from the book of acts, because most of the time you find the testimony of the church as they preached the message of the gospel and then they were persecuted. They preached the message, they were persecuted.

But here what God is doing sovereignly is he's allowing them this sort of safety. What's happening here is that the message of the church hasn't quite been differentiated from just a sect of Judaism. It hasn't been publicly proclaimed that this is outlawed.

This isn't something that the church, that the Sadducees and the Pharisees and the religious leaders of the day and the roman officials would have said, this can't go on. I'm sure some persecution had happened, but this is not, by and large, mass persecution. See, God was starting the church and allowing these people to learn and grow before they are scattered.

God here is active in growing this church. God is active in working in this church to be devoted, united, sacrificial and worshipers of God. He is an active God.

The question for us is, how do we live like this church lived? How do we become devoted? I think we need to be devoted to personal, spiritual walk with God, to our familial relationships, to our church and to our community. Notice it starts on the inside. It starts inside of us and it goes out.

We ought to be devoted first and foremost in our own hearts. If we have any hope of leading our families, of leading this church, of leading this community to the gospel around a united gospel, we ought to be united around the gospel. That can be offensive to people, but it is true.

United around our family values, our church values, united around the love that we have for one another, getting over the differences and seeing each other as people in need of discipleship and seeing those needs. We ought to be sacrificial in giving our time, our prayers, our money, our energies, ourselves. And we ought to be worshiping.

We ought to acknowledge who our God is and humbly seek his face every day and declare his truth every day out of a pure heart, a heart that seeks to glorify the God who saved us, to make his name large. So, as you look at this early church, how did this church do? Seems like they were doing well. How are we doing as a church? How are you doing as a church member? Don't just point fingers at someone else and say, well, we need this, this, and this.

That's easy to do. How am I doing today? Am I devoted? Am I united around the gospel? Am I sacrificing? Am I worshiping? This is a mirror. As you look in the mirror, you see imperfections.

And the good news is we don't have to fix ourselves. We allow God to change us. Is there something in your life that you need to have changed by God? Do you need to confess sin? Do you need to build a discipleship relationship to help conquer a sin? Do you need to just build relationships in general that help you grow in Christ? Is there something in your life that's keeping you back from walking with God? Are you discouraged today? If you are any of these things, the answer is in the word of God.

The answer is going to your community of believers here and reaching out for help. Please reach out for help. Let's look to the Lord in prayer once more.

God, we are thankful for this picture of a church. You worked in this church a few thousand years ago and you are working in your church today. But God, more specifically, I ask that you work in these people.

And personally I ask that you work in my life. God, help us to grow in all these areas. Help us to understand our need for a savior every single day, help us to understand our need for community, and help us to see the needs of this community as people around us need the gospel.

God, thank you. In your son's name we pray. Amen.

The deacons and men would come forward for the Lord's table. The Lord's table is a time of remembrance, a time where we look to what God has done for us, and we reflect on ourselves and we see that we're not worthy. But because Jesus body was broken and his blood was spilt, because we have these pictures of what God has done to remind us of what God has done, we can rest in hope and confidence.

So as we look back on what Jesus has done, we are reminded of the sad nature, the mournful nature of this, but also the joy. Allow me to read a few verses here from one Corinthians, chapter eleven. Therefore, whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord.

But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks, judgment upon himself, not discerning the Lord's body. For this reason, many are weak and sick among you.

Let's take a few moments to reflect and confess sin. Heavenly Father, as we come to this table, we do remember you. We remember your sacrifice on our behalf.

And we are humbled that a God that existed for all of eternity and all righteousness and all purity and all justice would save us. Help us to drink and eat in a worthy manner that is reflective of a child of God. God bless the Lord's table in your son's name.

Amen. Amen. Verse 23 says, for I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you that the Lord Jesus, on the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread.

Jonathan, would you thank the Lord for his broken body? For us it's still truly fair what you think about that, how we did nothing to deserve you, loved us so much that you came to earth, became a man, paid the price. Verse 24 continues. And when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, take, eat.

This is my body which is broken for you do this in remembrance of me. Let us eat a supper. Continued in verse 25 the same way he also took the cup.

Thomas, you thank the Lord for his blood that was built for us once again. Come before you. Lord, thank you for the new covenant you made through your blood with us and that we are free to come before you directly and just speak directly to you and grow through you.

We just pray to remember the sacrifice you made for this and that we would live in a way that remembers that in your name I pray. Amen. Verse 25 says, in the same manner, he also took the cup after supper, saying, this cup is a new covenant in my blood.

This do as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. Let us drink. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

Let's thank the Lord again. God, as a church, we are humbled to come before you, knowing that you have given us the greatest gift and that is life with you. Thank you for your sacrifice, for your love for us.

I pray that you would help us to remember that every single day, to help us to walk with you motivated out of love for you. Help us do that as a church and individually. In your son's name we pray.

Thank you, Amen.