Sermon Tone Analysis

Acts 2 Verses 42 to 47 Devoted to Prayer October 16, 2022

Class Presentation Notes AAAA

Background Scriptures:

· Psalm 66:16-20 (NASB)

16 Come and hear, all who fear God, And I will tell of what He has done for my soul.

17 I cried to Him with my mouth, And He was extolled with my tongue.

18 If I regard wickedness in my heart, The Lord will not hear;

19 But certainly God has heard; He has given heed to the voice of my prayer.

20 Blessed be God, Who has not turned away my prayer Nor His lovingkindness from me.

Main Idea: Praying in faith can produce miracles.

Question to Explore: How important is prayer to me?

Create Interest:

· Thinking about this story reminds me that there are many similarities between those who care for physical bodies and those who care for Christ’s spiritual body.

Don’t miss this.

Luke, the author of Acts, was actually a double doctor!

He really was a physician who took care of fractures and colds and illnesses, but as a Christian on mission he also understood and strengthened the figurative body of Christ.

In this passage Dr. Luke tells us what characterized the early Spirit-filled congregation—what made it healthy, dynamic, and alive.

He basically records the diet and exercise regimen of a healthy body of Christ

Lesson In Historical Context:

· The epistles of the New Testament shape the doctrine for the life of the church.

Acts traces the application of that doctrine in the history of the early church.

This passage describes the historical outworking of God’s ideal in the first local church.

It describes the new-born church in its prime, when it possessed a purity of devotion to the risen Lord unmatched in succeeding generations.

· In this brief cameo of life in the early church, three distinguishing dimensions emerge that reveal this to be a remarkable assembly.

They manifested spiritual duties and spiritual attitudes, and the result was spiritual impact.[1]

· God delivers the gospel through the faithfulness of those who hear the message.

The gospel started out in Jerusalem, and now it has arrived all the way to where you are right now.

The book of Acts describes how that began.

· Acts opens with a reference to the ‘first account … about all that Jesus began to do and teach’ (v.

1), which is the Gospel of Luke.

The historical facts of the Gospel of Luke and of Acts are anchored by ‘many convincing proofs’ (v.

3): eyewitness accounts of the resurrection by hundreds of people (1 Cor.

15:5–8), the fulfilment of Bible prophecy (Luke 24:44–49), and visible miraculous signs throughout Jerusalem (Luke 23:44–45).

Before ascending into heaven, Jesus commanded the apostles to stay in Jerusalem and wait for the promise of the Holy Spirit (see John 14:16–17; 15:26–27).After Jesus departed into heaven, he gave his people the Helper to empower them to testify about Jesus Christ (Acts 2:2–3).[2]

· Before jumping into verse 42, let’s pause to remember how this church was born.

Peter preached a Christ-exalting sermon, and as a result of the Spirit and the Word at work, three thousand people were saved.

(That’s a pretty good day!) God builds his church by his Word.

Just as God spoke creation into existence in Genesis, he speaks this new creation—this new community—into existence through his mighty Word.

· The church is God’s plan.

That plan is bigger than the random conversion of a few individuals.

Christianity is personal but not individualistic.

It’s corporate.

Jesus is saving a people for himself (Titus 2:14).

This fact is made plain here in Acts 2; it has also been emphasized in Acts 1, as the people gathered together (1:14; 2:1).

The communal nature of the church is reiterated throughout the New Testament and is illustrated by the fact that the epistles, or letters, were written to churches or in reference to churches.

· This was really a church, nothing more and nothing less.

Its life was completely defined by the devotion to those spiritual duties which make up the unique identity of the church.

Nothing outside the living Lord, the Spirit, and the Word define life for the church.

This church, though not having any cultural elements of success, no worldly strategies, was still endowed with every necessary component for accomplishing the purposes of its Lord.

The church will still be effective in bringing sinners to Christ when it manifests the same key elements of spiritual duty that marked this first fellowship.

· Based on the importance of the church, it is imperative that we understand what the church is supposed to be and do.[3]

Bible Study:

Acts 2:42 (NASB)

42 They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.

· Luke presents in this paragraph an ideal picture of this new community, rejoicing in the forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Spirit.

The community, the apostolic fellowship, was constituted on the basis of the apostolic teaching.

o This teaching was authoritative because it was the teaching of the Lord communicated through the apostles in the power of the Spirit.

For believers of later generations, the New Testament scriptures form the written deposit of the apostolic teaching.

o The apostolic succession is recognized most clearly in those churches which adhere most steadfastly to the apostolic teaching.

· In doctrine (Didache): the teaching, the instruction of the apostles providing unique insight into how the Christian community lived and functioned.

The teaching would include both what Christ taught and His actual death, resurrection, and ascension (or exaltation).

It would

be the same teaching and instructions that are shared in the New Testament and that the disciples wrote to various churches and bodies of believers.

The teaching would be no different.

There is only one message, only one Word, that saves, roots, and grounds people in the Lord—the Word of God Himself, the message of the New Testament.

On the day of Pentecost, the persons who were saved needed to be grounded in the faith.

The only message that could ground them was the message found in the New Testament.

It was that message, that doctrine they were taught.

· Matthew 28:19-20 (NASB)

19 "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,

20 teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."

· Luke 24:45-48 (NASB)

45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures,

46 and He said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day,

47 and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.

48 "You are witnesses of these things.

Thought to soak on:

· Note a striking fact: we can be saved, rooted, and grounded in the very same message.

God has given us the very same doctrines and instructions to root and ground us.

We can have a true, dynamic apostolic experience and maturity in the Lord.

We can grow and know the Lord as intimately as the early believers knew the Lord.

In fact, we come short if we do not, for we have the very same doctrine, teachings, and instructions that they had.[4]

· The apostolic fellowship found expression in a number of practical ways of fellowship including the breaking of bread and prayers.

o Fellowship: the fellowship wrought by the Spirit of God means more than the association existing in secular groups such as civic clubs and community bodies.

There is a vast difference between community participation and spiritual participation.

Community participation is based upon neighborly association.

Spiritual participation is based upon a spiritual union wrought by the Spirit of God.

o The distinctiveness is this: the Holy Spirit is within the Christian believer.

§ The Holy Spirit creates a spiritual union by melting and molding the heart of the Christian believer to the hearts of other believers.

He attaches the life of one believer to the lives of other believers.

§ Through the Spirit of God, believers become one in life and purpose.

They have a joint life sharing their blessings and needs and gifts together.Note several things about fellowship that are taught by this passage.

o Fellowship is being experienced by the new believers because they join other Christians in learning the Scriptures (apostles’ teachings) and in worship (prayers and celebrating the Lord’s Supper, Acts 2:41–42).

o Fellowship forbids an unattached Christian life.

Their fellowship is maintained because they “continue steadfastly” in the Scriptures, in worship and in prayer.

An unattached Christian life is just impossible.

§ Christianity is first an individual matter, but then it becomes a social matter.

The Christian is attached to Christ individually, but he is also attached to other believers.

He walks with other believers in the Scriptures and in worship.

§ Christianity is first a spiritual organism, but then it becomes a spiritual organization.