The Perfect Community

Acts 2:42-47 And they were continually devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. 43 And everyone kept feeling a sense of awe; many wonders and signs were taking place through the apostles. 44 And all those who had believed were together, and had all things in common; 45 and they began selling their property and possessions, and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need. 46 And 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, 47 praising God, and having favor with all the people. And the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved. (NAS)

INTRO

Like many other pastors, upon first reading our text for today, I thought to myself, “This is the perfect church! Everything seems to be running so smoothly. They’re growing, and learning and being formed as disciples in what seems to be an authentic way!”

I know that I am not the only one who has ever thought this. The reality is many have pointed to this text as a model for how the church should look and have beckoned us to go back to the early church model of “doing church.” Namely, that we must go back to a right preaching of the gospel. We must see our churches grow and that its growth is fundamentally the pastor’s responsibility. Yet, this is not the case. The scripture is not giving Creedence to the faithfulness of the apostles. It is giving glory to the God who calls the community of faith together and shares with us a glimpse of the loving kindness God wishes to offer to the world through the church. We as a people often hear what we want to hear in the scriptures and blindly look past the parts of this church’s description that we do not want to hear.

While indeed, at a quick glance, we might think that this is the perfect church. Perhaps that’s because the description found in these verses is an initial state of harmony within the church. Yet, this harmony almost immediately passes away. In the next few verses and throughout the rest of Acts we will see problems like Peter being arrested and a rising tension between the Christian Church and Jewish leaders.

Further reading will shed light on tensions that exist within the community itself. The practice of sharing processions led to people lying about their giving to make themselves look better. They then experienced people choosing to give more provisions of food to the Jewish women over the Greek women - a dispute that eventually required intervention from the apostles. Then, there is controversy as to whether gentile converts must observe the whole of the Mosaic law, especially around circumcision. The conflicts pile up as they go on and on and on…

It reminds me of stories I have heard where a person comes to a new church and everyone seems to love everyone. That is until they are asked to serve on a ministerial board within the church, and their illusions of the perfectness of the church begin to fade.

You see, while this initial harmony does not last. It does point to the church’s eschatological hope. That is to say, it points to the end goal of the church, the very essence of our calling as the church, it shows what church can be at its best. What exactly is this hope? It is to live in a Community of prophetic witness - a community that points to Christ’s love, hope, mercy, grace, and justice.

The beauty of the Easter Proclamation is that all people are welcomed into the body of Christ. Yet, so often, we tend to claim an individualistic approach to being and doing church. Where we make the resurrection and Pentecost into moments of individuality. Whereby the church becomes about ourselves, our personal professions of faith, and our wants.

One commentary rightly notes, “Both the resurrection and Pentecost become individual moments in the lives of believers, personal professions that allow us to negotiate and navigate the meaning of the resurrection and Pentecost without attention to the other.”

What Luke is trying to share with us is not a vision of the perfect community of faith, but rather, Luke is reminding the reader that Christ’s resurrection and our acceptance of Christ as our savior is not a personal claim to secure ourselves for the afterlife. Rather, to follow Christ means to be initiated into Christ’s holy Church. It is to be incorporated into God’s mighty acts of salvation. It is to be in an intentional community.

These verses do not lay down rules or concrete structures for Christian living. Rather, the community in the Book of Acts strives to mutually serve the other…even in their differences. So often, we are told that the church is not supposed to be of the world. Therefore, we dismiss things that we deem to be worldly and even ridicule or question those who believe differently than us as being unchristian. Yet, our passage for today points out that the church doesn’t exists just in and of themselves. They do not only interact with their own community instead the lines are blurred as the distinction between the sacred and the secular are often merged together.

What do I mean by this? The church does not stay in its own circle but goes out and worships in public spaces. They feed those who are not Christians and they care for those who believe differently than they do….they invite people into a community and it is through that radical hospitality that God works.

Did the early church really live in this type of intentional community? I believe so! The scriptures even share with us the four marks/themes. This vision of the church as laid before us in Acts also invites us to live into a radical community. To be continually devoting ourselves to the work of the community.

The first mark is the Proclamation of the Word

In other words, not only did they hear the teachings of the apostles, but they did so not as individuals but as a community. Hearing God’s word and engaging in God’s Word as a community, as a body, where we hear different views and are challenged by each other’s different views, is how we come to know Jesus. It is how we deepen our understanding of who God is. I have had many people, even those who are not Christian reveal to me something about God with me.

2. The second mark is Fellowship

Oftentimes, when we talk about forming some type of fellowship event or “church program,” the question asked is how will we draw these people into the church. We then set a metric of measurement: “If we offer this program and no one from the program comes into the church by this date…then we need to move on and stop wasting our money.”

The community in our scripture did not devote themselves to evangelism. They did not set metrics of success. They set out to live out their relationship with God. In the process, they realized that one can not separate our relationships with God from our relationships with others. We should offer fellowship events not as an evangelistic event but as a way to learn something about those around us.

3. The third mark is the breaking of bread.

Eating together is something we often take advantage of…yet eating together is an important part of being in community. It is the place where the lines should begin to blur. As God takes the ordinary, such as food and time, and blends them into conversational moments that blossom into relationships.

It is the space and place where you feel the loving embrace of others as you enter more deeply into conversation with the other. One of the hardest moments of ministry was when I had to share a report with Bassett Memorial UMC about the church's financial state and begin to talk about the idea of discontinuing the church.

As you can imagine, it was a deeply somber time of conversation. Yet, what shocked me the most was after we had this conversation about possibly closing the church, we went to the fellowship hall, where the mood immediately changed as they celebrated the new life that Ciera and I were going to bring into the world! The love shared with me at that moment was transformative, faithful, and beautiful. To this day, former members of Bassett Memorial continue to meet together and share a meal on the third Thursday of each month. - in part because God took the challenges of discontinuing, the difficult conversations, our desires, and crushed dreams, and brought new life as the body of believers continues to find ways to be in community.

Church, the act of gathering, is an act of resistance. No one has changed their mind through a well-articulated argument. Joyce Rosario says it this way “We gathered first. We saw each other first. We listened to each other and encouraged each other. Gathering means being who we are, as we are, and holding our communal group in resistance to the systems that do not want or value us for who we are, as we are. Sometimes, putting out a cheese plate and some wine is enough to fight the systems for the day.”

4. The fourth mark they prayed together.

When you are in a close-knit community, everybody knows your struggles and supports you through them. The prayers of the early church, as seen in Acts are not just empty words, but the prayers are backed by action. So often, we pray that God will do something, but then we do nothing about it. Might our challenge us this week to be a people of prayer and action?

Furthermore, they did not just pray by themselves; they prayed together and held one another accountable. They had fixed times to come together to pray. I often wonder what it might look like for us to be a people of prayer.

Yes, the church of Acts struggled, had divisions, and split. Even in the midst of human imperfections, God continues to spread the good news to the ends of the earth. While we know the church is imperfect, we, too, as God’s people, need to continue trying to reach the goal. To Grow more Christ like, to devote ourselves more fully to God. We need to stop living out our individualistic faith and believe more fully in the power of God’s Spirit, which call us to be in community with each other.

We need to allow God to change the way we live, what we say, what we do, how we eat, and who we eat with and talk. We need to find ways to be invitational…what might this look like?

Recently, the Surgeon General of The United States of America issued an advisory called “Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation.” he notes, “The lack of social connection poses a significant risk for individual health and longevity.”

Church, the world is longing for connection and hope. Love and grace! The world, those outside our walls, needs us to be a people who Lovingly affirm, generously give, and compassionately serve as we strive to build a community of connection, love, and justice that is bound together by the Holy Spirit in Jesus Christ.

We have work to do! What does it look like for you to “adopt a youth,” encourage a parent, and love the multiple children in our building each week? What does it look like to intentionally reach out and form a connection? What does it look like to give of your time and talents for the betterment of others? What does it look like to serve as Jesus serves?

It begins with resistance. The act of gathering is an act of resistance. It’s time to resist the hated, the you are to different, the you are unloveable language of the world, to welcome, to embrace, to get to know by finding ways to gather with, in and through the community around us.

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.