Godly Fruit from a healthy tree. Acts 2:42-47

Introduction

Good morning church and thank you for being here for worship with us as we join together in our time in the word I’ll ask you to turn in your Bibles to Acts, 2, starting in verse 42.

Last week we spoke about the amazing revival owned, operated, and orchastrated by the falling of the Holy Spirit. That rain brought spiritual growth among those that heard the gospel, resulting in 3000 people accepting Christ as their savior and repenting of their own sin. Btw, I’ve been told that because often the counts of people in the Bible only took into account men of a certain age that such numbers would likely not have counted the women or children who would have been saved. That is interesting to think about but we can’t be certain. Suffice it to say, the final number of the church went from 120 to likely well over 3000 in one day. What an amazing event to have seen. I hear stories like this and immediately think what it must have been like to just be a fly on the wall and see it happen.

Tension

but, can I give you a little insider trading lesson here from me to you? For pastors we often look for the fruit after the decision before we make a call. The way I always put it to couples in counseling before the big day is this,

“What we do in here matters because its easy to get married. Anyone can do that, some people do it multiple times. What is really hard is to stay married because it requires you to give up yourself every day for this person. Halls, caterers, cakes, and dresses seem important but they will all disappear from the radar in one day and then when the smoke had cleared, its just him and her and marriage. So lets make sure your marriage doesn’t just survive, but that it can thrive.”

In that same way I pastors have seen countless people through the years give their lives to Jesus, be baptized, repent of their sins, join churches, and commit to living for him only to see those same people disappear, relapse, dive right back into behaviors they told everyone in their lives they were done with, and even on occasions try to break the church apart on their way out the door. We all feel the preasure of knowing that we are not the umpires to people’s spiritual decisions. We can advise, we can pray and guide but we cannot really know the inner workings of any persons heart truly. What tells the story is the fruit that grows on the outside of that person’s life. An apple tree that grows oranges is not an apple tree and a repentant, regenerative, redeemed follower of Christ will have spiritual fruit that grows on them to show the change as well.

So, as we talk about the aftermath of Pentecost, today I want us to look at the fruit that came about in the people and what we can learn about them and ourselves today because of it.

Truth

Acts 2:42–47 ESV

42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. 43 And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. 44 And all who believed were together and had all things in common. 45 And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. 46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

Prayer

Exposition

So starting off, doesn’t this sound like the kind of church that if you were visiting you’d want to join immediately? I mean the Holy Spirit dropped a bomb of conviction and truth on the people and they coudn’t ignore the need for a savior anymore. All signs and wonders found their purpose and meaning in Jesus and all roads lead to Him being the Christ. Everyone was cut to their core and they genuinely and completely gave Him their all. 3000 people’s eternal destiny changed overnight and now the change is working its way out in obience. Change wasn’t just something they experienced on Tuesday, but the change was affecting the rest of the days and how they chose to live them.

Acts 2:42–47 ESV

42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

“Proskarterountes” is the word here for “persisting or continuing in” and endevour. I bring this up only because it is used in almost the same context all over the new testament, especially in Acts, Romans, and Colossians. And each time it is used to discuss God’s people persisting, continuing in, devoting themselves to, being steadfast in specifically knowing and studying and adhering to Godly teaching. They first fruit that God grew on these new and budding believers was a devotion to His word and it quickly became a hallmark of His church.

Secondly, we also see them devoting themselves to fellowship which is defined furter as the breaking bread and prayer. One thing noticably missing from the passage is the word “and” after fellowship. They didn’t devote themselves to “fellowship and to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” No, they devoted themselves to fellowship, coma, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” This indicates that these activities of prayer and breaking of bread essentially act as a sort of defintion of what fellowship entails. They are not seen as two activities but one and the same food and prayer which entail Christian fellowship. I know what you’re all thinking. We have verifiable evidence now that the first Church was a Baptist one complete with prayer service and potlucks. Gathering in prayer with food is a holy endevour here in scripture and serves as another fruit of God’s work in their lives.

Acts 2:42–47 ESV

43 And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles.

I used to tell all my students as a youth pastor that I hated how the word “awesome” had been so broken by their generation. Similarly to how this generation uses the word “literally” to describe everything but something that is literally something else. Awesome would be used to decribe a movie, a burrito, their grandma, Jesus, and the nap they had 20 minutes ago. Awesome means to be awestruck or dumbfounded by how glorious something is. Its not a burrito. In the midst of all they’d seen, heard, learned, and experienced themselves, the awe of what God had been doing through the centuries of history of his people, how he’d orchestrated the coming of the Christ, how Jesus had lived perfectly and died for them, and how they had been saved from their sins for all time was “awesome” and they couldn’t shake it off.

To top this off, the same type of miracles they’d just experienced by the apostles teaching them the gospel in their own languages were being displayed in an ongoing manner. The apostles were still doing things that had as their only explanation the working of The Holy Spirit. Many signs and wonders and miraculous happenings were becoming the norm of this time because God was moving. And as a result more awe was being laid down in their hearts and minds.

Acts 2:42–47 ESV

44 And all who believed were together and had all things in common. 45 And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need.

Verses 44 and 45 go together in a way that I can only describe as beautiful. Due to all the devotion these people, complete strangers in so many other ways. Where they lived, how they got there, what family there were born into, what nation they were dispersed into, what kind of money they had, all of those things disolved in an instant when they saw Christ clearly. The way I describe it so easily to myself is how I used to think about video games. They were the forbidden fruit in my home because we had one tv, an ancient old zenith that weighed 200 lbs. And if you were on the tv playing video games you were taking up the screen from the parents, a capital offence of a crime. One saturday I was at home unsupervised and I plugged it in a played for a couple hours of pure bliss. I knew that I’d have time to do my chores with plenty of time before my parents got home and it had only been a couple hours anyway. I looked up to see my parents looking at me which was strange because they had gotten home like 6 hours early, or so I thought. I had played for 8 hours straight losing all track of time. I was super grounded which was a new term they made up for the occasion.

You know the funny part is that all of the kids kind of get what I mean by that but can I tell you kids something that your parents know and want to teach you about video games. They super don’t matter at all. Like at all. They are just fun but there are other things that are fun and actually produce real benefits in your life. In college I played a game so much because I loved it. In between classes, weekends, way too late most nights. Then one of my friends told me you could type “/played” into the chat box and they would tell you how many human hours of your life you’d played that one character. As I looked down I noticed I’d played that one character over 300 hours this semester. 12 and a half days of my literal life had been spent just playing that one character and I had 5 others. I knew something at that moment. I had to scale back the amount of time I gave to worthless activities, and I needed to spend more time on things that actually mattered.

These men and women had seen the light here. What they had been doing and wrapping their entire lives around previously had shifted in importance because they had been hit with something of eternal significance and importance. It demanded real attention. It doesn’t matter if the table is set perfectly for the dinner service on the titanic. Some things change the importance of others.

Jesus’ good news had triumphed over all other tidbits of their lives and was now all encompassingly important in all of their lives. They’d found real meaning and purpose and it redefined how they had relationships with people, especially fellow followers.

Verse 45 makes it clear how far this went. Among the 3000 were the haves and the have nots. Those with land and holdings and money and those who were destitute. When confronted of the needs of these 3000 followers, the Holy Spirit moved in their hearts to sell their possessions to make a way for those that needed help. The cool thing about this was that it was Holy Spirit lead and accomplished and I will tell you, when you see it happen its an awesome thing.

I was around 17 at the time in Owensville, where I grew up. I was meeting Tom, my youth pastor for lunch that day and he called me to tell me to meet him at Steve Baer’s house that day instead. I drove over there to see both Tom and Steve stooped over the open hood of a minivan I knew didn’t belong to either of them. Tom came over to me gave me a high five and said “tag me out I’m picking up the kids.” He drove away and now I was Steve’s helper.

What’s going on Steve, well we were replacing a battery that was dead but that didn’t do it, so now are are replacing an alternator, and Tom is off to the tire shop to get a quote on the tires after he picks up the kids. That seems like alot of work to be doing all at once on 4pm after school in the rain, who is this for.

Steve explained that when Tom was dropping off the kids at school the rain had been pouring down that morning and he saw a young woman on the side of the road looking under the hood but even in the chaos of the rain he could see that she was weeping. He pulled over and asked her to get in and get out of the rain and talk with him. She explained that the van died that morning and she was on her way to get the kids to daycare and to get to work before she got fired. She was out of points because the kids had been sick so much. She couln’t loose another job. Tom in a split second said I’m dropping the kids off at school and I’ll be back in 3 minutes. Get your kids ready and we will get you taken care of. He returned back and got her 3 kiddos and all their car seats moved over. Drove her across town to the babysitter, then rushed to the otherside of town to get her to work. Mind you this woman has never seen Tom a day in her life. She was just desperate. And the cherry on Top. Tom asked her as he dropped her off, “Hey, I know you don’t know me at all but I’m tom and here is my cell phone number. If you’ll trust me with your keys I can try and look at the van and see what I can do. I can’t promise anything other than we will get it off the road and try to get it brought to a shop if you need.” She started crying. “I don’t have money for repairs but thank you anyway.” Tom interjected, “Well just the same, I’d like to look at it and maybe its nothing. Could just be a loose wire or something crazy like that.” She threw him the keys through the rain and said “well, things can’t get worse so what can it hurt.”

Tom called a tow truck and had it towed to steve’s house and the two had been working on it all day while I was at school. I asked Steve, “If she doens’t have any money how’d you get all the parts.” Steve ignored me and asked me for a 1/2 inch socket from under the car. He was soaked to the bone and had most likely been that way all day. By the time Tom got back, steve had it running like a top. We went over to the tire shop and I realized now what was happening. Steve had put $100 into not just a new battery but the best battery at O’Reilys. He had replaced the alternator and got it running. But Steve worked at the tire shop and he also paid for 4 brand new tires to be put on it. While he was taking the old barely hanging on by a thread tires off another one of the employees was replacing the two front breaks which were down to the studs. Tom threw me the keys to his van and told me to follow him. I drove him down to her work in the pouring rain and saw him get out and run to his van. Steve had put over $600 into parts and tires for a woman he never met, Tom filled the back of her van with groceries and diapers for the babies, and he left an envelope with a note and her keys in the drivers seat with $250 in it, which just so happened to be the exact amount he’d gotten paid to do a funeral that week.

It took me months to pull it out of both him and Steve about what exactly I’d been apart of and neither men would tell me what they did but I got them to tell me what the other guy did. Steve helped because Tom called and he felt God lay this woman on his heart. Tom had gotten paid too much in his own words for doing a funeral that he would have done gladly for free. The family laughed at him when he tried to return the money and told him he’d find a use for it.

That afternoon, in all the rain always stuck with me, cemented there later by Steve’s comments on the situation when I asked him why he did this. “Juston, sometimes God cracks the door and your obedience would be to follow him through it. As it opens you find out the situation was worse that you thought and alot more is required than you first bargained for. So does that mean it was a mistake to go through the doorway or does it mean now that you know further what being obedient needs to look like? Helping people gets messy because you get their mess on you. But buddy, “he said as he placed his hand on my shoulder, looking into my eyes”, get messy anyway and give him the glory alone. Also if you tell anybody anything I’ll break you kneecaps.” Well steve, if you can find me you can hurt me.

I’ve been apart of many times when I got to see and hear how the right money came from the right place at just the right time and I can’t help but feel that same thing here. God pressed people’s hearts and needs were taken care of and God was glorified, not only in the lives of the giver, or of the receivers but look at vs 46.

Acts 2:42–47 ESV

46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

this was a movement of God in His people and their cups ran over into the community who weren’t yet believers. They saw this movement in the people and the change in how they loved and treated each other and it made waves in their hearts as well. Have you ever been at a potluck so good with such great people that revival broke out? I mean think about this. People devoted themselves to hearing, learning, and doing what the Word of God said. Those same people living in obedience to the word and fellowship around it, in prayer and eating meals together as a family. This caused wealthy beleivers to pay for the needs of those who didn’t have the means to care for themselves. They did this by sacrificing their own property because God made them feel like they should. And the outpouring of this kind of love impacted the community making them want to be apart of it.

Landing

Friends, i want to close today with two observations for us. 1. This is the spirit led natural out-flowing of a man or woman who has met with Jesus. This is the fruit. And if you are a changed person because of the grace and mercy God has poured out upon you, this kind of love and grace should be visabile. We all lose our way and lose focus. We struggle to see the important things for what they are and get disctracted. If that is you, I’ll ask you to pray the words of King David, “restore to me the joy of your salvation.” Number 2, a community of people transformed in this way is infectious to the community. Our world is dry and barren for love and community and when they see the genuine article it is greater than any billboard an advertisement for a transformed heart.

For a church to be these kinds of people means they’ve been changed by God to value what is eternal over those things that are only temperary. Becoming students of and adherants of the word will cause this change of heart to become a change of everything. And for the heart that has been so throuroughly saved, so completely transformed, the ripples will eventually become too attractive to ignore. The community will see and will want to know, “what makes them so different? I want what they have.”