Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Let’s Pray

This morning we are going to talk about the Wonder that was experienced in the early church community.

Our main idea this morning and what I hope we will leave with is - There is Life in Community.

It’s important that we recognize our need for community.

God through the bible calls us toward this time and time again.

But what is community?

We talk about it a lot in church and when we meet with people, we encourage you to join the community or find community.

But what is it?

We are probably familiar with this idea of community being defined as a group of people living in the same place or having a particular characteristic in common.

In a sense that is what community is people who are in the same place or have a shared interests coming together.

What we will find out today that community in the Christian sense is so much more.

I think as people we do want community.

We do want people to spend time with and to go through this life with.

I know for me, as a bit of a extrovert, I really love spending time with people.

And I’ve found throughout life that people gravitate toward some sort of community whether good or bad.

When I went back home after finishing university in 2009 I found myself leaving the community that I found in university, a group of Christian young adults that I had being doing life with for 3 years.

I went home to their not being a strong community of young adult believers and so I ended up gravitating toward a community that was made up of my work colleagues.

This community was focused on career and partying.

And so I found myself gravitating toward this group of people which wasn’t directing me toward things that would better my life.

But God is good and he began encouraging me through my friends from university and eventually directed me toward a group of young adults, who were not all from my church, but were meeting together, studying the bible, and growing together.

And this was the push that I needed to chose and be apart of a community that would give me life.

What’s incredible are the many stories of communities of Christians springing into action and bringing the love of Jesus into situations.

Let me share a story, a number of years ago at my church in Bermuda there was a guy in the Young Adults ministry group.

He was out kite surfing, during a windy day as you do in Bermuda.

(Story on community.)

There is life in community.

And with that we will continue looking at the book of Acts.

Please grab a bible from the seats and turn with me to verses 42-47.

It’s page 832 just at the top left of the page.

- 42 All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper*), and to prayer.

43 A deep sense of awe came over them all, and the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders.

44 And all the believers met together in one place and shared everything they had.

45 They sold their property and possessions and shared the money with those in need.

46 They worshiped together at the Temple each day, met in homes for the Lord’s Supper, and shared their meals with great joy and generosity*—47 all the while praising God and enjoying the goodwill of all the people.

And each day the Lord added to their fellowship those who were being saved.

Background

* 2:46 Or and sincere hearts.

We’re in the same story that we were in last week when we talked about the Wonder of the Holy Spirit and how it came to the believers in Jerusalem.

Acts is written by the Apostle Luke and he spends a bit of time writing about what the early church was and things that they were going through as the begin going out into the world sharing the gospel.

Tyndale House Publishers.

Holy Bible: New Living Translation.

Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2015.

Print.

We see here the believers had just experienced this supernatural event.

They had all come from different places and had gathered together as one.

Then the Spirit came and they were able to hear each other in their own language as they talked about all that God had did through them.

The bible tells us that many people were being added into the list of believers during this time.

The community was growing.

We are seeing life formed and nurtured into this community.

As we look at this thought this morning - there is life in Community - our passage begins to give us some ideas of what was going on in the midst of their community which help us as we look to see our community grow.

1.

They committed themselves to 4 things.

(Acts 2:42)

You see immediately that all the believers devoted themselves to four key things; teaching, fellowship, sharing meals and praying.

Teaching

We see the focus on teaching, specifically teaching from the apostles which would have been the preaching of the gospel.

The apostles were instructed by Jesus near the end of his ministry on earth, and we read in Matthew, to go into all the world and to share all that he had taught them; to share the gospel.

And so we see the early church meeting together and taking in this teaching.

They make sure that they were present and doing exactly what we are doing now.

They devoted themselves to do this.

It is so important for us to be regularly meeting together and talking through and learning about the bible and how we should live our lives.

I love what one commentary said, “They first of all devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching.

Meeting together in the temple courts appears to have been for the express purpose of hearing the apostolic preaching, though doubtless there were also opportunities for teaching in the home context.”

Understanding what was going on during this time, there was a thirst for learning more and more about Christ; about who he was and what he was about.

And it didn’t just stop during their times together in worship together but was brought back home.

Why should we do this?

The bible backs this up for us when it says in , “16 All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives.

It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right.

17 God uses it to prepare and equip his people to do every good work.”

The early church knew that in order for them to grow in their faith they needed to be in a place where they were receiving teaching about Jesus.

There seems to be an eagerness to do this together.

The bible is our source for knowing how God wants us to live.

They first of all devoted themselves (ēsan proskarterountes) to the apostles’ teaching.104

Meeting together in the temple courts (v.

46) appears to have been for the express purpose of hearing the apostolic preaching (cf.

3:11–26; 5:21), though doubtless there were also opportunities for teaching in the home context.

16 All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives.

It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right.

17 God uses it to prepare and equip his people to do every good work.”

104 proskarterountes normally means ‘to occupy oneself diligently with something’, ‘to pay persistent attention to’, ‘to hold fast to something’, or ‘continually to be in’ (it is used in the last sense in 2:46).

Cf.

W. Grundmann, TDNT 3:618.

Luke uses the same verb to describe the devotion of the 120 to prayer (1:14) and the resolve of the apostles to occupy themselves with prayer and the ministry of the word (6:4).

The periphrastic construction in 2:42 (with the imperfect indicative ēsan and the present participle proskarterountes) stresses the ongoing nature of this activity.

Johnson 1992, 58, translates ‘constant in their attention’.

The verb applies to the four nouns in the dative case that follow, though the Greek connectives put them in pairs: ‘to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to the prayers.’

I love talking and spending time with new Christians.

Very often they have an intense hunger for God’s word.

They just can’t get enough of it.

As we grow in the faith there are times where our desire and want to be in God’s word decreases.

I know there are times where I’m in that place.

And I know that I need to check my heart because I need fill my spiritual tank with truth from the bible.

And one of the best ways that I’ve learned to do this is in community.

Peterson, David G.

The Acts of the Apostles.

Grand Rapids, MI; Nottingham, England: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2009.

Print.

The Pillar New Testament Commentary.

We started a small group in Bermuda with a few friends a number of years ago.

And I was a really amazing time of growing together in our understanding of the bible.