The Bigger Body

INTRODUCTION

We are back in our series Great Grace, all about the life and activity of the church, this community of God made alive by the Spirit and empowered to live and love and learn together as we go mission with Jesus. Last week, Jeff took us through a passage in Acts chapter 11, with this group of believers in Antioch who were the first in history to be called “Christians.” This simple little group started a church, as Jeff said, without a committee, without a set of bylaws, without a budget or a building, and without a big name pastor to lead them. They just met together and preached the gospel to anyone who would hear it. And people heard and believed and were saved, and news traveled all the way down to Jersualem, where Paul and Barnabas came and confirmed that the Spirit was working and this was a sincere movement of God.

Simplicity. Clarity. The Gospel is preached and the Spirit activates, and Jesus’s church thrives. Jeff used a curious phrase to describe the church in Antioch, do you remember it? He called them, “faithful nobodies.” I like that term. I’m not saying they’re nobody as in there’s nothing special or worthwhile about them; there absolutely is. But hear me out: we’ve been in this series going on three months now, and if you’ve been with us for any period of time, you may have noticed that we have spent very little time on the story of some of the more well-known disciples of Jesus. Peter, John, the Apostles, Paul. This series isn’t really about these celebrity hero Christians. It’s the story of the others, the rest of the cast, the nameless brothers and sisters who, day in and day out, gather together to share in the truth and love of Jesus.

Now, I have absolutely nothing against the work of the Peters and Pauls. God does incredible work through them, their speeches and miracles are inspirational and teach us powerful truths. But there is a tendency within the church—because there is a tendency within humans—to elevate heroes of faith, to make charismatic and gifted individuals the ultimate goal and pursuit, and to lay all of the mission of God at the feet of a few well-regarded pastors and teachers. When we do this, we make the goal of the church about the search for that incredible, spectacular encounter, that word of innovation and authority, and we condition the members of the church to depend so deeply on the testimony of the leader that we end up losing sight of the everyday moments, and, perhaps most egregiously, the work of the Spirit.

Unfortunately, our tendency to put the future of the church on the shoulders of celebrity pastors and authors and musicians has lead to a deformed church body. When I was ten, I hurt my left knee playing sports and had to have surgery to repair it. And because it was sore and weak, I favored it. I put more stress on my right leg and limped everywhere, for years. And my left knee didn’t get stronger; instead, I hurt it again a few years later. And I had hip pain. And my right leg started to hurt. And my legs were two completely different size—bulging muscles on one side, pretty stick-like on the other. The emphasis on celebrity church leaders has caused a similar favoring, and similar deformities. And what we find further is that, when those celebrity Christians buckle under the weight of pressure to be perfect, the whole body falls, churches implode and shut down, and the testimony of Jesus and his church is damaged.

So for the purpose of this series, I’m not interested in the Peters and the Pauls. Instead, I’m looking for those everyday moments in Acts that show the beautiful community at work. Because ultimately, the mission of God will not be progressed because of a few spectacular, charismatic individuals. It will go forward because of small, simple, powerful acts of trust, of dependency, of hospitality, of service, as each and every member of God’s church does their part.

With that, let’s take a look at one of those simple moments from some faithful nobodies, and pray that God might use all of us faithful nobodies in this room to bring a glimpse his glorious kingdom to our town.

PRAY

BE THE BIGGER BODY

Acts 11:27–30 CSB

In those days some prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch. One of them, named Agabus, stood up and predicted by the Spirit that there would be a severe famine throughout the Roman world. This took place during the reign of Claudius. Each of the disciples, according to his ability, determined to send relief to the brothers and sisters who lived in Judea. They did this, sending it to the elders by means of Barnabas and Saul.

This isn’t a long passage, and we don’t need to spend a terribly long time on it. But I feel it’s important for us to pause on a contemplate together as a community.

Here’s what’s going on: the Antioch church has been growing and studying and loving together for the better part of a year. They’ve been taken wholly under the wing of the central church, under the leadership of the Apostles, and counseled and trained by Barnabas and Saul. At one point, these prophets come up and join the church. And one of them, Agabus (whose Hebrew name means “grasshopper”) stands up and predicts a huge famine that will spread throughout the Roman world. The Jewish historian Josephus actually records this famine taking place in AD 47; this isn’t just a tale of fiction that Luke tells here, but a historical marker. Luke name drops Claudius here just to remind readers that, yeah, he’s telling the truth (if you want to impress your friends, Bible nerds call this “historic verisimilitude”).

The church hears this prophecy and decides, yep, this is legit. No false prophets here. In fact, there’s no mention of paying out money, no exchange of goods for a nice prophecy. Someone simply is moved by the Spirit to stand and speak a difficult truth. And this church, who has been trained and taught to understand the scriptures and validate prophetic words, responds simply, graciously, and beautifully to the call for help.

I have just a few observations I’d like to share today based the powerful response of the Antioch church, because I want us to be a church that responds just like this. It’s not the grand gestures, the monumental changes, that define a church body. It’s the simple acts of loving the least, the hurting, the broken, the needy. If we truly want to call ourselves the body of Christ, then our ultimate activity ought to be in line with the very life of Jesus.

BE READY

First observation: the church was ready. They heard there was going to be a great famine, that people would be suffering and starving, and they just gave. They sent relief to their spiritual brothers and sisters.

Grace is meant to shared, not hoarded. Be ready to give when the need comes. There are all kinds of reasons to justify our hoarding of grace. Think of how the church could have responded:

Well, how much do we know about this “Agabus,” anyway? A prophet? Sounds suspicious to me.

We can’t give beyond our benevolence fund! That would take away from our building campaign!

Okay, there’s a famine throughout all Rome, you say? That includes us! We’d better take care of our needs. I’m sure Jerusalem will be fine. That’s where the church was founded, after all! We’re just a little toe in the whole body of Christ.

When the opportunity comes to be generous with the grace we are given, one of the biggest hurdles to that generosity is our excuses. And they are all rooted in different things that help us justify our stinginess:

Cynicism: we struggle to believe the sincerity of others, while never doubting our own.

Priorities: we order the direction of our grace toward what we think will give us the greatest return on our investment.

False Humility: we think we are less than we are, so we don’t have to do what we are infinitely able to.

And yet, the small, outbound church in Antioch did not waste their chance. Agabus was clearly a man of God; Luke says it was by the Spirit that he foretold of famine. The church knew the Spirit, because they were Spirit-filled people! They could discern the difference. But I don’t want to get too stuck in the weeds on that. The need was clear. The opportunity to give was real. The real question was not that; the real question was: would they be ready when the time came? And because this was a church that was marked by the grace of God, as Barnabas saw in Acts 11:23, they were ready. Barnabas in fact encourages them to remain true with devoted hearts, and that word devoted means according to plan, purposeful. It was the purpose of the church to embody the grace of God and be ready to act when called upon. Their hearts were ordered in such a way that they could receive the Spirit’s prompting, discern it, and act upon it.

I want us to be a church that is ready. There are real needs in our world today. Real pain encountered by brothers and sisters in our town and our region and our nation and beyond. Real threats of persecution and hardship. Real stories of poverty and hunger and loss. And so as a church, I would like to see our value system expand to include this sort of readiness. That means living within our means as an organization to free up the finances of our members to give generously when the opportunity arises. It means making a flexible budget that allows for the Spirit of God to move us and nudge us toward the needs of others. And let me tell you, as small as we are right now, that’s not easy. I recently took a part-time job in order to ease the load of my salary on the church so that we can scale down enough to serve others well. It’s a challenge for me and my family, it’s a lot of adjustment not being able to be here as often as I want to be, but you know what? Our church isn’t hurting because of it. The rest of our elder team has stepped up and taught and led well. You, the members of our church, our multiplying ministry. And that is why I continue to be excited and hopeful about our church community. Because I believe that, ultimately, the most impactful moments in any church’s history happen when ministry is multiplied and grace spreads beyond the four walls.

Have you ever read a church history account before? It’s weird. It has nothing to do with the church at all. It has to do with when they established, when they incorporated, who pastored it and when, and what building improvements they made. In fact, that’s our church’s recorded history, sadly. I read it when I first came on. I can tell you when we bought the different properties around the campus. I can tell you when we renovated the sanctuary. I can tell you when Harold Johnson led the church (1936-1961), when Lyndell Kuns led the church (1961-1991), when John Rolland led the church (1992-2016), and when Jacob Parodi led the church (2017-Present). But I don’t know anything about the church. I don’t know how the church responded to felt needs. I don’t know how the church truly discipled others to follow Jesus. I don’t know how the church loved one another through difficult seasons or generously served one another in faithful kindness. Because churches don’t record that sort of stuff. It doesn’t make the history books. Stuff like what happened in Antioch is not the story of our church.

But it should be. It should be littered with it. It should be overrun by moments of grace and kindness and selfless humility. I say we start a new record. I say the next chapter of our history book should be marked not by the moments we hoarded our grace, but by the moments we shared it. When the Spirit of God moved and his people responded. To do that, we need to be ready.

BE WILLING

First, the church in Antioch was ready and willing to give when the time came. But they were also aware that the body of Christ was more than just them and willing to serve beyond their local level. Think about this for a second. Look at the map. This is a church full of Gentiles—Gentile being the word ethnos, meaning nations, ethnic people groups apart from the Jews. This is one of the very first non-Jewish churches of its kind. It would be akin to a church in Brazil or Chile or Mexico, started by one of our missionary teams in South America. They are small, they don’t have the sort of cultural influence in their area like the apostles do, there’s no infrastructure in place to sustain them. And yet it seems this works to their advantage, because it makes them keenly aware of where they came from and who their real brothers and sisters are. And so they give, almost in reverse, to their church-planting family. It’s like when your parents raise you and take care of you, but then sneak into conversation that someday you’ll be returning the favor when they get older? Maybe it’s not totally like that, but it’s close.

Now, could Antioch have heard the news of famine and turned inward on their own needs? Sure, and we would have totally justified them for that. But Like doesn’t record that story. He records a story of a community turned outward. There’s a need to help hurting people? Let’s meet it. They are in Judea and Jerusalem? Doesn’t matter where; let’s help!

I want us to be aware. Church, I know we have immediate needs inside this body, and we should, by all means, look to those. But there are other churches in Cottonwood, other brothers and sisters in Shasta County. We are part of a greater network of Churches (VCN). Beth and I are actually headed out tomorrow to visit with several church leaders from within our network to hear how they are doing. I hope to hear stories of how we, as a tiny church on the very north end (we are almost at the furthest northern point of our network—kind of like Antioch!) can graciously help our our brothers and sisters in need.

You know, often being “Baptist,” as it says on the sign out there, means we take pride in our autonomy, meaning we are not ruled by elders or leaders outside of our local church. That’s fine, but autonomy doesn’t need to mean ignorance. It doesn’t need to mean selfishness. Sometimes our freedom from other churches becomes a blinder to their needs and hurts. But let’s change the narrative. Let’s not make our local autonomy a freedom from other churches. Let’s make it a freedom for other churches. To voluntarily move toward other brothers and sisters by the power of the Spirit and by the grace of God. To do so, we need to open our eyes, and become aware of the whole body, not just our part. Little toes are important. They offer balance. Stubbing your little toe hurts everywhere. We can have a major influence on the greater body of Christ. So don’t forget who you are connected to.

BE ABLE

And that actually leads me to the last point. The church knew the body they were are part of, but they also did not underestimate what they were capable of. They knew they were able to help. Look what Luke says:

Acts 11:29 CSB

Each of the disciples, according to his ability, determined to send relief to the brothers and sisters who lived in Judea.

Look at the freedom here. There was no expected amount, no pressure to meet a certain level of charity; they all, each, gave as God had given them the ability to give.

This sets the standard actually for giving in the New Testament. Paul writes nothing of tithing; but it’s interesting that when he writes to the church in Corinth, he instructs them to set aside an offering in keeping with how they are prospering, so that Paul can take it when he visits and bring it to the community in Jerusalem.

The takeaway is clear: as you are able, give. You do not need to take out a second mortgage on your house, you don’t need to open a new line of credit, you don’t need to sell all of your kids toys to support the church (but you have my permission to use that threat, parents, if it helps). But each of you have received grace from God, different degrees, different measures, not to revel in your own prosperity, but to give more generously. Know your limits, but know them enough not to fear giving, but to know how much God is leading you to give.

A word of caution here. The church in Antioch does not replace their usual financial support of their local church with these unscheduled opportunities. They give above and beyond these. Radical one-time gifts are not a replacement for faithful commitment to your local body. Doing so implies God’s only interested in your gifts when they have real significant, spectacular impacts. Here’s my encouragement to you, and I believe this is biblical. Financially give to your local church community; determine how God has gifted you to reasonably share your grace with your church. And as a church, we will do everything we can to scale our needs so that you, as an individual, can be freed up and able to serve the greater body as the Spirit leads. If you are only giving to the local church, and you have nothing left over for when the opportunity comes, consider revising that budget. If you are only giving to the opportunity and not to the local church, rethink that approach. If you are not giving at all, ask yourself why? Remember the markers of radical generosity: Surrender, Unity, Trust. Have I surrendered everything to Jesus? Do I learn and love with my community? Do I trust my leaders? If one of those things are off, it will inhibit your ability to be radically generous with your resources.

CONCLUSION

Be ready. Be willing. Be able. How this plays out in our church is up to you. Our breakout groups today are specifically tied to how, as a church, we can apply this sort of giving. But I want to end just by encouraging you today to be a faithful nobody that is empowered by the grace of God, and prepared to act, so that when the Spirit moves, you move. When the opportunity comes, you are ready, willing, and able. And we, in our little toe spot on the map of God’s church, can serve and love far beyond what anybody could expect or imagine.