Text: Acts 4:32-35, 6:1-7
We aren’t quite to Easter yet, but I thought it might be a good idea to take a sneak peek into the future. The life of the early church, told by Luke in the book of Acts, has an awful lot of parallels with our experience right now! Everything was changing. The foundations were shifting underneath their feet. The old ways of doing things were tossed out. Something new was brewing.
You see, even in the midst of all of the uncertainty and fear and transformation they were experiencing, the disciples and the community of believers had tapped into the power of God. The Holy Spirit flowed among them. They were of one heart and one mind. They looked out for each other. They encouraged one another. They were grounded in their relationship with God. But they also never stopped sharing the good news of Jesus Christ with others in the world.
We’ve been reading through “Unbinding Your Heart” together as a church this Lent and today I want to take us back to chapter three. Martha Grace Reese invites us to think about these three interwoven sets of relationships that we have… relationships that we see clearly in this passage from Acts chapter 4. Our relationship with God. Our relationships between church members. And our relationships with people outside the church.
As she writes:
“God works powerfully through these three sets of relationships in healthy churches. These great churches, large and small, have a spider-web wholeness about them. Touch one area of the web, and ripples shimmer across its entire surface. As individual relationships with God grow, people are able to be more real with each other within the church. As relationships within the church get richer, members of the church somehow know how to be better friends at work, in the neighborhood, coaching Little League…” (p. 45)
That was exactly what was happening with the early Christian church. They were deeply connected with God, devoting themselves to learning from the disciples and their prayer and worship life. Every day they met together and praised God. And the scriptures say that there was no needy person among them! Because they relied upon God, they had no shame or guilt about their situations. They were real and honest about what was going on in their lives and when a difficulty or challenge arose, they shared it…. And the community stepped up in response. Everyone cared for everyone else.
But here is the thing. This wasn’t an isolated and insulated group. Luke tells us that they were out there in the world, demonstrating God’s goodness to everyone. In just four chapters of scripture, the family of believers goes from 120, to three thousand, to five thousand! Talk about exponential growth! Daily God was adding to the community. (2:47)
That makes sense, doesn’t it? After all, Reese writes that: “If faith and church have changed your life, you’ll want to share that discovery with your friends. You want everyone to know that Christ lives. You want everyone to know that God loves us extravagantly. You want everyone to know that God will overwhelm their souls with grace and wash away their sins. You want everyone to understand to the soles of their feet that there is no sin, no resentment, no bitterness, no wound, no fear, no illness, no loneliness that Christ cannot forgive, dissolve, heal, cure, fill…. Nothing is more beautiful than this good news.” (p. 51-52)
I’m challenged by those words, because I know that I have been less than enthusiastic about sharing this good news with others. Maybe it’s because I’ve heard “no” too many times. Maybe it’s because I’m too worried about what they might think.
But our book also reminds us that all of these areas are interconnected. So maybe my, our, hesitancy to step outside and share the good news with others also has something to do with those other relationships.
Maybe our relationship with God needs some work. If that’s the case, then maybe before we step out there and start telling people about the good news we need to let it sink into our heart a little deeper. We need to spend some time in prayer each morning. Or read scripture each day. Or join a bible study. Or more regularly participate in worship.
Maybe our relationship with God is just fine, but there is a conflict or a struggle or we aren’t feeling supported by our relationships within the church. This happens far more than we want to admit. We feel slighted by not being invited to lead or serve. We have an interaction that rubs us the wrong way. We have made a mistake and instead of turning to the community, we turn away.
Or maybe there is a huge thing happening in our lives… the death of a loved one or a job loss or a new baby or a child coming home from college… and instead of bringing all of the joys and struggles and stress and realness of our lives to one another, we hold it all inside.
Or maybe, the church got so busy taking care of other things that they literally started neglecting some of their own.
That’s the situation the disciples found ourselves in by chapter six of Luke’s account. The numbers within the community kept increasing, but with more people came more work. Like most churches… c’mon, let’s be honest!… people started to group together with people that were like them. Same age groups, same ethnic background, same party or perspective. And because of this, some of the community was slipping through the cracks.
It’s hard to feel excited and passionate about your church if you aren’t feeling cared for. It’s hard to get out there and share the good news if you have needs yourself that are unmet. And it’s hard to learn how to step out of your comfort zone and talk with your neighbors when you haven’t even done so with the members of your own faith community.
A few weeks ago, Jerad Fischer shared with our church that deep relationships grow when you have something in common. And how awesome is it to discover that what you have in common with someone is God!
So the disciples looked out at the community and realized they needed to be more intentional about how they cared for one another. They needed to help the church build new relationships within the community itself that cut across all of those old lines of cliques and comfort zones and familiarity. They called some leaders to step up and reach out to care for one another.
Friends, I think that’s the kind of situation we find ourselves in today. In a world that is so uncertain and unknown, it’s time for us to be more intentional about our relationships, too. It’s time for us to go deeper in prayer and worship and time with our God. And it’s time for us to really reach out and care for one another as a community of faith.
This week, we are sending out assignments for our caring connections groups. Every member of our faith community has been grouped together with others. Some of these are people you might know, and others are new relationships that you haven’t built yet. But in each group, we’ve got families and elders, retired folks and working parents, children and youth.
And just like the apostles called upon the members of that early faith community to reach out and serve one another, that is your task as well. When you get your caring connection assignment, your job is to reach out to those members of your faith community. Send them a card. Call them up on the phone and ask how they are doing. Find out if they have access to our worship on Sundays. See who might need groceries. Draw pictures and mail them. Look out for one another.
As much as the world feels like it is upside down right now, I have to tell you that I am excited. I’m excited about the opportunity to let the distractions fall away. I’m excited about the time we get to spend with God in a new way. I’m excited about building these new relationships that are going to strengthen our church for the long haul. I’m excited about discovering new ways of “being church.”
And I believe… I know… I have faith… that as we deepen our relationship with God and we solidify our relationships with one another, all of that love and energy and grace is going to spill over into the world and it will impact the relationships we have with every other person we meet.
Thanks be to God. Amen.