WHAT COMES FIRST? OUTCOME or PROCESS

 

 April 16, 2024

Acts 2:42

42 They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. 43 Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. 44 All the believers were together and had everything in common. 45 They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. 46 Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, 47 praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

WHAT COMES FIRST? 

OUTCOME or PROCESS

I Believe that many of us have had a complicated history with Acts 2:42-47. I know some Pastors who avoid preaching on this text, one colleague said to me “I did my best to avoid preaching it. The passage felt like a perfect, unrealistic, and fictional experience.” Others have said that the notion in verses 45-46 of communal ownership, and selling properties to help where there was need, “just doesn’t preach well” in our modern world. Yet, I read and listen to other Pastors who declare "If only we could just be like the Church in Acts 2."

When you read our Bible reading today, what was your first reaction? Maybe you agree with one of the views I mentioned above.

I noticed something in wrestling with this passage that helped me gain a “fuller” understanding of this text.

For these early followers of Jesus, community was not the goal, it was the outcome. These ordinary people lived as witnesses and, as we mentioned yesterday, they lived their lives with the expectation that God would move through them. They were faithful, “they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer,” (vs. 42) and God looked after the outcomes. The outcome of their faithfulness was community, they looked around, and boom! They had a lot of company in those very same faithful pursuits.

I wonder, if the goal had been to build the kind of community Acts 2 describes if they would have been disappointed. I wonder if they would have missed out on witnessing the power of the resurrection at work.

My thought is that the kind of community we long for is the result of a process where we witness the resurrection of Jesus. We experience the same power which raised Christ Jesus from the dead. According to the Apostle Paul in Romans 8, that resurrection power is alive within us. See, when we experience that power and discover other people experiencing that power, God creates a united community.

So, the early disciples believed that this same power that raised Jesus from the dead was alive in them. They witnessed the resurrection. They watched Jesus ascend to heaven. They received the Holy Spirit. Resurrection power dwelt with in them. They experienced the miraculous work of God’s Spirit around them daily. People responded by trusting in Jesus and thousands were baptized. Their process was, being faithful, and learning (together) what it meant to live in light of the resurrection every day. From this process, a tight-knit, unified, together community emerges. Seems like some really good preaching material, doesn’t it?

I have lived most of my life, maybe you can relate, wanting the outcome without the process. We forget we only get a resurrection community when we live as resurrection people together.

The early disciples weren’t sitting at the tomb, expecting the resurrection of Jesus. They were grieving their crucified and dead teacher. God raised Jesus from the dead when they were hopeless. If they can be surprised by hope there, I wonder what God can do in our hearts.

"God, I believe You're at work in the world.
You're bringing resurrection in me and around me.
My eyes are open - I want to see You." Amen