The Foundation (Part B)

The Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.

Okay, I've commented on this time and time again. The Lord builds the church. Not by might, not by power, by my spirit. Jesus said in Matthew 16, 18, I will build my church. John 15, 5, He who abides in me and I in him will bear much fruit. Without me, you can do nothing. Psalm 127, verse 1. The Lord builds the house and those who labor, labor in vain. That is without the Lord doing it. It's natural to us to resist authority.

To all of us. Unless he's got a pistol on his side. It makes it a little harder, but anyway. Think about it. If the Walmart guy pulled you over, would you even pull over? If the security guard?

No, but if a guy with a pistol pulls you over, you stop. It kind of doesn't make sense. You'd think that would be the one I'd keep going from.

Okay, anyway. Fellowship is next. Well, they weren't separated by class. Koinonia is the Greek word. It's a word that's an idiom.

It's difficult, not for us, for the Greek. It's difficult to take this word and squeeze out of it its meanings. You have to illustrate it to get to it, but you just can't put it in the dictionary. If you put it in the dictionary, look up the word Koinonia and it should say, read the book of Acts. That would be a good way to define the word.

Of course, that doesn't happen. Our Koinonia runs deeper than mere friendship. The Lord doesn't say, I want you to go to this church because you'll like everybody there. John's first letter, chapter 1 verse 3, that you may have fellowship with us and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his son, Jesus Christ. That's fellowship. That means friendship, in spite of friendliness, because of God's presence. Fellowship includes serving together and pardoning one another. But you can't pardon somebody if you're emotionally driven in life. We do not pray, my emotions are my shepherd. I shall not pardon. The Lord is my shepherd and I shall not want.

He's going to take care of it. It is a two-edged sword. Fellowship involves association and disassociation.

Malachi, Malachi. You know, he went right at the priests who were corrupt. But anyway, he says, then you shall again discern between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve him. Discernment. And now comes the breaking of bread. We'll come back to fellowship also. I made some earlier comments on it.

Maybe there's so much to say. But the breaking of bread. This is different from the house-to-house eating meals breaking of bread that we read in verse 46. This is the communion table.

Context gives us this. Assembling with the Lord present, the one who died. That's the theme of this communion table that we know is the bread and the cup because of our sin. Christ doesn't let us forget it.

He says, I don't want you to lose sight of this. You are a sinner. You're saved by grace.

And I want to use you to save other sinners who are not yet saved by grace but can be. Christ instituted this meal when he took the bread, the loaf, and he broke it. And he handed out the pieces to his disciples in anticipation of his soon hours away of that, his arrest, his persecution, and his crucifixion. It says that they all drank from the same cup and partook of the same loaf. This is communion. They all drank.

They all partook. 1 Corinthians 10, 16, the cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? As Jesus said, shed for many.

Shed for you. It is a commemoration in the assembly. Now, I mentioned before, in Ezekiel's millennial temple, there will be no blood sacrifices because Christ has paid that price. There will be commemorative sacrifices. Well, that's what our communion table is. There's no blood sacrifice anymore.

Christ is not offered up again, once crucified. And we rejoice in that. We symbolize that. We commemorate it. We say to the world and to each other, this is a big deal and we're not going to forget it. Not enough to remember the Alamo.

I mean, think about it. In history, they wanted to remember the war crime that took place at the Alamo. And we're not forgetting, they would say. Well, how much more is ours concerning salvation? Acts 20, verse 7. Now, on the first day of the week, that is Sunday, when the disciples came together to break bread. That's why we gather, we follow this tradition of the apostles. Paul, ready to depart the next day, spoke to them and continued his message until midnight.

Now, it really doesn't have anything to do with my point, except I wish I could go until midnight. And I just, you know, I know it's hard. I know it. I go through this, every time I prepare a message, it's like, Lord, I just want to get the words down, you know, so that it's not long. And I just can't get it there. And I've come to believe he doesn't want it there. And so, it takes a little effort to sit and listen to someone else speaking about God's word. You parents know that. Haven't you been trying to teach your kids certain things and you know that they don't want to hear it?

You're just going on and on and on? Well, at least I got scripture. The Lord's Supper, celebrated as a meal initially. Initially, they did sit down and it was a meal, but because of abuses and then later persecution, but mainly because of the abuses, the New Testament church had to limit this to just the symbolism.

Because people were coming into the church, gorging themselves and getting drunk in the church. I'm amazed at the patience of the apostle Paul dealing with the Corinthians, but he did deal with them in patience as an example. To commune is to draw near. I'll give you some verses you can look it up. Exodus 3, 5, you know, Moses takes the sandals off your feet. Psalm 73, verse 8.

To not to commune is to be afar off. Ephesians 2, 17. Matthew 15, 8.

These people draw near me with their mouths and their heart is far from me. In vain they worship me. Man, what a heavy blow to ritualism. Your ritual means nothing.

It's your relationship that counts. And there, you know, in chapter 2, Paul's saying you're no longer strangers. Now you've been brought near to Christ. 1 Corinthians 11, 29. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the body of the Lord.

And that's where they were just abusing the table. Paul, don't you get it? It's the presence of Christ.

It's not just a time for you to just, you know, pig out. It's a solemn event. And if you have not reverence, you have a great liability flowing through your veins. Isaiah 12, 6. For great is the Holy One of Israel in your midst. That's what the ark, again what David was. It was God with them. The Shekinah, the presence of Christ. The Shekinah that followed the Jews or led the Jews in the wilderness, that was what we call a theophany, physical manifestation that God has chosen to use as an emblem of his presence. And when he shows up in human form before the virgin birth, we call it a Christophany.

Yahweh in human form. How many churchgoers would say that this verse, Acts 2 42, is to be a priority of every believer and every church? How many churches are even aware of Acts 2 42 that you shall continue steadfastly in the apostles doctrine, in fellowship, in communion, in prayer?

How many cherry pick from that? Well, we do the prayer, we do the communion, we have the fellowship, the doctrine we massage. We move it around. We don't just take it as it is. I don't know if they are understanding, if they think that the church must evolve doctrinally. The church does not evolve doctrinally. Behaviorally, the church can evolve. I mean there are certain things we can plan, we do it a little different like with the communion table. We can change little things, we have some space, but not with doctrine. Not with what we have been taught is a fact about God and a fact about man.

We can have a church service at 11 o'clock, we can have one at 9 o'clock, so we have that right. But we better be careful with all of them that we are not leaning on our own understanding, but seeking the Lord. We talked about, you know, pastor directed. That's what the shepherd does. He directs the sheep, where are we going next, boss? That's what the sheep were saying, I'm hungry.

Where are we going next? Are we going to that pasture over there? He leads me into green pastures. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside the still waters because I'm terrified of those whitewater rapids.

That's the idea. Verse 43, then fear came upon every soul and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. Fear came upon every soul. That's reverence versus irreverence. Someone who uses Christ's name in vain is demonstrating how irreverent they are. Someone who makes a mockery of the things that are solemn in scripture. That is irreverence.

I don't know. Do observers of the church today, when they look at us, is their reverence? Do they at least say, well, I don't believe that, but they do it right for what they believe? Or do they say they don't even follow their own beliefs?

These are critical things. Second Chronicles, the King Jehoshaphat, instituting change, we read this. He said to the priests and Levites, I want you to teach the word. So they taught in Judah and had the book of the law of Yahweh with them.

They went throughout all the cities of Judah and taught the people and the fear of Yahweh fell on all the kingdoms of the lands that were around Judah so that they did not make war against Jehoshaphat. That's attractive to me. I like some of that, Lord. I would like to be part of a church that had that. We'll find this respect in this manner continue in Acts 5-5, Acts 5-11, Acts 9-31, and Acts 19-17. Fear came upon them. It was that reverence, like these guys are in touch with God. And of course, there were those that were greatly irreverent that killed the Christians.

And of course, Stephen being the first. Today, the church is more in fear of losing attendees than continuing steadfastly. If they have to change what the apostles said to keep people attending, they will, many churches. I don't know why they don't just stop calling themselves churches, you know, Harry's Hangout or something, just anything. But stop calling yourself a church if you're going to depart from the doctrine. And many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. God established these men.

I don't know, I've got to speed this up a little. There's so much more I want to say. I mean, if you're looking for a church, on one hand, I feel sorry for you.

I wouldn't want to trade places. But on the other hand, it's a glorious opportunity to submit to God, to be led, to say, where do you want me? And wait for him. He'll tell you.

The light will turn on, that's it. And then the devil's coming. And you should be ready. You shouldn't be, well, I'm afraid he's going to get me. He will if you're not ready. It doesn't take much to be ready, I should add that.

What does it take mainly to be ready? To continue steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship and communion and prayer, right here in our own Bible. God did this, what he's doing to his disciples by these signs and wonders. He did it for Moses to Joshua. When Moses was going to heaven and Joshua was going to take the lead, God said, I'm going to strengthen Joshua in front of everybody.

Elijah and Elisha. After Elijah went up in the charioteer fight, he said, can I have a double portion of whatever it is you're having? And he said, if you see me go up, you get it.

And he got it. God will do this with the two witnesses and 144,000 and he does it with us. But the difference is with us. He doesn't have us roll up our jacket and strike water and it parts for us as it did with Elisha. What God does, he says, I'm going to have you stick to truth in the face of everything.

That is a miracle. Evidently, because there are those that don't. There are those that turn tail, you know what, I'm changing teams now. I'm going back to the world. We call them apostates.

It's their call. No one put a gun to their head and made them depart from Christ. Verse 44, now all who believe were together and had all things in common. The early church evidently experimented with this idea of a common purse.

We'll just contribute to this common purse. It was a high and a pure motive. It was a good thing that their hearts were looking in this direction. But it didn't work. And in fact, it was going to lead to the death of two people who were part of this and failed to follow through with it. It was not called for by God.

That doesn't make it a sin. They wanted to do something good and helpful and it did help some for a while. It also caused problems for the apostles. It was almost a detour to take them from studying the word of God and being in prayer to being involved in helps ministry, which is nothing wrong with the helps ministry, but that was not their calling. And the Spirit made that clear. And a lot of good came out of that. Philip, for Stephen, it came out of this event. But it does seem it was more of an emotional charged event.

It's not communism or socialism that's mandated. They were ready to help and people were contributing to this. It was one of the few possible flaws of the early church, relatively minor. And when you look at Acts chapter 4 verse 32, which revisits this, they were still doing it. They really don't do it too much after Sapphira and Ananias are struck dead.

And that's just the way it is. But what we read in verse 33, while the multitude is involved in this helps ministry, is a contrast between verse 32 and 33 of chapter 4 in Acts. In verse 33, it says that the apostles, it says, with great power the apostles gave witness to the resurrection of the Lord and great grace was upon them all. So it says, here's everyone helping, here are the apostles.

They're doing what they're supposed to do. They were sticking with the word. And things that took them from that word were to be shut down. And we'll get that in Acts chapter 6. Well, coming back to verse 44, this was voluntary, not compulsory. As I mentioned Acts chapter 5, Peter will say it right out to Ananias and Sapphira.

He says, while it remained, was it not your own? That was what they promised to give to the church. So they said, we're going to give all of this, we're going to sell our land and give it all to the church. Well, they sold their land, but they only gave some to the church. They lied. And they were struck dead for this. It was pretty heavy stuff.

We'll get to that in five, but we'll read this. Peter says, while it remained, was it not your own? And after it was sold, was it not in your own control?

You could have done with it whatever you want until you pledged it to God. Now it became a contract, a covenant. And they were going around bragging and boasting and they were dealt with severely. Anyway, this communal pot caused the first major problem when the Hellenistic Jews were not getting their portion. The Jerusalem Jews were getting in abundance, so was the charge.

And that was a big problem. You are free to give to a ministry that will take care of the needs of others for you. There's no sin in that. Or you're free to give it yourself. What you're not free to do is say you're going to give it and don't give it.

That's where it starts to get a little sticky. Well, anyway, verse 45, and sold their possessions and goods and divided them among all as anyone had need. And I've commented on that. The apostles were initially the ones that oversaw the money or the goods. But in time, not long after, they said, you know, we're not here for this.

Get somebody else who are faithful in the body. And that's what they did. You can't devalue service, being a servant in the church. The walls in the church.

You go to the kids' ministry. Who takes care of scuffs on the walls? They get a lot of them. Somebody is just like, you know, when I worked bridges, the painters were always painting a bridge. They go from one end to the other.

Take them about a year. Then they go back and do it again. And they just kept doing that.

It's the same here. Men's maintenance. If we have the workers, everything needs painting. The list always has got something to be painted. Service. And you come into the church, boy, this is nice and shiny, this place.

Like the Chicanas here. You know, somebody's working, doing it. Don't undervalue serving. Verse 46, so continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart. This was no fad. This was not like, hey, everybody's doing it.

I'm going to do it too. This was the outcome of their coming to Christ. Of seeing in their scripture that their Messiah had come and died for them with one accord. Because the leaders were united.

This was a big deal. You get to 1 Corinthians 3 and the people aren't united around them. You know, one, I like Apollos better than I like Peter. Another one, I like Paul. Paul said, did I die for you? In the temple, the Jewish temple is fading away. The New Testament church begins there but will depart, move away from there. Jesus said to the woman at the well, the hour is coming now is when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. For the Father is seeking such to worship Him. They will worship the Father not in any particular place.

I won't go to that verse, take more time. Anyway, this temple held fond memories for these men of Christ teaching there and ministering. And they were not in a hurry to leave. What's going to chase them out of there? Persecution.

Persecution will squeeze them out. I mentioned the meals. These were actual dinners and fellowship. Christians are still doing this.

You invite people to your homes, you go out together. The one thing I loved about the church in Manhattan, after every service, they were all single, almost everybody there. But you'd go to almost any number of the good restaurants or diners and there would be the church people. It would be all over the place. And it was one of the highlights of the week.

I so looked forward to that. And now when you have families though, you either invite people, you know, you don't take a whole family out to a restaurant as a rule, with another whole family regularly. You may do it from time to time.

The tip's going to be bigger. But anyway, we still do this. Simplicity of heart. A singleness of heart. The idea is they didn't complicate the faith. They left that for future authors to write many books that no one's going to ever read. Verse 47. We're at the last verse. I have to get to this. Praising God and having favor with all the people, the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.

I've commented on this time and time again. The Lord builds the church. Not by might, not by power, by my spirit. Jesus said, Matthew 16, 18, I will build my church. John 15, 5. He who abides in me and I in him will bear much fruit.

Without me you can do nothing. Psalm 127, verse 1. The Lord builds the house and those who labor, labor in vain. That is without the Lord doing it.

We are not a marketing agency. The church grows through nutrition, not addition. That's how we build the church.

Not by human government, power, or wit, or gimmicks. We just, the apostles doctrine. I think a lot of Christendom either doesn't know this verse exists, they don't understand it, or fearfully they don't believe it.

They believe they can do better. God is not going to entice people to a church. May you never hear me say to somebody who's searching for a church, well I hope you come back.

I hope you, you know, this is going to be a church. That is so far beyond me. That's God's work.

My work is to not mess it up. And I don't know why Christians don't get it. So here we are. Church is turning to tech firm to target new members. More than 30,000 churches have signed up with GLOO, G-L-O-O. I couldn't find what that was an acronym for.

I could make up some things. But it says a small tech firm that utilizes personal data and online activities to target individuals who may be interested in a church's message and potential membership. GLOO says it seeks to reshape the way that the church's ministries and people connect with each other, which has become increasingly relevant as churches look for ways to boost numbers following declining attendance that has been exacerbated during pandemic.

Anyway, the company explained in a recent Wall Street Journal report that it wants churches to be empowered with big data. I mean, am I the only one? I mean, is there anyone here that says, no, I don't see anything wrong with this? I mean, I'm not saying this is a sin, but who needs the Holy Spirit? Who needs Acts 2.42? Who needs to continue steadfastly? He continues, the goal is to target people in the same way that big brands like Amazon, Google, and Netflix use that data to target consumers with goods and services. We don't have goods.

We have services, and they are good. But, I mean, thank you, thank you. It's not in my notes. It's just the Spirit was upon me. I mean, is this what they perceive the church to be? Wisdom and fear came upon all of them because they couldn't get enough money from the church that they wanted.

They charge you for this. Could you imagine? I'm taking your tithe money, and I'm going to buy somebody who can get people to come in here because we can't do it. I don't know. I mean, younger, I would have been pounding the pulpit.

I'm older now, and I'm more mellow. And nothing scriptural in any of this, not even the grounds of scripture. One G. Campbell Morgan said about the church who does these things, she has turned to other lords and other masters and has adopted other methods than the methods of Christ himself. I'll close with this verse from Zephaniah chapter 3.

Of course, the lamentation for the state of Israel at that time. She has not obeyed his voice. She has not received correction. She has not trusted Yahweh. She has not drawn near to her God. It's communion.

You're drawn near to God, not marketing agencies in Christ's name. You've been listening to Cross Reference Radio, the daily radio ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel in Mechanicsville, Virginia. As we mentioned at the beginning of today's broadcast, today's teaching is available free of charge at our website. Simply visit crossreferenceradio.com. That's crossreferenceradio.com. We'd also like to encourage you to subscribe to the Cross Reference Radio podcast. Subscribing ensures that you stay current with all the latest teachings from Pastor Rick. You can subscribe at crossreferenceradio.com or simply search for Cross Reference Radio in your favorite podcast app. Tune in next time as Pastor Rick continues teaching through the book of Acts right here on Cross Reference Radio.