Miracles and Mission

Miracles and Mission: Acts 5. 12-20
This is yet another summary passage with the same themes: unity, power, mission. But it is different: although Luke has actually mentioned the Church (at last! Verse 11) this time the focus is not so much on the inner life of the community: it is, rather, on the outward flow from the community in mission: its impact on society, in the power of the Spirit.  This wee summary is much more about Miracles and Mission, because the Chruch was experiencing a season of heightened awareness of the power of God.

1. Miracle and  mission go together . v. 12... Miracles:  The NIV is wrong to say “They healed”.  What the Greek says is more like "Many signs and wonders were done by “the hands of the Apostles.”  Teh passive verb ("wre done") is ofetnt in teh Bible a way of pointing to God without mentining his name.  That suggests the Apostles were the waiters, their hands used to bring healing  but that the source of the healing was beyond them, in God!  This was God at work in Jesus' Name. It was done “among the people (i.e. of the city not just the Church!) and they (Luke means the “believers”) were all not just physically together, but “of one passion” in Solomon's porch.  The emphasis isn't on the Apostles: it is on the fact of a community who “were of one passion”, where God was at work and people got healed, and saved.

They were among the people (v 12); they were highly regarded by the people (v. 13b)   and many believed both men and women -- so gender prejudice is being broken down. (v 14)  Miracles enable mission.  And that in turn releases more miracles:  (v 15)   This is “healing on the Streets”!  People started dragging their ill and disabled relatives out onto the streets so Peter's shadow would fall on them! Luke doesn't suggest that Peter or anyone else encouraged folks to do that.  It just happened. That's how big the rumour grew, about the miracles God was doing through his Church!  And this ministry touched all classes of people. The rich had wooden beds – or couches; the poor had mats.

And as a result, (v 16)  crowds from outside Jerusalem began to gather.  God is using the miraculous to push out the boundaries.  The Church's Commission was to go to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth.  Here God is giving a little push, and Luke, careful historian that he is, doesn't fail to notice that here is an early hint of the Good news impacting “Judea”.  Miracles enable mission.  And that in turn releases more miracles – which results in a mission advance.  Men and women; rich and poor, Jerusalem and Judea.

So Miracle and  mission go together . The supernatural is always missionary. Mission is always supernatural. It is always about the intervention of God.  All mission involves the visible intervention of God in the world.  Miraculous demonstration is a vital part of mission.  Healing prepares the way for and confirms the preaching of the word, as do love and holiness, and the  miracles of healthy community life. 

2. The Church is a Miracle Mission community. When I started preparing for this, I thought we might have a break from talking about “Church” this week to talk about “Miracles and Mission” instead: but it seems that God's word won't let us do that.  Talk about Miracles, and you're talking about an activity of the Spirit through his people.  Talk about mission, and you're talking about an activity of the Spirit in his people. Luke is now clearly talking about Church (v11) and has already emphasised the unity thing. But there are other important truths about the Church here.

v. 13f nobody else (of the rest i.e. unbelievers) dared join (i.e. stick themselves to, or keep company with) them. This was not a group swollen by hangers-on.  Nobody dared be a “hanger-on”.  For a start, there was God to consider. Look what happened to Ananias and Sapphira!  This wasn't definitely the sort of group of people with some sort of shared beliefs, that you could “experiment” with.  God was present in this group. But there were people who were on teh journey to faith and who thoguth highly of the disciples.

There will be some folks who “don't dare join.”  For some people, their journey is taking time.  They are watching, listening; they hold Christians in high regard.  But in terms of “joining” - well they are not there yet.  That is nothing new.  We need to work lovingly, patiently, faithfully, consistently with those who are not sure about trusting Jesus.

But more and more believed and were added.  These didn't “join”; they “were placed”.  (Passive verb again!) God did it.  People believed in the Lord, and found themselves in a new relationship with him and with his people.  If you have a living faith, you are committed to Jesus, and you just know that this is “home” spiritually, then I would suggest that God has already “added” you and I would encourage you to respond to that – to agree with God – by entering into the formal commitment to one another that we call “church membership”.   Mission does result in the Miracle of the Church being built. 

So the Church is a Miracle Mission community. Talk about Church, and you're talking about the results of miracle and mission, the Spirit making this new community.  : the Church is the agent and result of mission.  The church carries the seed of mission.  The church is the fruit of mission.  So as the Church did “church stuff” (Mission!) the Church grew. 

3. Miracles and Mission and our world....  v. 17-20   Miracles did not mean a problem-free life!  Far from it!   In the midst of this “revival” time, when there is so much power at work, so much effective mission. and real growth, the high priest and other Sadducees were filled with jealousy.  The Apostles (all of them this time!) were thrown in prison.  But this time, they didn't even spend a night in the cells because an angel of the Lord opened the doors of the jail and brought them out.  Miracles, the power of the Spirit, are not given to shield the Community from the kind of problems we might encounter in mission.  Rather, they are there for us when we are going through the challenges. Talk about miracles and seasons of revival, and an awful lot of silliness can emerge. Power isn't about prosperity, privilege, prestige, or becoming the perfect Church. It's about mission: effective mission in a hostile environment.

So, finally, it seems revival is seasonal.  God is always with us. The Church is always supernatural, But it appears that there are seasons of greater manifestation even in the New Testament, and this was such a time.  Like the farmers, we need all the seasons for healthy and fruitful living.  In a hostile world, we need seasons of revival to come.   And if we want a season of outpouring, we will only get it as we do what the early Church did: this season was a direct answer to the prayers in 4. 30“Stretch out your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus”

© Gilmour Lilly August  2013

Acts 4v32-5v11 Making it, faking it.

Acts 4v32-5v11  Making it, faking it.

Making it
Luke moves his history of the emerging church along with a short description of the life they shared together.  Making it, forming this community, is the work of the Holy Spirit.   We finished last week by stating that this “amazing shared life” was one of the “visible demonstrations of God's transforming power.” It was part of the answer to the prayer for God to stretch out his hand. The Spirit is bringing this into being. 

Of one mind. Luke has still held back from using the word “Church” (Ekklesia),  he is still talking about “believers” (cf. 2. 44) – only now they are a crowd, too many to be “in one place”, but still they are of one mind.    Making it happen starts inside.  It starts with our values. I've seen plenty of Churches say big, exciting things about their life together.  But it's not about rhetoric; it's about the inner life.  It's about being “one in heart and soul ”  (Literal translation).  That means we are not just a bunch of people who are interested in Christianity; we are a real community, a family (aiming to be a healthy one not a dysfunctional one!). That's quite a work of the Spirit, and one we need to co-operate with as we allow the Word and Spirit to infiltrate and shape our values, our emotional responses, our inner drives.

They shared everything they had.   It's about our attitude to possessions, but also about our attitude to one another and to ourselves, and to Jesus.  I remember hearing Jim Graham comment about the way the early Church,”had everything in common”.  He said there are two wrong attitudes.  One is to say “What's mine's my own.”  The other is to say “What's yours is mine!”  Rather, Jim suggested, we need to be able to say “What's mine is His!”  The ability to hold on to material things loosely, using them to bless one another, and being prepared to hand things over, is a litmus test of our relationship with Jesus.  It is one of the evidences that we have reached a point where “What’s mine is His!”  Being the Church, living as the Church, as a real community, is part of the outworking of Discipleship. 

Great Power, Great Grace  They knwe an anointing to proclaim the Gospel – presumably with signs following; and (literally) “great grace was upon them all, for there was not a needy person among them”.  Nobody was stuck. Nobody went without. This is one of these points when I want to say again that Grace is a wee bit more than “God's riches at Christ’s expense.”  It's more like “God's Redeeming Action in Christian Experience”.  It's not quite so neat but it's better theology.  The word “Grace” (Charis) is a big word that's about the  gifting, joy-bringing, releasing, pleasing, thanks-inspiring action of God. The supreme example of that was the cross of Jesus. for helpless sinners; but it's the same word that Paul uses when he is talking about spiritual gifts, about anointing to preach the Gospel, and in other ways.   

Grace at work.  “Grace” works out, for the first believers, in this practical life. “There wasn’t a need person among them...”  because they were prepared to use their resources for the common good.  People realised capital and made it available to church leaders – not for the private jet or the luxury home, or even for the smoked-glass fronted sanctuary – but for the poor.  Now the sharing of goods in Acts 2 wasn't a once-off, across the board event that left everyone in the same financial circumstances.  People responded “from  time to time”.  The words “owned, brought and put” are continuous actions. You could translate it “They were bringing the money and putting it at the Apostles' feet.”  It was an ongoing thing not something that happened all at once. They did it as they were led to by the Holy Spirit.  This worked out differently for different believers in Jerusalem: not everyone stripped away all they owned all at once.  These inner attitudes have to turn outwards, in practical discipleship.  Don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them. (Rom  12. 9 NLT)   We can't claim to love people and remain indifferent to their needs.  We can't claim we love people and exploit them.   Grace is always practical. But it will be practical in different ways in different times in the lives of different people.  

Summary.  The Spirit “makes” community life that is radical in its attitude to material things (because of radical obedience to Jesus.) and experiences the power of the Spirit, and meets real needs.

Faking it
In the Jerusalem Church, Ananias and Sapphira  watched; they were impressed.  They wanted to fit in.  They wanted a part of the action.  They wanted to make an impression too. Maybe someone in their house-group had asked an awkward question about how much they had in the bank.  So they sold a piece of property, which they were entitled to do.  And they came to the Apostles with their offering. They wanted the Apostles  to think that the money they presented was every penny they got from selling the land.  They wanted their friends who may have known how much money they got for the property, to think they  had given it all to church.   It was a big lie.  They were challenged about it. Not only Ananias, but Sapphira died on the spot. 

So what is the big deal?  Howard Marshall describes this episode as “one of the most difficult” in the book of Acts. When I mentioned at house-group on Wednesday that this was the next passage to deal with, someone said they felt sorry for  Ananias and Sapphira.  As Peter said, before they sold their land it was “theirs”.  When they sold it the money was “theirs”.  Nobody was making any objection to that.  Nobody was coercing them into anything different.

Why did God react in such forceful and final way? 

The problem begins in the fact that they was their property as “Theirs”. That made them fundamentally different to the rest of the community: the others didn’t' think what what they owned was their own.  But although they were different form the rest of the community,  they wanted to look like they were the same as all the rest.  They wanted everyone  to think “Ananias and Sapphira are keen believers who don't view the resources they have as their own.”   It would have been OK to be different.  It would have been OK to say “That field was mine; and this money is mine, and I'm giving part of it for the poor; and the rest, is remaining mine!” That would have been OK.  What wasn’t'  OK was to pretend, to act the part.  Do you know what the Greek word for an actor is?  It's "hypocrites." If you or I are acting a part, were a hypocrite.

By playing the part, they showed that they were different from the rest in another way.  Peter says, they weren't just lying to men but to God. The Holy Spirit is the one who “created the community and maintained it in being.” He is in the Apostles.  And he is God.  And there Ananias and Sapphira were, lying to the Holy Spirit and testing the Holy Spirit obviously trying to see how much they could get away with.  The rest of the fellowship was marked by “Great power and great grace” … they were swimming in this amazing move of God, and Ananias and Sapphira had already reckoned the Holy Spirit out of the equation, viewing the the community and its leaders as just a bunch of religious people, daring the Spirit to reveal the truth about them to the others.  Was God really there with them? Did God really care about how they behaved and thought? Would God notice? Maybe he wasn't as close as they all claimed he was? 

There are too many Christians who “Fake it” in terms of what they putting in and why.  They fake it about giving money or time, or about their motives.  They “Fake it” about how much they read the Bible and pray.  There are too many Christians  who “Fake it” about what they are actually receiving or experiencing from God: they copy gifts, they do what looks or sounds “spiritual”.   When the Spirit is making it happen, there will always be someone faking it. That's part of life. 

It's OK to fail.  It's OK not to be super-dedicated to the Lord.  Now don't get me wrong.  It's better if we are 100% committed to Jesus. and love him with all we are.    I want us to be 100% committed.  But I also want us to be 100% real.  Too much of Word and Spirit Christianity is built on putting people on a guilt trip and manipulating them.  So, part of commitment is honesty. 

I want us to be a generous, giving, bible-reading, praying, worshipping, healing, spirit-filled Church.  But above all I want us to be a real community.

© Gilmour Lilly August  2013