A Light in the Darkness

  …praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. Acts 2:47 ESV             It is God’s Church, He builds it. He gives it favor with men, and sustains it against those who don’t favor it. It is the Lord who does all these things. He adds, and subtracts. No one else, but God accomplishes the work, we are used by Him as a skilled craftsman uses tools in his projects. Therefore, God alone is worthy of all praise wherever and whenever the Church prevails.             It follows then that the most dangerous threat to any Christian endeavor is pride. Pride in whatever form it may exist comes against God to remove Him from the place of primacy. Pride denies the power of God, substituting in its place the feeble powers of man.   Pride reduces us while trying vainly to elevate us. Pride causes ...

  And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, Acts 2:46 ESV             Give your attention to the phrase, “day by day.” This indicates each and every day. The community of the earliest church gathered not just consistently, but constantly. Why? Hadn’t these people other places to go, and other people to see? Didn’t they need to work? It seems to us they hadn’t, that they lived in some fairytale time without jobs and outside obligations. But the text of scripture suggests no such thing. The text of scripture suggests something else entirely.             The truth appears that these saints of yore did indeed have something we now lack, but it wasn’t more time, or easier lives, or any such thing as we like to think. What they had was an appreciation of God and a hunger for the t...

  And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. Acts 2:44-45 ESV             Much is made of the community here presented. Many attempts are made to recreate such a community. What must be understood is that community was not created through human machinations. It did not result from the application of any human idea. It was not created through mere human cooperation, or agreement. What occurred there in Jerusalem, and is recorded here for us to see, was the direct result of revival: that is the special manifestation and powerful working of the Spirit to glorify the Son to the glory of the Father. It follows gospel proclamation, and personal gospel transformation. It follows logically, and supernaturally, naturally from the newly created nature. As individual hearts are made captive to the will o...