Acts 2:42-47 Devoted

We are going to be in Acts chapter two today.

And trusting the Lord, I want you to choose to believe this morning that as we study, maybe rather than say choose, I want you to risk to believe that what we're reading in Acts and we're studying in Acts is true.

If you're a guest with us, my name's Joey.

I'm honored to be the pastor here.

If you've been riding with us for a minute, you know we finished up Luke and we are in the book of Acts, and we've been taking it slow.

We're marinating, right?

The world is into microwaving, but God's into marinating.

So we're taking our time.

This is a slow cook, right?

And uh we enjoy it like that.

So we're gonna be in Acts chapter 2, verse 42 is where we're gonna start.

Acts 2:42

I'm gonna do my very best to get through all the texts we have today, but I'm not sure that I'm gonna be able to.

And uh what I love about you is that you're okay with that.

So, verse 42, you ready for this?

All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, to fellowship, and to sharing in meals, including the Lord's Supper and to prayer.

I want to stop real quick.

We know what has just happened.

Earlier in Acts chapter 2, there's 120 people.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

They're gathered together, they're waiting on the promise of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit comes.

There's tongues of fire, flames of fire on their head.

There's a mighty wind sound, there's a new language spoken.

And then Peter preaches an incredible message.

3,000 people receive Jesus that day and are baptized, added to the church that day.

The church grows from 120 to 3,120 in one day.

It's incredible, right?

And so these are the people that are gathering together in the church.

And so sometimes people get stressed out with the term like a megachurch.

I'm not really stressed out by that because I see day one on the church, it grows exponentially.

So let's not be a people that points fingers and say, well, I don't like how that looks or how that operates.

Because we see that when God's moving, big things can happen, right?

But we also see the faithfulness of the 120 to pray till the Holy Spirit came.

So whether it's a small group or a big group, we remain faithful, yeah?

So I love that about you is that we are a faithful people and we're going to contend for what God has for us.

So we are in verse 42.

That's what's happened.

And now after that, the we get a slowdown picture of what the new church, like the um, how can we say the unadulterated version, a clear picture of the church.

All the believers, check this out, devoted themselves.

Devoted themselves.

Devoted, uh, if we're going to really get into the depth of that word, uh, it really means to persist and, to attend continually, to remain steadfastly committed.

Uh, Luke actually uses this word back in chapter 1 and verse 14 of Acts when he talks about the uh the apostles as they're together.

It says they all met together and were constantly united in prayer.

This is this word is the opposite of um occasional.

This word is the opposite of intermittently, right?

You ever heard of intermittent fasting?

There's a time in the day where you don't eat, and then there's a time where you do eat, right?

Uh well, these people weren't intermittent in their things relating to God.

They are fully committed to relationship with Jesus and with one another.

And it's consistent.

And it's it's it's it's the habit they form, it's habitual.

They couldn't get enough of it, right?

And so one of the things that I want to recognize is I want to recognize and praise God, you as you're in this place today, you could be anywhere, and yet you chose to come into the presence of God.

You chose to come together with other believers, and then praise God for that faithfulness.

Because I believe when we gather together in community, there is a blessing of God that we don't necessarily see when we're isolated and alone.

Not that God can't bless you in an alone time, He for sure can.

But there's something special that happens in the house when we gather together because we know that the church is the people, not the building.

Yeah?

And so as we're the church, we gather together as the bride of Christ.

And listen, the bride of Christ is not an amputee, so we come together in unity, right?

And I want to just say this because we as Westerners, we are very much idea of like individualistic mindset.

Like, how can I create the best life for me?

The Jewish reader, the Jewish people in that context is very much communal, it's group, it's together.

Yeah.

So this word is the opposite of occasional.

Now, I'm gonna just say really quickly, uh, there is no guilt trips for those who are in Christ Jesus.

But there is correction.

And if occasional probably designates you a little bit more than um devoted in your walk with the Lord and in your walk with the family of the Lord, then praise God, it's an opportunity for correction.

You're not less than, you're not worse than, you're not, listen, we all need Jesus, but I love that he will correct those whom he loves.

And so if occasional looks more like your lifestyle than devoted right now, then it's a time to flip the script and say, okay, God, I see what your word says, and I see how your church functions.

There's a devotion of the believers.

They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching.

The apostles' teaching is what?

They did not have the New Testament.

We're on the same page.

At this point, all the letters of the New Testament hadn't been written.

The books of the New Testament had not been written.

What did they have?

They've got Old Testament.

Some of y'all don't like it in the Old Testament at all.

I have heard it.

You're like, I can't pronounce the names, I don't know what's going on, right?

Like they're talking about foreskins.

We don't like that.

We're like, there's all kinds of stuff happening in the Old Testament that I don't get.

There's an ark.

What happened to all the people?

Like, did the ever did the world drown?

Like everybody's like, what is going on in the Old Testament?

The Old Testament is incredibly beautiful.

If you will spend the time and take the effort to get into it.

But if you just take it at a glance, you're like, what is up?

There's a bald guy one time that's being threatened, and he calls down bears, and the and the people threaten him to get eaten.

What's that about?

And you're like, is this some kind of like, is this still applying for today?

Does Joey have that propensity, right?

Like, what's going on?

But they had the Old Testament.

And the beauty of the Old Testament is it all points to Jesus.

So why would they abandon it?

No, no, no.

It's rich.

Peter's first message when 3,000 people get saved, he couldn't go to Galatians because Galatians hadn't been written yet.

He couldn't read Romans, Romans hadn't been written.

He reads Joel, right?

He gets into Joel, he gets into Psalms, like he's he's going to Old Testament, and people are like, oh my gosh, Jesus is the one that it was all talked about.

The Holy Spirit is what was prophesied in Joel.

And these people come and they're fired up about it.

Now, it says this, we see this in Matthew 28, 19, when Jesus is giving the Great Commission.

He says, Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit.

You are, if you're a Jesus follower, you are part of the Great Commission.

Right?

So here's what you, your options are this, as a Jesus follower, somebody whose life, we talk about submitted, whose life is submitted, you can either be obedient or disobedient.

We don't get a third, there's not a third option.

So therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, the Holy Spirit.

He's talking in this moment to the disciples who become the apostles.

Verse 20 says in Matthew 28, verse 20 of Matthew 28, says, Teach these new disciples, those who come to Jesus, like the 3,000 that get saved that one day on the day of Pentecost, teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you.

Matthew 28:20

And be sure of this, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

It says, verse 20, teach these new disciples to obey all the commands.

So when they are, the believers are devoted to, uh they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, they're showing up on the regular, consistently.

It's priority.

It's not if nothing else is going on.

They're showing up and they're hearing from the apostles what Jesus taught the apostles.

And the apostles are being faithful to teach all that Jesus taught them so that everybody could have what?

Not a life coach.

But that they could be obedient to what Jesus said and taught.

Right?

And so when I'm in here, when I'm preaching to you, I am not trying to be your life coach, though I pray that you're encouraged.

I'm trying to give you opportunity to see areas where you can be obedient in your life.

Devotion is an area of be of obedience, right?

So they're devoted to the apostles' teaching, right?

Now, the apostles, listen, um they are teaching, and there's also the anointing of the Holy Spirit upon them as they teach.

And there's people that are gathered together from all over the place.

Because remember how it starts in Acts chapter 2.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

All these people from all different locations are there for Pentecost.

They're there for a festival.

And so it's not just people from Jerusalem there, it's people from all over the place.

So you got outsiders that are that are back home, right?

Everybody that's living in different areas, they've shown up.

And they are staying put and they are learning and they are growing.

So check this out.

Read this one more time.

You're gonna get sick of this by the end of the day.

But but I'm praying this being your heart all week long.

All the believers, all the believers devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching.

Check this out, and to fellowship.

Stop.

So I remember uh the word used here is a word called koinanea.

And back in the 90s, there's like a time, like 90s, early 2000s, where Greek words were the jam.

Like all these churches started being named like Greek words.

And um, and there's nothing wrong with that because one of the languages originally written in the Bible is Greek.

But I remember um I would go to a conference and they would have what was called koinonia time.

And you would go and get like a coffee and a donut and chill and talk to one another.

Now, listen, I like coffee and I like a donut, but that's a disservice to koinanea to say, listen, like we're just gonna go have coffee and a donut, and that's that's our fellowship.

We reduce fellowship to like brief meals, brief interactions, brief encounters, and sometimes it's built around food.

Most often in the church is built around food.

If you're having a fire koinanea time, it's a potluck, right?

You're like, woo, all the stuff's here.

We're gonna have great koinanea today.

And that's it's such a disservice to what koinonia is.

This word is so much richer and more layered than grabbing a coffee and a donut.

Koinanea is the context.

In this context, especially, the Holy Spirit formed community with Jesus as the center.

It's a Holy Spirit formed community with Jesus at the center.

Koinonia is not a Christian social club.

I just need that to sit for a second.

Koin and E is not a Christian social club where it's like, hey, we are the better thans because we say Jesus is our God, and so we look down on people who say Jesus is not their God, and like, no, no, no, no.

Koin and E is not some social club.

It is the Holy Spirit forming a family.

Check this out, in which Jesus is Lord to the degree that he outranks social status, he outranks ethnicity, he outranks culture, he outranks education level, he outranks age, he outranks gender, he outranks self.

That's what koinanea is.

To Jesus, you you outrank all of these things.

Check this out.

If I if I could put it like this, Koinonia is, stay on their computer, don't fall, don't fall, don't fall.

Woo! That was close.

All right.

We were gonna have a koinonia moment and getting Pastor Joey a new computer then.

Koinonia, Jesus is at the center, and everything I do now is in orbit around Jesus.

And and and I don't I don't have anything about like who else can be in orbit with me.

So we're in orbit together around Jesus.

Listen, I want to say this to you.

In Koinonia, racism cannot exist in koinanea.

Sexism cannot exist in koinanea.

Yeah?

I cannot be so filled with Joey.

Self-reliance cannot exist in koinanea.

Isolation cannot exist in koinanea.

Jesus is at the center.

We orbit around him, and he is the primary of all that we do, and everything we do together focuses on him.

Koina is not human-made goodwill.

That's a disservice.

Koinanea is the Holy Spirit bringing divided people into one family.

I gotta move this forward again.

Because I gotta get closer to you on this one.

Koinanea is the Holy Spirit bringing together a united family.

And so it's mad confusing to the world when the church fights.

Doesn't mean we can't have disagreements.

Can I tell you something?

It is crazy confusing to a world when the Bible says you will know them by their love.

And what they're known for is their hatred, their bitterness, their cattiness, their backstabbing, their lying, their vanity.

It's so confusing.

You look at the day of Pentecost and you look in Acts 2 and the church's birth and Koin and Nea, boom, is on the scene.

And do you know what happens?

They devote themselves to the apostles' teaching and to this fellowship where listen, there is now no societal like you can belong, but you can't belong.

Or you can come and join in, but you can't come and join in.

Or you've made enough money so you can be a part of the group.

Or you is none of that.

You don't have the skin color I have.

So it's none of that.

Everything is like God is saying, This is the body that I want my bride to look like.

And it's a unified body and it's a joined body.

There's one where there's love that's existing in it, yeah.

They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, to fellowship, and to sharing in meals, including the Lord's Supper.

That's highlightable.

All of these have been.

To sharing meals, including the Lord's Supper.

Now, uh, you're like, cool, I like to eat.

I like to hang out with people.

I like that too.

But if we leave it at that, we've done what?

We've done a disservice.

There would be culturally an understanding that when you eat together, oftentimes there would be maybe a person in the group that could be the most important.

And so that person might get the biggest portion or greater honor or sit at the better seat of the table.

And so nobody wanted to feel uncomfortable.

So people would only eat with other people that was their level so that they wouldn't feel uncomfortable.

But you've got 3,120 people that are following Jesus.

They're from different places, different backgrounds.

And now what are they doing?

They're eating together.

So what does that mean?

I receive this person who I'm eating with.

I identify with this person who I'm eating with.

We share a relationship of peace and mutual obligation to Jesus.

To eat with someone could communicate acceptance more strongly than a private conversation.

If somebody sees you at a table with somebody else and you're breaking bread with them, you are declaring to those that see you, this person is fully a part of my life.

Again, there's a tearing down of that which would divide.

Can you see what Jesus is doing when the Holy Spirit comes?

It is bringing together a strong body, not a dismembered body.

But the enemy wants to come in and dismember the body of Christ.

Listen, I listen, I've heard about churches that have split because of color carpet, right?

The carpet of the color.

We can't decide.

So there's a church split.

People dying and going to hell and stress about carpet color.

It's crazy to me.

And this is what you this is when you know you've become self-focused and you're not orbiting around Jesus anymore, is when we let issues divide us rather than saying, God, what do you want to do to bring us together?

Because it's your kingdom come, your will be done.

This new Jesus worshiping community had meals that declared who Jesus is.

When we receive communion, we're not, we talked about this a while back.

It's not a symbolic moment.

It is a declaration, you're preaching when you receive communion that Jesus died for me and he rose again.

And his blood was poured out for me and pays a price for my sin.

When we have communion Sunday and you come up and receive, I need you to know this that you are preaching a message with your life and it happens at a table.

Yeah?

It's not just some kind of neat moment.

So what do I, so what's one of the things we should do?

We should come and we should check our hands and make sure they're clean before we come to the Lord's table.

We need to examine our hearts.

God, is there anything in me that you want to deal with and you want to handle right now before I go up to get to your table?

Because everybody's welcome at the table.

And we all need to understand the grace and the love and the healing of God.

And all are welcome to come to the table.

But I want to say, Jesus, followers, you better make sure when you come, you do it with the right heart.

You say, Lord, check my hands, check my heart.

If I need to forgive somebody, I'm going to choose to forgive.

If I need to ask for forgiveness, I'm going to ask for forgiveness.

Yeah?

Because we're declaring the price that He paid when we receive and break bread together that is communion.

Y'all rolling with me this morning?

This is good stuff.

I'm so proud of you.

They committed themselves to the apostles' teaching, to fellowship, coin and ea, to sharing together in meals, and to prayer.

Woo! And to prayer.

You can get a good group when there's food.

And there's prayer time, it's like a little harder.

A little, it's more difficult.

There's a guy named Jim Cimbala.

He writes a book called Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire.

Anybody ever heard of the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir?

He's the pastor of that church.

And he was praying.

He's like, God, how do we reach our community?

How do we reach our city?

How do we how do we do this?

And the Lord spoke to him and said, Jim, if you'll make prayer a priority and not stop making it a priority, I'll move.

Do you want to know something's incredible?

They have a line waiting to get into their prayer services.

You don't know what else is incredible about that?

They have a wait list to be able to serve in the church.

Because everybody wants to serve, and there's no more spots to give out.

So you gotta wait to be able to be an usher.

You gotta wait to be able to clean the toilet.

You gotta wait to be able to serve a child.

You gotta wait to be able to teach a class.

You right?

Everybody's like, why?

Because there's prayer in that.

And so I believe this there's a blessing when we can pray and it's spontaneous, right?

Like anybody like old Western movies?

I man, my grandfather, my Paw Paw, I would walk in.

I don't know how gun smoke was on every single time I showed up at his house.

There was not DVR then, there was like three channels, yet gun smoke was always on.

That or bonanza.

And I loved a gunfight, and people just, you know, shooting from the hip.

And sometimes prayer is spontaneous, you're shooting from the hip.

But I also see that when you study this word, it's not always only talking about spontaneous prayer, which there was, but the word that's used implies appointed prayers.

Like what we just had this morning that we joined in together with.

It's like a man, isn't that powerful when there's unity and more than just one person prays a prayer, but we come together as a church and we we have a declarative prayer.

That's a powerful thing.

And sometimes you're like, man, I don't know how I feel about tradition.

I want to tell you something about tradition.

There's something I'm learning about it, that there is a lot more freedom in it than it is boundaries and barriers and chains, if there's the right heart behind it.

And the heart is not let me have a form and a function that I control, but let me have a desire that we can be in unity in this direction, declaring who Jesus is, and there's power and authority in that moment.

You with me on that?

So listen, there's gonna be times, just heads up.

Well, there's going to be some times where we boom, we're shooting from the hip and there's spontaneous prayer, but there's going to be times where we pray together the same prayer.

And for a while, that's been foreign to our body, but praise God, He's growing us all the time.

Right?

So Hope City's not going to look the same next year as it does this year.

And it doesn't mean that we suck right now.

It doesn't mean that we're terrible people right now.

It means we love Jesus and we're growing and we're developing.

And you know what that means for you?

There's freedom that you don't have to be perfect right now because you're growing and developing.

And what it means for us as a koinonia is that we don't have to look at somebody else and say, man, they're so much better at life than I am.

No.

They're growing and developing, and I'm growing and developing.

Yeah?

I can look at somebody that's part of the koinanea, that's part of the fellowship, and I don't have to be begrudging of their gift because we're together, and so their gift is my gift.

Right?

Listen, I was scrolling Facebook this week, and our sister Cheyenne's making this huge mural in Covington, fighting the rain and doing your thing.

It's looking great.

I can look at that and say, oh, God, why didn't you give me that gift?

I mean, I draw a stick person and it looks like they got scoliosis, right?

Like I struggle.

I struggle.

I make a smiley face and it's cross-eyed.

I want to draw good.

And then you see that, you're like, man, what an incredible gift.

I wish I had that gift.

Right?

I don't, I just like, I don't have that.

But wait a minute, but I do have that gift because we're according to me, we're in fellowship.

Yeah.

I see Sheila, this woman, would invite Olive Roanoke into her house.

Two days before Thanksgiving.

And and I'm like, I don't have that gift.

No, that gift, skip me.

Yeah, I know.

I know.

Well, I know the collard greens there are good, because that's, you know, yeah.

And so uh I at least know that much.

But I look like, man, what an incredible gift of hospitality.

Praise God, I've got that gift.

A gift of faith.

Sometimes I've seen people in the body of Christ.

I'm like, how do you have faith for that?

I wish I had that gift.

I've got that gift because I've got them.

I don't have to be begrudging.

I don't have to be like divisive because I don't have certain things.

We can have a church down the street, have 45 baptisms on a Sunday where we have two.

And we can celebrate them because it's kingdom.

There's 47 baptisms in the kingdom.

Why would I say try to find something to pick them apart?

Some of us are in opposition of God because we're coming against his children, because we're not having enough identity as who we are in him to live functionally.

And so we have to pick apart other people so that we can feel better about ourselves.

That is a dysfunctional body.

That is not the way, Quintania, that's not the way the body of Christ is intended to work.

You with me on that?

I'm so proud of how into this you guys are today.

Prayer in our lifetime can be a private practice and it should be.

Prayer should be a spiritual discipline.

But it also has been created so that it can be corporate, that it can be together.

It's not an either or, it's a both and.

I push back at people sometimes and say, well, I can have, I can have church in a tree stand, I can have church on a fishing boat, I can have, right?

Like you can have encounters with God in those moments, but the church is the gathering together of the saints.

We are we are the church.

You can have, you can have great moments, you can have personal pride, you should have you should have a prayer spot in your house.

Here's what I encourage you.

This doesn't have anything to do with the message.

If there's some things you're praying over in your life right now, check this out.

There's a trail that I like to walk.

I don't even know if we consider it a trail because it's paved.

I like to walk the green way in my life.

My wife likes to jog it.

We'll start walking together.

I'm like, girl, just go.

You've got this.

And she just always the wind at her back, it seems.

She's just going.

I'm getting like where this one.

And she'll be, she'll make it all the way to the end, the whole end of the trail, and turn back around.

I'm like, hey, girl.

And then I'll just turn around and start walking back.

And she just started doing is I've started assigning your names to places on that trail.

So as I walk, I walk by you and God, I just thank you for Adam and Julia and Atlas today.

Your hand be on them.

Right?

Just assign your names.

Like, what if the things you're praying for in life, if you just started assigning locations on your drive to work, that your drive could be a prayer service?

You have trouble memorizing scripture?

Man, assign scriptures to locations.

I'm gonna assign the first part of this verse to my driveway.

That as I'm pulling out, I'm reciting the first part of the verse.

I'm assigning the next part of the verse to my first turn off of my street, right?

Get creative with it.

God gave you a brain, use it.

It's awesome.

When you get insights in that, you get some life hacks like that, but there should be personal, private time in prayer, but we gotta remember there's corporate, powerful times together.

Let's not be afraid of them.

Let's not be afraid of quiet.

Can I tell you something?

When you I've been in churches that are seeking the heart of God, and I've had moments in there where it got mad awkward.

I was in this one place one time because I and I didn't understand it, and this woman pulled out like this horn of an animal.

I didn't know it was called a shofar, and she I was like, oh, what was that?

I was like, oh, that's in scripture.

I didn't know.

I had not been exposed to that just yet.

But it was incredible.

It was it was awesome.

In fact, the church I was at at that time, we ended up expanding, God was blessing, and we had to, part of the church had to start meeting in a movie theater.

So we go in and we'd set up a service in the movie theater.

And she showed up one day.

And the and the movie theater staff, they're just going about trying to get stuff ready, vacuuming little areas.

Everybody's having a heart attack.

But man, I want to tell you something.

Like, if I can get deeper with with God, if I can know more of his love, more of his heart, more of it had just been greater intimacy, and awkwardness has to pay the price in my life, right?

Like, it's gotta be awkward every if it's gotta be quiet every so often.

There's sometimes I haven't lost my place.

I'm just praying.

I'll be preaching.

Have you ever, I'm sure you noticed it, and you're all very kind about it.

Bless him, Lord.

He's lost.

He's lost.

I mean, he had pastor does rabbit trails, but right now he is gone.

Sometimes I'm quiet and it's I'm not lost.

I'm just praying like Holy Spirit.

What do you want to say right now?

Is that awkward?

For sure.

But I gotta get comfortable with dead air if I'm gonna trust the Holy Spirit.

Right?

There is no way I'm getting to the end of the passage today.

Yeah, yeah, that's right.

We just completed one verse.

Verse 43.

Buckle up, a whole nother verse is coming.

A deep sense of awe came over them all.

It's so crazy how inclusive this wording is.

A deep sense of awe came over them all, and the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders.

I don't have time today.

Like we're talking signs and wonders when God does amazing things.

Man, Whitney, praise God.

I'm running short on time.

I'm gonna walk back to you and you're gonna give your testimony of praying over that doctor this week.

But praise God, we're gonna meet again next week.

And you can give that testimony then.

We're gonna find out that God is still working miracles and healing people.

God is still, he has not stopped.

He has not ceased.

What happened is people stopped taking risk.

We stopped risking to believe that what we see in the word is true.

Check this out.

A deep sense of awe came over them all as the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders.

Why did that happen for Jesus?

Because it was heaven's confirmation that he was legit.

And what I see to be true in the life of the believer, especially going through Acts, is that the power of God affirms the word of God.

The power of God affirms the word of God.

So I can preach a super awesome, amazing sermon every so often, but if there's never a power to affirm it, and so I'm believing for our body, us as individuals and corporately, that we would have moments in our week where we're like, I need to stop and pray for this person.

It's gonna feel awkward, but I sense it in my spirit, and so I'm gonna stop and pray, and then heaven invades.

Yeah.

Awe was there over all of them.

And this is what it says, and all the believers met together in one place and shared everything they had.

They sold their property and possessions and shared the money with those in need.

Now, check this out.

This is this is interesting because this is not a passage to endorse socialism, right?

That would be a disservice to this because we see throughout even Proverbs, it's talking about the value of work, the value of working hard, the value, like don't don't be lazy in the harvest.

A lot of folding the hands and a lot of sleep is gonna end in poverty.

But we do recognize that in life, hard times hit everybody.

There's gonna be trouble that hits, there's gonna be moments, and listen, we check this out.

We also recognize the context that a bunch of people showed up from other places, and now they're staying there for an extended amount of time that they had not planned on.

And now what do you have?

You've got needs.

Can we just be as practical as understanding scriptures that there are needs present, but what they've done is in the koinonia, it's not about me, it's about us.

And so the provision of God in my life I hold open-handedly, not reserving everything for me, saying there just could be an offer bad day for me at some point.

So I better.

I'm not saying don't save your money, but what I'm telling you is this that oftentimes God wants to work in and through our lives, and He's wanting to give more to you, but you've got to give it away.

The Dead Sea has an inlet, but it does not have an outlet.

You want to be entrusted with more?

Allow God to do more through you.

I don't know how that makes me feel.

It should feel a little scary because it goes count, it's counterintuitive to how we function.

It's counterintuitive to say, man, I don't have a whole lot in the account right now, but I feel like God's saying, give that person a hundred.

Give that person a 50.

I don't have a whole lot right now.

Can I tell you something?

As you give, it's not just about them.

It's about what God's gonna do in you.

How were all of the people in awe of who God was?

Because they came to a point where saying, man, we are we're in orbit.

So everything in my life is about Jesus.

So if he calls me to do something that's radical and looks weird to other people, that's just how it's gonna be.

And if there's a need, we're gonna find a way to meet that need.

Not gonna have a brother in Christ go hungry.

Not gonna have a sister in Christ go go go go hungry.

They're gonna have a place to lay their head.

They sold their property.

Now listen, this is descriptive, not prescriptive.

You don't have to go home and get on Zillow and put your house.

You're not gonna see Pastor Sheila's house on Zillow tomorrow, right?

She's gonna be, but you can come over to her house, sit on the front porch, get prayed for, get invited to Thanksgiving with 682 other people.

You could like these things can happen, right?

But this is descriptive, not prescriptive, but what it is showing is the heart of people who love Jesus more than they love themselves.

And so when they do that, they can minister to the world around them and for sure the body of believers, the koinonia in which they are a part of.

They worship together at the temple each day, met in homes for the Lord's Supper and shared meals with each other.

They're still showing up to the temple.

Like, there's not a persecution yet, so they're still rolling up strong to the temple and having a big old service.

Yeah?

And because to them, everything that was taught in the temple led to Jesus.

So why not show up to the temple with Jesus, right?

And so they're still showing up to the temple.

They're meeting in homes for the Lord's Supper and shared meals with each other.

We remember again what that means.

With check this out, with great joy and generosity.

With great joy and generosity, all while praising God and enjoying the goodwill of all the people.

And each day, check this out, the Lord added to their fellowship those who are being saved.

The Holy Spirit is at work in a group of people that are in orbit around Jesus and their life is about Jesus.

And as they're functioning in that capacity, there's not only a generosity in showing up with their time and saying, I want to learn more about who Jesus is and what he's taught and how I can be obedient.

I want to show up and make sure that I can break bread with brothers and sisters, and that we can say, together, we are together, not mattering background, age, race, ethnicity, we are together part of the body of Christ.

That we then come together and say, we're gonna meet needs, we're gonna serve each other.

And what happened, they had great joy and generosity.

And check this out.

I love, I love what it means is uh sincere hearts.

Generosity can be translated sincere hearts.

Nobody's showing up to get something out of it for themselves.

Nobody's scheming to try to get a higher role in the church or scheming to get a new business relationship.

They're showing up simply because they love Jesus and they love each other.

I gotta look at the word though, great joy.

We got it right there.

They worship together at the temple each day, met in the homes for the Lord's Supper, and shared their meals with great joy.

Great joy does not equal easy.

Your life cannot be easy, and you can still experience great joy.

In fact, I think that's one of the things that will separate the church from this world as gas prices go up and as economies struggle, and as all these things happen, that we can still have great joy because the joy of the Lord is our strength.

Our joy is found in Him, our peace is found in Him.

And it doesn't mean that it's about easy.

They had struggles and pain.

And it was the joy of a people who discovered that the crucified Jesus lives and the Holy Spirit has come as promised, and no follower of Christ has to eat alone.

And I just want to be real with you today.

There's people that can hear this whole message.

Ron, would you come for me, man?

They can hear this whole message.

You can hear this.

I understand that there's people right now that you can hear a message on koinania and yet it still makes you nervous.

Trauma is a real thing.

And when you're in a relationship with people long enough, man, chances are you're gonna get hurt by somebody.

I feel like pain rarely comes in isolation, but it often comes in community.

You can get hurt in community way faster than you can get hurt in isolation.

That's why I hurt people like to isolate because they don't want to get hurt anymore.

That's why I hurt people, they they'll they'll they'll just I see that that is supposed to be help.

I see that Koinonia is supposed to be beautiful, that it's supposed to be Holy Spirit led.

I I see that it's supposed to be deep, but my pain, I don't want to experience what I have had happened in my life again.

And so I'm gonna I understand that for some people coming into even church today was a risk because do you know what a trigger is?

You can walk into a room that looks like it reminds you of another room you were once in where pain occurred, and so you can have one foot in the present, you're here at Hope City, but your other foot is in the past where you got hurt.

And so you're in two places at the same time, and your body's trying to reconcile those experiences.

And so it was a risk for you to come, and it was courageous that you came.

And some of us we're still afraid to let our defenses down and let our walls down because, like last time I did that, I got hurt.

And your body is still dealing with that trauma.

Can I tell you one thing about trauma?

Trauma means if you have trauma, it means that you did live.

That you are still alive.

You were not defeated.

You, man, for sure, hell broke loose or something painful happened, but trauma did not kill you because you're still breathing and you're here right now.

But what I would say about that is if you have moments in your life where you're like, I want to be vulnerable, but I'm too scared to, it's an opportunity to invite the Holy Spirit to jump back to that spot in your life and say, Holy Spirit, what do you want to speak to me?

That I could close my eyes and I could see that I was in that room.

I had a time in my ministry, I was young.

Like 25, pastoring, struggling.

I had some, man, some incredible people though, that would come.

And can I tell you something?

You don't know what you don't know.

So I'm like learning on the fly.

There were so many times I'd be in a meeting, I was like, Bible college did not prepare me for that conversation.

I did not, that was not on any manual, in any book.

I legit, I had a meeting one time where a guy was like, I feel I'm pretty sure biblically it's okay to have two wives.

I'm like, how did we how did we get here?

This is not Utah.

It's just like, whatever.

Sorry, if you're from Utah.

Man, there's some things I got right, and there's a lot I got wrong.

And then one evening, I got let about, I got, they let me know about all I got wrong.

I sat in a room.

There's about ten other people.

Hey, Joey, man, you had a I had a guy say, Man, shame on you.

Like, shame on me.

I'm pretty sure that's not part of the kingdom.

Man, like, I don't think that's how Jesus rolls, but can I tell you something?

One night, it knocked me out of my shoes for years.

I was like trying to find my way, trying to pastor.

I'm gonna tell you right now, if you ever tried to do your job and had zero confidence that you could accomplish it.

Right?

Like, I was trying to work an app the other day on my phone.

I was like, I have no idea what's going on right now.

It does not feel good to be in your profession and not have a clue how to do your profession because you feel so.

That you're going to get it wrong again.

And you're just walking on the eggshells.

I don't want to get it wrong, and I don't want to get it wrong, and I don't want to get it wrong.

And you just then, you know what happens when you try to live not to make mistakes?

Man, you inevitably make mistakes.

And uh man, praise God.

Praise God that uh suffering is an invitation to intimacy with God.

Pain can be, he didn't cause the pain, but it can be an invitation into his presence.

And you know what had to happen for me?

Holy Spirit had to, I had to, there was a day when I was getting triggered, and praise God, I had a godly friend in my life, and he said, Joey, I want you to go back to that room.

I can close my eyes, I can see where I was, I can see where all the chairs were.

Have you ever had a moment of trauma?

You can close your eyes and you can be boom, you're right there.

And you feel all those things.

And I was just, I'm in the room and I see the chairs, and I feel less than, and I feel lost, and I and I feel ashamed, even though I knew I shouldn't be, and I there's all these things going on in my heart.

My buddy said, I want you to see that room.

And he said, I want you to, I want you to ask the Holy Spirit how he sees you.

Not how those people see you.

Ask Holy Spirit, how do you how do you see me?

And I had to have that healing.

Because God knows there'd be a day I'd step into this room and I didn't need to still have a foot in that room.

And he brought healing.

And I can look back on that time now.

I mean, like, I just feel peace now.

I go back then, I was like, yeah, I was young.

I did, some of that stuff was legit.

A lot of it wasn't, but some of it was.

But all the pain, all the worry, all the all the rejection, Holy Spirit said, let me just take that away.

And I just want to ask you, maybe you're in this place, and I believe there's so many, God is is doing something so sweet and so special here.

But it can you close your eyes for a minute?

If you have fear, if there's something of anxiety that wells up within you, when I start talking about like deep relationships, authentic relationships, rich relationships, because some of you, you don't have a problem praying for anybody, but you will let hell freeze over before you ask anybody to pray for you.

Why is that?

We're all learning, we're all growing, we're all seeking Jesus, we're all in orbit, around the King of Kings and the Lord of Lord, the Prince of Peace.

That's who we're just in orbit around him, in all of his love, in all of his goodness, empowered by his Holy Spirit.

And I just want to ask you right now, if there's somebody, if you're in the room and you're like, man, church scares me, can you, would you be brave enough to go back to the place where the pain was?

Would you be brave enough right now to go back to the trauma and say, Holy Spirit, what do you want to say to me?

Holy Spirit, how do you see me?

Holy Spirit, how have you created me?

I invite you to come on this journey with us as we devote ourselves to knowing what the Lord has said to deep, rich fellowship, the koinonia relationship, the breaking of bread together, both over meals and the Lord's table, into praying together.

I invite you on this journey, but I want to let you know that you don't have to come in on this journey with one foot in this room and one foot in the last room.

The Holy Spirit would want to heal.

He wants to bring peace, he wants to unravel the trauma that you feel wrapped around you.

Thank you, God, for giving us such a beautiful picture of your bride.

Granting us grace when we don't get it right, but putting a fire in our heart to pursue obedience in all you've called us to.

We love you, we honor you.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

I was going to say just a quick side note, too.

I fully believe, and for me, man, uh the Holy Spirit so healed that moment and that season in my life.

Uh but there is blessing, God-given blessing, and something called therapy.

And so you are not less than to walk into a place that somebody God has gifted to help people unravel trauma.

And go and let them help start unraveling.

I want to encourage you in this.

Yeah?

Because I believe that there is the practical of the spiritual, and that spiritual can oftentimes absolutely affect the emotional and the physical.

But there are some times where coming together with somebody else that can help you walk through the pain and bring some direction.

It can be a freeing thing.

Yeah.

Man, you can be a Jesus lover and do that at the same time.

It's not either or.

Yeah.

Cool.

Man, I love you guys.

I'm so proud of you.

Thank you for rolling with me through this.

We made it through like at least six verses, maybe five even.

Maybe five.

It was incredible.

At this rate, it'll be 20 30 when we wrap up Acts.