Leftovers - Acts 5 & 6

Happy Monday last week of school.

Summer's in the air. You can feel it can't Yeah, you

can feel it like kids are just getting more ramped up and like,

yeah, it's, it's an exciting time of year.

I, I remember as a teacher that like, yeah, you, you get to that

last like 3-4 weeks and then it just feels different all the

time in the school and out of the school.

You can see it on the kids faces.

Like I love this time of year. Yeah, pool was open this

weekend. Yeah, I guess, Well, that's more

of an appeal for me than you, I guess.

You probably don't just go like chill at the pool.

I mean if, if I. Like a weird middle-aged man in

his 40s just chilling at the pool.

Like that's, that's not what you do without kids.

I don't, yeah. I don't think I could go to the

pool by myself anymore because like, dude, what are you doing

here? Like why are you here?

Yeah, You know, I just, I, well, because here's the thing.

Oh my gosh. Here's the thing.

Like if I go, if I go to the pool and they're like, Pastor

Chris, what are you doing here? I was like, well, you know, I'm

just coming to see kids. Like that sounds really bad.

That's yeah. No, man, not.

Knowing who you are. Pastor Chris, like, you go to

see kids at, you know, a local coffee shop or, you know, you

see them on Wednesday. Like, you don't go to the pool

to go see kids by yourself. That's really terrible.

Don't do that. So yeah, I don't go to the pool

anymore. OK, that's fair.

We we hit it up this weekend, Saturday and Sunday afternoon.

And that's that's good. We actually have Yeah.

I mean, there's there's kids from youth group, kids from

church that are working there now.

It's lifeguards too. And it's, yeah, it's good.

We let the kids go and they, the lifeguards, can watch them.

Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah.

So anyway, this is the ERC Leftovers podcast.

Pastor Matt, Pastor Chris here, and we just kind of recap, go

over yesterday's sermon and things that we just couldn't get

to as we're working through the series of Acts.

Anything that's leftover, thoughts from the narrative, the

book of Acts, and Luke's account of the early church.

We try to have a little fun and brevity along the way too.

But yeah, thanks for coming along.

Coming back for more conversation surrounding the

sermon series that we're working through right now.

Anything like we could just jump right into?

Would you rather we try to have a little fun before look at the

text some more? Yeah, yeah, I, we mentioned it

last week, but man, all the grad parties, so much fun.

I just, I, I just want to say it again because I love being

invited to them and, and I just think they're so much fun.

And so thank you to all of the seniors and their parents over

the last, you know, month or so. Who, yeah, they're, they're

excited and about what's next. And man, I think again, we get

to be so excited for these young people because if you, if

anybody listening, you can remember back to how that felt

of like, I'm an adult now. And you, you can just see that

on their faces. And it's so cool for them and so

exciting. And I love seeing it.

And I think you put it this way, which I, it's so true, whether

you're super involved, like because you volunteer on

Wednesdays or whatever. Like it's so neat to watch kids

that you've seen grow up in the church and now they're going out

into the world. And you know that because of

what they know and have experienced inside their local

church community and what they know about the gospel, that

they're going to make a really great impact on the world that

they go and live in. Yeah, it's very fun.

Cool times for the students and their families and really just

yeah, for church family to be able to celebrate these young

adults going out into the world and having been raised up, Yeah,

it's pretty darn cool. So yeah, what was I going to get

to? Would you rather would?

You rather let's do it. Let's talk.

About this, would you rather? I feel like I had a fleeting

thought as you were talking and now.

Apparently it's fleeted. It fleeted.

Is that a is fled, fleeted, fled.

Happens to a fleeting thought It fleets.

Is that like eating? Oh.

Gosh, all right, you know what? Let's be honest, I am way too

old to pick up on young people's catch phrases unless I'm doing

it just to be terrible. Nope, I can't do it.

Doesn't. Work.

Just like I can't do a British accent, I can't do that either.

Oh, I was going to say that's what it was.

Worship night this Friday in the sanctuary.

School years out, summers here can start this new season off

right. We're going to be in the

sanctuary from 6:00 to 8:00 this Friday.

Come on out. And we, yeah, we want you to

come and start this summer season off well, fellowship and

worship with the people of God here this Friday in the

sanctuary at church, 6:00 to 8:00 PM.

Love that and this is the first one I'll ever.

That's the first time I'll I'm ever able to attend.

I've always been out of town. Yeah, we've somehow scheduled it

when you're gone, so. It's almost like you did it on

purpose, Sir. Like I'm gonna, like, I'm gonna

embarrass you on worship night because you know, I'll, I'll

sing terribly. And no, I'm kidding.

I mean, I do sing terribly, but it's, you know.

Just oddly worked out that way somehow, right?

This week's Would You rather? Would you rather your shirts

always be two sizes too big or one size too small?

Oh. No, no, no, Sir.

OK. OK.

OK, let me let me let me try and get us kick started here.

OK, so I came in to the church today and I, I had told Matt a

story about like, hey, man, like yesterday was not great for me.

Like stepped on the scale and I'm literally the heaviest I've

ever been in my entire life. And so now as you ask that

ridiculous question, I'm like, well, I could use some baggy in

my life. But then again, then again, if I

was jacked I would be like, give me the smaller shirt.

OK. So this is regardless of weight,

this is just kind of like physique kind of the question

because. Kind of.

OK, so we, we've talked about this because you're, you're now

on the on the weight loss train or you, you just want to drop

some pounds here. Dude I need to otherwise I have

to buy new pants. Yeah.

And I so I've I've dropped quite a bit in the past couple months

here. And what are you?

What are you up to right now? Or what are you down to actually

like? How much weight have you lost?

I've dropped about £35. That's remarkable.

So yeah, but I was at the same point you were back in March.

I was just like, hey, this is came back from Florida, came

back from exponential. And I was like, this is the most

I've ever weighed in my life. I'm done with this and it's been

great. I feel good.

But yesterday I usually go somewhere, I don't know, I wear,

I guess I don't have a Sunday morning outfit really.

I'll wear pretty much anything. I have some, some button up,

some sweatshirts, some T-shirts. I was wearing a button up

yesterday and it's still like I've worn a size large T-shirt

for as long as I can remember it.

Even when I was gaining weight, I just kind of just still

squeezed into the little size large T-shirt.

And now I was, I had this size large button up yesterday and I

didn't even really realize it till like I got home and looked

in the mirror and I was like, wow, this this shirt is wearing

me like I, I was, I I felt like it looked super bag and weird.

So I didn't love that look either that it felt like, oh,

this, this shirt is way too big for where I'm at right now.

So now you wear a SH medium I. I'm awkwardly in between, like a

medium would be way too tight, but also like this.

This is a large T-shirt. That's fine.

I mean, you can't. That's fine all of you watching

our non video podcast, you can't see the T-shirt that I'm

wearing. But yeah, so I feel I don't

know, maybe that shirt was just sized weird.

I didn't like the baggy look. It was.

It didn't even feel baggy actually.

It was just when I looked at myself, I.

Was like no but. That shirt looks way too baggy.

I noticed yesterday because I don't know, I just noticed

things like that. I was like, oh man, that shirt

like that's looser than what he would normally wear.

I noticed it. So yeah, I didn't, I didn't love

that once I figured it out, but oh, but like one size too small,

like that's what I'm saying. Yeah, a medium right now like

that would be oof. You're that's that's skin tight.

There's no, there's no hiding anything with that like.

You're. Can you do anything

stylistically with a baggy shirt?

Can you like? Oh, what?

What are you going to tie it off in the back with like a hair

tie? What are we doing here?

That would be weird too. That would be terrible.

Don't do that. 2 sizes too big though. 2 sizes is a lot man.

That's a lot. Yeah, and it's like cute when

kids wear it cause like, whatever the little, my little

girls, they're weird. I get one of Clara's shirts and

it's more like a dress and it's down to their knees.

Like that's that's fine. I can't wear shirts halfway down

my thighs. That's.

Ridiculous, right? Like.

But then again, the alternative is.

Down here. The alternative is, of course.

Yeah, there's no secrets anymore, like and.

And here's the thing. And are you showing some mid

like too a size too small? Is is mid drift coming out?

It's. Probably you.

Definitely don't want to see that.

If it's a size too small, it's probably hanging out right at

the top of your pants. That's where the shirt ends.

It's right at the. So every time you bend over,

every time you lift your arms like.

You're not bending over. No.

And if you lift your arms, like let's say for example, you're

giving the closing blessing, so you lift your arms and oh, we

all just saw Matt's belly button.

That's awesome. Like, I don't know man.

You twist the wrong way. You just tear right through the

shirt. That's too small.

I don't know if you you burst. Through it, I just think of

like, you know, Chris Farley in I don't know what, I can't

remember the name of the movie. Tommy Boy Tommy Boy Fat guy in a

little coat in. A little coat, yeah.

I I think I got to go too big. Like I'll feel silly but

whatever man, I'm not. I'm not showing you my belly

button every time I lift my arms or something.

I'm not. That's the answer to it's

probably, yeah, more, more mystery and ridiculousness than

just everything. And maybe you just lean into it

and you're like, you know, you know what, Like, I really like

gangster rap of the 90s, and I'm going to wear everything really

baggy. You get like clown shoes too,

just like you're. Just walking around like Ronald

McDonald. Everything is ridiculously sized

on your person, Yeah. I got to.

Go too big? No, I think.

I think the answer is 2 sizes too big.

It would look ridiculous, but not as ridiculous as I would

feel. I would feel so much more

self-conscious in me too the tight one.

Me too. I think I would know and feel at

all times that I looked ridiculous.

The the two sides is too big. I'd be like, yeah, I don't know.

Well, and I think this small one too, if people didn't know you

had to do this, they're like, Oh my gosh, look at this.

Someone needs to tell that guy. Yeah, look at this conceited

dude. Like he thinks he's ripped and

he's trying to wear this tiny shirt to show it off, and he's

not. He's not.

Let me go see if we can find you a tighter shirt.

Tighter shirt. That's the line for the second.

Transformer. Oh, I'm gone.

Shia Labeoust getting in trouble and he's like, oh, I'm going to

go find you a tighter shirt. There isn't one.

We already checked. All right.

So dumb. Really terrible movie reference.

Sorry for any of you that watched the second Michael Bay

Transformers movie. Wow.

Yeah. Anyway, OK, so you were in

really happy passage of Acts yesterday, right?

You ended with the the villain or you started with the villain

winning, right? That the that the bad guy wins

and. That's terrible.

It's awful. I mean, again, when I gave that

kind of movie reference, like that was real for me and

everybody in that theater and apparently across the country,

like, dude, you don't. You don't go to things like

movies and be like, Yep, they broke up at the end of the

movie. They never talked to each other

again. The bad guy wins.

The killer doesn't get caught. You they don't really make

movies like that. Not really.

So when you see that happen in real life, I mean, imagine like,

of course, you know, bad things do happen.

And you know, you can see that all throughout the Bible.

It's very real about that in life.

But when you come to a passage like this, and again, it's just

a really clear stopping point, especially from a preaching

perspective, you're like, oh, wow, this.

I can't imagine living in this era of like, hey, we got this

church started and it's great and everybody's happy and people

are being saved. And then all of a sudden, like

boom, like now we're scattered and people are dying.

We're dying now because this group of people or this

individual in in particular is, is angry with us and doesn't

like our theology. We're dying now.

I think I'm going to get out of town.

Yeah, yeah. And that was wildly scary or

just like reality setting in, right?

Like, oh, this is actually what this life is about.

And and yeah, the the intimidation, the persecution,

the, the, the gravity of what taking up your cross daily looks

like, of what committing to following Jesus looks like or,

or the ultimate cost that that it cost a Christian.

Obviously they were aware of what it cost Jesus, but that's

when faced with that, and that's an interesting examination for

yourself. Like what point is your faith

that real is, is your faith that important, resolute, strong?

Like if you were threatened with this, if your life was at stake,

how? And I think that's kind of the

ultimate proving grounds that modern that the majority, not

all of course, but the majority of modern day people never have

to do that. They never have to go.

OK, is this so real for me that like, you know what, when I'm

pressed, I'm going to hold to it no matter what the cost is.

Again, most modern day people don't have to deal with that.

We certainly do have not in. Relation to like life

threatening. Right, right now there's social

capital that Americans stand to lose if you profess your faith

and you say, no, this is I refuse to work on this day

because this is my Sabbath. This is the day when I worship,

I refuse. You know, you can lose social

capital, you can lose potentially income, etcetera,

etcetera. But it's you.

I mean, in in America, it's not currently at the cost of your

life to say this is who I am. Right.

Yeah. And that's what's what we

ultimately see it in the in the killing of Stephen.

And yeah, feels like a dark time for the church.

And yet. Right.

And yet, amidst persecution, amidst amidst this threat,

there's still growth. They're both in in maturity and

number like that's that's still resulted in and we haven't even

gotten to the big we haven't even gotten to the punchline.

The villains still out there, right, like Saul is still

persecuting and and hunting down Christians and things.

We haven't even gotten to his transformation yet in the book

of Acts. So there's still a lot more to

come. I want to jump back a couple

chapters. Just we we maybe should have.

Covered. Yeah, we had to, we kind of had

to make what I would call it like a sizable jump to get to

Saul yesterday. So yeah, it it'll be good to

maybe recap some of those other things we missed.

Yeah, back in chapter 4, I'm going to start at verse 32.

All the believers were in one heart and mind.

No one claimed that any of their possessions were their own, but

they shared everything they had with great power.

The apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of

the Lord Jesus, and God's grace was so powerfully at work in

them all that there were no needy persons among them.

From time to time those who owned land or houses sold them,

brought the money from the sales and put at the apostles feet,

and it was distributed to anyone who had need.

Joseph a Levite from Cyprus whom the apostles called Barnabas.

Barnabas wow that was difficult. Whom the apostles called

Barnabas, which means son of encouragement, sold a field he

owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles feet.

There's an interesting interaction here later on.

Barnabas is a companion of of Saul, then Paul in in some of

his journeys and even in the books of Galatians and

Ephesians. I think there's references to

Barnabas travels with Paul We so we just we kind of get a really

brief intro to him here. But but Barnabas, son of

encouragement. This was a guy who had a way

with words was was cheering on uplifting actions and and people

and believers that so much so that that's the nickname they

gave him that he was just this this encourager alongside them.

His example is in here for how this how this worked of this

sharing of possessions and and being of 1 heart and one mind.

Sold the field he owned and brought the money and put it at

the apostles feet. This might seem like a radically

crazy thing. Like anyone who had land or

houses sold them and gave to those who are in need so that

there was no one in need. Well, this sounds like that

sounds like communism, right? Like this almost just just

sounds like those who had gave away what they had.

So those who didn't have would have stuff, right?

And that's not, that's not what's happening here.

There. There is an example of

generosity here later on, especially in first Timothy.

We see from Paul first Timothy chapter 5, we see some

1 Timothy 5 · chapter mention

guidelines for this because of course, still dealing with

sinful broken people here. There's a chance for this sort

of model to be abused and and people who weren't actually

needy or in need like gaining some of this.

So the church must discern who the truly needy are.

Paul teaches in first Timothy 5. If one can work to support

themselves, they weren't they're not in this needy category.

They should be in the providing for others needs category.

If a family can support a needy person, the church, the church

isn't then supporting that family amongst them if they if

they're self-sufficient in themselves.

And it's also right for the church to examine moral conduct

before giving support. This isn't just giving all hold

all holds barred. Just like because someone has a

need, regardless of of moral or ethic consequence.

There there needed to be some showing of no, this this person,

this family is bought into this faith is is earnestly has left

sin habits behind or or or detrimental things.

It's like kind of a well, no, that's not the example I want to

give. But yeah, there needed to be

some show. Let me show you my faith by my

works. James writes like there needed

to be some outward show of bought in it Ness to this

community in their lives. It wasn't just.

Hey, they're not going to turn their lives around, but we're

we're still just going to aimlessly, not aimlessly.

Oh man, I'm really struggling with words.

Not aimlessly, but like inconsequentially sure, we're

we're going to put some of thought and care into this and

how we're giving and how we're being generous.

We aren't just wasting resource. And that's that's the other side

of it. That maybe sounds crass to say

that anyone who is in need not give or giving them something

that they're not going to use. Maybe the best way they could is

wasting. But that was what was facing the

church at this time really. They wanted to be discerning of

how they were using this resource they were trusted with.

Absolutely. Well, a couple things coming off

that and I, you're absolutely right.

But one of the interesting things that we see, and I'm

sorry, I'm blanking on who it is, but there was a 1st century

non Jewish, non Christian person who looked at the amazing way

that the church is generous. OK, so think about the world

we're living in for a second. Let me try and paint that

picture a little bit. We're living in a world where

like, so for example, sexuality is all over the place and that's

OK. So we like give our sexuality

away to everybody or anything that we feel like it because our

bodies, well, they're just our bodies.

And I'm just kind of covering this need I have for this

pleasure, right? So that's kind of a weird wide

open thing. But at the same time, my money

is mine. My resources are mine, period.

So that's the kind of world we're living in where like, I

don't give my money away. Why would I ever do that?

But I'll give like this part of myself away and that's fine.

So the Christian Church comes along and they do the exact

opposite. They say, no, my sexuality is

meant for one person that I'm committed to and nobody else but

my money and my resources. I'm going to give that away like

I'm dying tomorrow. And So what happens is there was

at least one writer early on. And again, I'm sorry, I forget

his name, but he kind of famously wrote about the fact

like these Christians are so easy to take advantage of

because people who have need, who who seem authentic, like

these Christians will just give you what you need.

And so like, yeah, there is the sense that that can be taken

advantage of if if there isn't wisdom and discernment and how

we do that. Additionally, I would tell you

that the the church itself is meant to take care of the

church. So I love churches, modern day

churches that like hey, we have food pantries and anybody can

come in who has need, etcetera, etcetera.

I think those things are awesome.

That's great. But at the same time it is the

church's job is leader's job to discern.

OK. We need to give first to the

people who are in and amongst our community.

That is our first priority when it comes to helping and giving.

And so I, I, I think a lot of churches model that today.

I know that's something that ERC does.

You know, we have a help fund and that help fund is

specifically for people in our community.

Now our church also helps our community in other bigger,

broader ways by giving to certain things.

And that's awesome. I'm glad we do that, but really

at the core of this is like we are helping those who are in our

fellowship or in our community. That is our call.

That is our job to do. Right.

And that's we don't necessarily any any passerby who has a need

who comes to our doors. That's not not necessarily

within our our purview for for every situation.

Not necessarily. Yeah, sometimes.

Sometimes it is. Sometimes God places a

circumstance that it it maybe seems very obviously that we can

meet that need. And even though we don't we

don't know this person, we don't have a background.

It just it seems like our passes are wow paths have been brought

to cross. Really shouldn't be recording a

podcast. My mouth did not want to talk

today. You're doing fine.

It's going to be all right. That, yeah, that God brought

this person to cross paths with us and this is how we can help

and aid this part, this part of their life.

Sure. But in general, like we're not,

we're not necessarily running it.

It, it is more of this early church model of those within our

community who are, who have everything in common, who, who

are of, of like mind and and like lifestyle and, and and and

mind and faith together. That's what this camaraderie

was. That's what this this coming

together was. And I don't know if this is the

I just did a quick Google search, but Mara bar Sarah

Payan. I don't it was a early 1st

century writer who who coined or told the the emperor that

Christians were naively generous and and easy to take advantage.

Of that might be the exact thing.

Yep, I think that's what that is.

Yep, thank you. Yeah, just just a letter letter

to Diognetus is is the early 1st century writing and that's not

again, I don't think Jesus is if we go to the pearly gates and I

don't I don't think Jesus going to be up there like that guy

took advantage of you like shouldn't shouldn't have given

that away. He was he was scamming you like

I'm I don't think that's going to happen.

But there is especially in first Timothy chapter 5 like there's

1 Timothy 5 · chapter mention

there's this call to discernment.

There's very obviously Paul's listing out a method, a standard

of because, because we have earthly resource and as, as it

is limited as as maybe unlimited as it, as it might, there's a

lot of money out there. There's a lot of money out

there. It may feel unlimited in some

way, but it's still a limited resource.

Like we're still meant to be prudent and good stewards of it.

And that's exactly it. So, you know, people, men, God

fearing people give of their financial resources, you know,

trusting that the leaders of your congregation will use that

money wisely, Right, right. And so, yeah, you don't just

want to throw it all over the place.

We don't hold on tight to it with a tight fist.

But at the same time, man, we have to exercise discernment and

how we give those things away to people in real genuine need.

So that way, those resources that people are entrusting to

our care are going to the right place.

Right because on the other side of this we have Joseph Barnabas

sells this field gives all the proceeds.

This is hey, this is for the church.

This is going to this is going to help out the beginning of

chapter 5. We have this story of Ananias

and Sapphira that were apparently in cahoots together.

They they they knew it. They sold part of possession and

and brought a certain part of it and laid it at the apostles

feet. Now, we don't have a whole lot

of narrative other than that that this was maybe this was

maybe the standard, that this was the practice.

For some reason, it was only OK that you sold all of it with the

understanding that you were giving all of it to the church.

Like, I'm not. I don't know if you have insight

or not on that. There's nothing in the text that

tells us this was necessarily an all or nothing thing.

Like I think it's a little strange if for whatever reason

we maybe they needed, I don't know, extra money on the side.

Maybe it, maybe it's the the spirit of it here.

Like it's not like they sold it and needed to pay off some

expense with part of it. I think it's just the

selfishness here. Like they they sold off the

field and was like, we're going to, we're going to say this was

all of the proceeds that we got. But really we just need to keep

this for a nest egg here. And that's, and that's exactly

what you see coming out of the beginning of Acts Chapter 5 as

Acts 5 · chapter mention

you, and you kind of get the sense that like, hey, I want to

be, I want to look generous, but I also want to hold something

back for myself. And that's where it gets really

kind of ugly here at the beginning of Chapter 5 is it's

like, Hey, we sold this and we said we basically sold it for

this much, but really it was a different amount, but we wanted

to feel like we're a part of like these really awesome people

who are so generous. And so it's like, what are you

doing here? What are they doing here, for

example? Well, as Peter would tell you,

you what you think you can trick God, you think you can because

he says in five four, while it remained unsold, did it not

remain your own? And after it was sold, was it

not at your disposal? Why is it that you have

contrived this deed in your heart?

You have not lied to man, but lied to God.

And so there is just this very much of like God loves a

cheerful giver. So why are we?

Yeah, why are we trying to fake out God?

It's not helpful. And that's, and that's the

deeper issue here. It's not that they, it's not

that they didn't give all of the proceeds to the the field, it's

that they misappropriate. They, they said that they did.

They said that this is all that we got from this and we gave it

all they wanted the same sort of recognition or or like

acknowledgement that they they were as benevolent as Barnabas

was by giving all of their field.

There's the Greek word in in verse 2 for kind of kept back

part part of the proceeds nosfizumi.

Oh yeah, that's. Been a while but it literally

means to misappropriate. So really the issue here, they

just, they lied that they, they said they were giving all of it

and they kept back some from for themselves.

It gives me the impression that if they had said, well, you know

what? We, we sold our field, but you

know what we got to, we got to pay for a new roof for our

house. So we're, so we're keeping,

we're keeping this part to pay for that.

But we'll, we'll give you the 80% of what we sold.

No issue here. I don't, I don't think 0 if they

had just been upfront about that, they gave the illusion

that they, they were being as sacrificial as Barnabas.

They're right. Oh my goodness, we gave all of

this field so generously. So generously look at how great

we. Are and then they were caught in

the lie and Peter confronted them right.

Why has Satan filled your heart? And Ananias, hearing these

words, fell down and breathed his last die is on the spot.

Like what? Crazy.

Crazy and of course, you know, people see this and and it says

and great fear came upon all who heard it.

Yeah, you think you, you lie to God and and you know, it's one

of those things like sometimes people say something like, oh

man, you know, God's going to strike me down with Thunder if I

whatever. And it's like you joke about

that, but God is the reason why you take every single breath.

And so if he chooses, he can do that.

So we ought to take that pretty seriously.

Yep. And then the same thing.

So the Ananias falls down dead. Sapphira was in on the scheme

his his wife and Peter confronts her too.

And verse 7, he gives her the number and said, this is this is

how much you gave. That's how much you sold the

field for. And she said, Yep, that's that's

all of it. And he challenges her again.

How is it that you have agreed together to test the spirit of

the Lord like? If she would have just came out

and said, Oh no, actually it was this much and we kept this much,

totally different story. Right same thing he and he gave

her a chance to answer truthfully.

She didn't she too, verse 10 then immediately she fell down

and breathed her last and and again the in verse 7, so great

fear came upon all the church and all those who heard these

things. Just the significance with which

God values and had instilled in the early church this this sense

of honesty, this sense of honestly stewardship and fiscal

responsibility too. If this is what you said you're

going to do, do it. Yeah.

If if, if it's not, if it's not what works out OK, you can.

Peter even gave her an an out to sit like OK, do you want to come

clean and say you only gave We don't know what fraction of it

was, but assumingly it was. They kept a smaller amount and

still gave a lot. But do you want to come clean

and say you OK, you in fact did only did give 3/4 And for

whatever pride overwhelms her. No, no, no, no.

We gave it. We gave it all we did.

We're just as noble as as Barnabas was.

And that's where that's where pride comes in and we just have

this really severe fear evoking response to it.

I don't think we see that a whole lot of people just

dropping dead from this. Sort of well, but here's an

interesting thing. So a lot of churches who are

maybe trying to fund a big expensive project that is

outside of the normal means of the church's yearly budget.

For example, a lot of people in church leadership have moved

away from pledging because here's the thing, you might say,

hey, over the next year, I'm going to give $10,000 to

whatever this thing is that we're trying to do.

Well, gosh, you know, you, maybe you only give like 5 or 6 and

all of a sudden it's like you broke your word to your church

community. And The thing is like, we, we

have counted on that because you, we took you at your word

and you're going to do that. And then you know, whether it

was like here where it's like, hey, man, I'm just trying to

scam the church, I'm skimming that Greek word, I'm skimming

off the top, or, or whether it's like, oh, no, actually I lost my

job. Well, of course, of course.

But that's why a lot of churches have moved away from pledging

for projects like that because they're like, no, you either

give it and give it freely and give it now, or like, let's not

assume a future generosity here. Let's just, you know, it

actually makes me think of like, hey, God told the Israelites,

just gather enough for today, just today.

I don't need you to store up and build and try and guarantee

something for yourself later. Like I'm going to provide for

you. Like just just do what you can

today. Do what I'm telling you to do

today and I'll be faithful tomorrow.

And in my faithfulness tomorrow you can, you can be faithful

too. And so I, they all kind of tie

together a little bit. And I think that's important for

us to just keep track of. Like God loves a cheerful giver.

We say that on a lot of Sundays. And sometimes it gets, it feels

repetitious or old, but it's so true.

Like, give generously out of your heart because you want to,

not because you're trying to look a certain way or prove

something. Yeah, or even just feel like

you're worthy or, or, or make. It would make a difference if I

if I gave this much more or, or I could.

I don't know. I don't think people necessarily

brag about their finances or giving.

I don't, I hope not experience that.

But yeah, it's not that misses the point.

It's not about us. It's it's not about how we feel.

We should feel generous and cheerful and and expectant.

The word, the words that we use as we talk about giving.

And this passage is just, yeah, warning against all of the

opposites of that. It's just.

Yep, not how the early church or or the church at large acts in

generosity. So Yep.

And then as we kind of move forward through five, you know,

we have a continued report that signs and wonders are being done

amongst them. And that's a pretty amazing

thing. And if you go to 514 and more

than ever, believes were added to the Lord multitudes of both

men and women, so that they even carried out the sick into the

streets and laid them on cots and mats that as Peter came by,

at least his shadow might fall on some of them.

That's so cool. Actually, that's that's an

amazing little, little section there too.

Yep, crowds gathered from towns all around Jerusalem bringing

their sick and those tormented by impure spirits and all of

them were healed. So this is this is a full on

movement at this point. Word is spreading.

The Holy Spirit is is healing and purifying lives and hearts.

And out of this they continue to preach the word.

This next, the last part of chapter 5 here is the apostles

persecuted, they're bought, brought before the San, the

Sanhedrin, the high priests. And look, we gave you strict

orders is verse 28 in chapter 5. We gave you strict orders not to

teach in his name, yet you have filled Jerusalem with your

teaching and are determined to make us guilty of this man's

blood. So the disciples are sticking to

kind of the rebuke that Peter talked about in chapters 3 and

4, like you guys rejected this cornerstone, you rejected the

word of life, you killed Jesus. Will you repent?

Are you still going to live in this denial?

And very clearly we see, hey, you're still trying to put this,

you're trying to make us out to be the bad guys, so we're going

to throw you in jail. And it happens again.

They get, they get locked up, but it only gives him more

opportunity to preach. Verse 40, his speech persuaded

them. They called the apostles in and

had them flogged and they ordered them not to speak in the

name of Jesus and let them go. There's this warning from oh

man, I got, I got caught up here.

Sorry, I missed, I missed my spot.

The apostles left the Sanhedrin. Verse 41 rejoicing because they

had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for his name.

There it is. That's what I was looking for

amidst this persecution. The disciples are rejoicing,

worthy of suffering disgrace in the name of Jesus.

And day after day they never stop teaching a proclaiming the

good news that Jesus is the Messiah.

Wow. You know, I don't know if any of

you have ever like gone to work and like you feel called to

speak to a Co worker about your faith and about Jesus.

And then they just squarely reject you.

And all of a sudden, like you're not even really welcome in the

you know, where you have lunch and microwave your food and

stuff. Because like, man, now you're

that guy, you're the annoying Jesus guy or whatever.

And then, you know, imagine like you find that out about yourself

and now you've got kind of you feel a little bit

disenfranchised from your other Co workers.

And you know what you do? You go home and you throw a

party with your Christian believer because hey, guys, I

talk about Jesus and now everybody at work won't talk to

me. Isn't this great?

Like we don't, we don't see that happening right now.

But I think it is a really neat thing to be able to be like, you

know, you know what like God is God has put this faith in my

heart and in my life. And you know, I might, I may not

be having to die for my faith in my witness, but you know what?

In my witness, I'm seeing how the world rejects that and I'm

still here. By God's grace, I'm still here

and I'm still talking about Jesus.

And I think that's an amazing thing that yeah, we should

rejoice over that. We should have an opportunity to

say, you know what? The faith that God put my heart,

it's strong, it's lasted. Praise be to the Lord for that,

because I know that's not of me. Because in myself, I want to

please people. I want to get along.

I want to. I want to fit in.

But God has allowed me to experience this thing and he

kept my faith strong, and that's a really great moment to in fact

celebrate. Yeah, Yep, really cool testimony

from them. Moving into Chapter 6, I think

this is the last thing we'll kind of cover here.

It's the beginnings of Stephen kind of the the start of where

Stephen is introduced. Chapter 6 verse one in those

days when the number of disciples was increasing, the 12

gathered all the disciples together and said it would not

be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in

order to wait on tables. Brothers and sisters, choose

seven men from among you who are known to be full of the spirit

and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility

over to them and we'll give our attention to prayer and the

ministry of the word. So the disciples here are saying

our main objective, our main purview here is, is the

preaching and teaching of the word as much as it it makes

sense for us to be a part of, of serving, of of giving to the

needy work in the whatever the soup kitchen or however it was.

It's not our primary calling that this outpouring of the Holy

Spirit, this this Commission from Jesus for us specifically.

These things can be done by other people.

And and it's not it's not less than they're they're saying

choose seven verse 3, choose seven from among you who are

known to be full of the spirit and wisdom.

So that's that's still the fullness of the Spirit, the

wisdom of the word still necessary for for you to do this

work. Well, we're not, it's not a less

than thing. And this proposal pleased the

whole group. Verse 5.

They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit,

and Philip and Procurus and, and this is the choosing of the

seven. They presented these men to the

apostles who prayed and laid their hands on them.

So the word of God spread the number of disciples in Jerusalem

increased rapidly and a large number of priests became

obedient to the faith. We see the early parts of this

picture of the body of Christ here, right?

The the disciples have been commissioned.

They're the main major preachers players in in the spreading of

God's word. Others full spirit, fully

believing Christians gifted in other ways, able, able to care

and serve and be a part of the body in these different ways.

And we see this early picture of that.

That's how it works. OK, we don't.

We don't have the priests, preachers, pastors, elders,

whatever it is. They're not doing all of the

things. There's other pieces of the body

coming together to bring this mission to bring, to bring these

works all together. Right.

Yeah, absolutely. And, and I'll share a brief kind

of experience I had as a very young pastor in my first call.

So I was not good at what you might call delegating because I

in some way, some part of me, I was always like, no, this is my

job. I need to do all of these things

all of the time, you know, some weird form of like self

validation, but really what I learned coming out of that

experience. And I had good wise Christians

around me to say, Chris, like you got, you got to stop, man.

That's, that's not your job. But you know, the, the, the

thing that I ultimately learned coming out of that is like, if

I'm going to break my back doing everything, well, a, that's a

pride issue, but B, what am I doing?

I'm stifling the growth of the church because I'm not allowing

other people and I'm not encouraging other people to use

their gifts how God has blessed them to serve or to do whatever

that looks like. I'm actually stopping spiritual

and mature, you know, a growth in terms of maturity of these

Christians by doing everything all of the time.

You can't do that. You have to let people use their

gifts and I don't care if they don't do it the same way you did

or maybe you well, I would have done.

No, it doesn't matter. Like let people use their gifts

how God has built them to do that.

Otherwise it is just the you show.

And I, I fell into that trap early in ministry and I

regretted it so much as I looked back.

I'm like, man, I wish I would have asked more people to

participate because that would have grown them spiritually in

maturity and it would have taught them how to serve their

church and their people better and it would have been so good

for them. But here I am prideful and like,

Oh no, I'm going to do it. I'm how to don't do that.

Yeah. And so we also have the example

as as you're describing of the apostles here having that

discernment of hey, we're we're caught up not doing the things

we were called to do. And it's it's holding us back

from the things we were called to do.

And it's also holding back the others of you that that can live

out the fullness of your faith in these areas in in this

service. It's biting us both ways.

It's it's detriment both ways for us and for you and the

growth the early church and and they fix it and the people agree

that this is this is how it's supposed to look and work and

out of it. Verse 7, the word of God spread

the number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly and

a large number of priests became obedient to faith.

We we see this model and it worked that the church continued

to multiply in it and and then out of that got Stephen in

trouble as we as we as we heard at the end of your message.

But that's kind of that's kind of where it started.

He his his his platform opportunity was brought and he

answered the call. And at verse 8, Stephen, a man

full of God's grace and power, performed great wonders and

signs among the people. So even in this quote UN quote

lesser role, and I don't I don't I don't want to describe it as a

lesser role. I don't it.

Was different. It was just different and and

the disciples needed to discern that because he still moved

pretty powerfully. He still moved pretty amazingly

in this role, right? It just, it didn't look exactly

like the disciples role did. And you certainly had everything

at stake that they did. Obviously like he's he's still

had the same amount of risk. So certainly the role was not

lesser. But really, I mean, think about

it, in the modern day church, the person who volunteers to

hang out in the nursery during the service time once a month or

whatever, man, what a vital, important role.

Like you get to be another adult in that very young person life

who cares about them, who looks out for them.

And you know, you give opportunities for other people

to do and experience other things because you do that once

a month or whatever, or even, gosh, I don't know, it doesn't

matter what you're doing. Like, let's take a moment here

and let you exercise your spiritual gifts, your your gifts

of service. And again, you're right, it's

never less than it's just different.

But God calls us all into different roles.

You know that I can't say to the foot and etcetera, etcetera.

Like what we hear that right, we need the whole body doing the

different parts that the body does.

And just because one person is on stage and another person is

serving Donuts, that's OK, that's OK.

Not everybody is called to serve in all of the ways, and that's

the body. We're supposed to share the

burden together of ministry and then sharing the rejoicing

together. So, you know, pastor of the

worship team comes off stage and oh, man, that was great.

That was great. Yeah, well, I could only do that

because all these other people are in place doing what God has

called them to do. That's why I can do what I'm

doing is because you're doing what God has called you to do.

We work together. It has to be that way.

Yep. Cool, cool.

We made it. You can catch Pastor Chris's

sermon on Steven if you missed that from yesterday.

That's also in the the podcast feed here on ERC Sundays.

Next week we're in Chapter 8 and we're going to take a look at

Philip and a little bit of his testimony and journey and

ministry in Acts Chapter 8. Definitely looking forward to

Acts 8 · chapter mention

that. There's some, there's pretty,

it's a pretty amazing moment. I can't wait to to talk about it

with you and and hear what you have to say on Sunday.

Yeah, so until then, have a blessed week, y'all.