Together - GENEROSITY

Amen.

Thank you, Pastor Tyler.

Thank you, worship team.

Hey, good morning, y'all.

Hey, if we haven't had the chance to meet, um, I'm uh my name is I don't call myself Pastor Jonathan.

My name is Jonathan Linker.

I was about to say I'm Pastor Jonathan.

Um, I am married to April, and I am the proud parent of four kids.

And the thing about parenting is sometimes it tells you things about not just your kids, but yourself.

Um all the dads in the room, see if you resonate a little bit with this.

But um, I like to drive when we go places.

Okay.

It's not that I don't trust my wife to drive where we go places, but I like to drive, okay?

Which means if we go on a trip, I'm probably the one who is ordering the food in the drive-thru if we stop at Chick-fil-A on our trip, right?

And um, there's this thing that happens often, okay?

And dads, we like to call it the dad tax.

All right, are you familiar with this, Garen is okay?

Um, the dad tax goes like this you you you know, you get you order food, um, you know, you you drove the family there, like you you pay for the food that's coming out of the you know delivery window, and then you turn around and you hand it to your children, and then and uh then is cued the dad tax.

So you hand them the little box of fries, and then you take one fry out.

Now, I don't know if any other dad has experienced this the same way, but sometimes my kids have the audacity to look at me and say, You can't have that fry.

It's mine.

Now I want you just to think about that experience, okay?

Because they they are so quick to go from receiving something that was a gift to them to immediately saying, oh no, that's not yours.

It's mine.

And I'm like, oh, okay, like you were too scared to actually even talk to the person through the window.

You whispered your food order to me.

Um, you you you did not supply the money, you didn't like pay for the car maintenance.

This is how dads think, by the way, that led us here.

You didn't buy the vehicle, you didn't make make the drive, and yet all of a sudden, something I've given to you so quickly just becomes here's the word, mine.

Now, let me tell you.

This is the curse of being a preacher, okay?

Because when I'm as a preacher, this is what I'm always thinking about.

Like, how, what do God's people need to hear?

What does the church need to hear?

What's the word of God saying, and how is this going to intersect with their lives?

And I'm always thinking about you.

But you know what God always does every single time I'm preparing a sermon?

He doesn't actually first tell me a sermon for you.

First of all, he tells it to me.

And so when I have that interaction with my kids with the dad tax and them saying mine, it's almost like the Holy Spirit whispers to me, Jonathan, you're no different.

You do the exact same thing to me.

God the Father has provided every single thing that I have.

Look, I didn't uh create my own air that I breathed.

I I didn't even get a say in being born.

I didn't get a say in being born where I was born into the family I was born.

Every single opportunity, every single good thing has come to me as a gift from God.

And yet, just like my kids, sometimes I am so quick, y'all, to take what he's given to me and immediately say that word.

Mine.

Today, we are talking about the topic of generosity.

You know, we are in a series that we're calling Together where we are looking at the story of the earliest church in Acts chapter 2, particularly verses 42 through 47.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

And we've we've said for five weeks, we're going to look at these six verses through these different lenses.

And we've had a had this progression.

First uh week we talked about how the gospel creates a people.

We said this: that Jesus did not just die to save you from sin, but Jesus died to save you into a community, the family of God.

And so the message of the gospel is that Jesus lived, that Jesus died, that Jesus rose again, and to all who believe in him, it counts for them.

That's the message of the gospel.

And then week two, what we said is what the gospel does is it creates us having unified worship together.

We talked about this passage through worship.

We said that shared worship creates shared community.

Week number three, we talked about what that community looks like.

What are the relational dynamics of the community, the family of God, the church?

We talked about that.

And this week, we're talking about how when we live according to God's house rules, his family rules, we will see that that church immediately, church enacts, and the church of God is called to practice generosity, especially generosity one to another.

Now, I talked about our reticence sometimes to give away that which has been given to us, all right?

But there's there's another side to this whole generosity conversation.

And to be honest, I kind of kind of caught me off guard this week about how pervasive I think this is in me and I probably in you, okay?

Um show of hands.

How many of you, if you hear about a need of somebody around you, um, you you actually like to meet those needs?

Raise your hand.

If you hear about a need in somebody around you, you actually you kind of like to meet those needs, okay?

Um sorry, one more time, hands up, just keep them up, okay?

All right, now, how many of you like to be the one to share a need when you have it?

Well, those hands went down fast, didn't they?

Isn't that kind of you know, the culture that we grow up in?

Like, don't be a taker, be a giver.

You know, one of the flip sides of generosity, especially in the family of God, is not just that we need to give to those in need, but we need to be able to acknowledge when we're the ones with the need to others.

And I think that's the one that can be a little bit harder.

Here's the truth that we're all trying to ignore.

What it means to be human being a human being, it means that you are fundamentally needy.

You have needs that you cannot meet.

But here's the beauty.

When God brings a bunch of people who all have needs together in a family, what begins to happen is that the same needs that we don't like in ourselves become the very instruments of relationships, of giving and receiving that bind the family together.

So today we're gonna look at Acts 2, 42 through 47 through this lens of generosity.

And so I'm gonna read this passage, I'm gonna point out a few things, and then I'm gonna walk us through four different things that this text is showing us about generosity, okay?

So Acts chapter 2, beginning in verse 42, and they, that they is the 3,120 uh Christians of Acts chapter 2.

Acts 2 · chapter mention Acts 2 · chapter mention

That this is referring to the church, okay?

They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and the prayers.

Verse 43, and all came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs are being done through the apostles, and all who believed, here's our series title, were together and had all things in common.

Here, generosity.

And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need.

And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad, here's our word now, and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people.

And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

This is the word of the Lord.

Before we jump in, I do just want to take a second and I want to define some terms before we get going.

I want to define what I mean by generosity.

I looked up the definition of generosity, and this is what I got.

Generosity is the quality of being kind, unselfish, and willing to give money, time, or support freely to others.

Let me read that again, okay?

Generosity is the quality of being kind, unselfish, and willing to give money, time, or support.

Here's a key word here, freely to others.

One of the ways I like to think about it is it's generosity is one-way giving.

In other words, it's when you give with no expectation of anything coming back in return.

Make sense?

Um sometimes we can give, but in our heart, the giving has an invoice that we're gonna send later.

I would just make the argument that's not generosity.

Um, I think about the movie The Godfather.

Um, you know, The Godfather was quite uh, you know, seemed to be quite generous.

He would do a lot of people favors.

He would make things happen for people that they couldn't make happen for themselves.

But there was always a receipt, an invoice, a favor he was going to ask in return.

I would just argue that's not generosity.

Generosity is one-way giving.

So, what we're gonna see here from this passage is how God, through the gospel, creates generosity in his people.

Okay.

And that the message of the gospel is fundamentally the message of God's generosity to you.

Let me, while we're defining terms, let me say that.

When I say the word gospel, I don't mean a musical genre.

Okay, I don't mean all of Christianity.

What I mean when I say the gospel is the gospel means the good news of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.

That's what I mean when I'm talking about the gospel.

It's the good news that Jesus lived the life you and I were supposed to live, that he died the death we deserved in our place for our sins.

And that is that is a story of one-way generosity.

There's nothing you could ever do to repay Jesus back, and there's nothing that God expects.

It's one-way giving.

It's this word that we call in church grace.

All right, so the first thing I want you to see, number one, God gave us Jesus and made us family.

Okay?

God gave us Jesus and made us family.

Now, again, we're talking about the early church here.

So the first place we see this is that God gave them Jesus and he made them family.

Um, if you remember our background of Acts chapter 2, the apostle Peter has gotten up and he's preached the message of the gospel, the life, burial, um, uh, resurrection of Jesus.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

And he says to the people, the Jews that are there, you crucified the Son of God.

But God raised him from the dead.

They were cut to the heart.

They said, What must we do to be saved?

And he says, Repent, turn away from your sin and be baptized.

And, if you keep going, and receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

You know what that story is?

It's a story of God's generosity towards sinners, of God's generosity towards us, of one-way giving, that God, for God so loved the world that he, what's the word?

Gave.

The story of the gospel is a story of generosity of God giving to us, with no expectation for us that we'd ever be able to pay him back in return.

God gave us Jesus.

He gave them Jesus, and through that he made us a family together.

We've we this is kind of our series line that we're saying every week.

Jesus did not just die to save you from your sin, but he died to save you into a community, into the family of God.

And so God gave us Jesus and made us family.

Our generosity doesn't start with us, church.

Amen.

Our generosity starts with him.

Um, I don't know if you've ever had an experience where um you've received just like incredible generosity.

And it's happened several different times in my life, but one memory in particular stands out.

I had this friend who um was always talking to me about the type of fish that they catch in the Chesapeake Bay.

His parents had this little cabin um on the eastern shore.

And so he's like, man, you got to come with us.

And so um my brother-in-law, my dad, we all went up there and we did this fishing trip on the Chesapeake Bay.

And the entire weekend, he just relentlessly served us because he served us so much it kind of felt uncomfortable.

You know, it's like, man, I can do that.

He's like, No, no, no, I got you.

And um, I was like, first of all, I was kind of put off by it.

I was like, it was really hard for me to receive what he was willing to do until I realized it actually made him happier to serve than for me to like take care of myself while I was on this trip.

And so again, like he just was so hospitable the entire trip.

They took us out, he put us on fish, we caught fish, he went back, he cleaned fish, he cleaned the boat, he prepared, and it was all joy to him.

Um, I was like, man, I, you know, if there was a sense that this made him unhappy, I probably wouldn't have let him do it.

But he was like so joyously generous.

Um, and I remember driving home from that trip, I was like, this is like the first time I've just felt um this one-way giving with no expectation of anything in return.

And I gotta tell you, it profoundly changed me.

I I discovered for myself the joy of generosity that I could turn around and give to others only because I'd received generosity so richly from him.

That's the story of the gospel is that we richly receive that which we do not deserve and that which we have not earned.

That's the message of the gospel.

It's grace.

Grace is a Christian word that we use to describe what we call unmerited favor.

It's unmerited.

We didn't merit it, we didn't earn it.

There's nothing that we did to say, oh, God owes us.

God owes us nothing.

But instead, he gives us grace, this unmerited favor, which is just another word for what?

For generosity.

And so what we see happening in Acts chapter 2 is this entire people, these 3,120 people are so aware of the generosity of God towards them that immediately you see what begins to happen?

Acts 2 · chapter mention

They begin to be generous to each other.

It's a natural overflow.

When you recognize how generous God has been to you, you cannot help but want to be generous to others.

Um I want you to look at that passage and look at that phrase, as any had need.

That this community, the early church, was so aware of the needs within their congregation, if you will, that they began to, because they were so aware of the needs of the people, that they began to loosen their hold on their things.

So having received generosity from God, they became generous with all that they had, their possessions, and could freely give to others.

And as you read this passage, I mean you can reread it again.

It doesn't, I don't get this sense that this was a burden to the first church, the earliest church.

The text says that they did this with glad and generous hearts.

I I kind of get the sense that there was a joy that came from giving.

As a matter of fact, if you follow the book of Acts to the very end, the Apostle Paul, uh, little factoid here, he quotes something Jesus said that we don't have recorded in any of the gospels.

It's one of the very few times.

Um, and he quotes this phrase that Jesus said, it is more blessed to give than to receive.

Now, what's so interesting here is this church is living it out.

They're experiencing this great sense of joy, not from holding on to more and more things, but to freely giving those things to each other as any had need.

That's why uh David in 1 Chronicles 29 14 would say this all things talking to God come from you, and of your own have we given you.

We can't even give God anything that's not ultimately his.

And yet out of their joy, what God had entrusted to them, they gave to others.

No, they they shared their fries.

It's kind of what I'm saying.

Every single thing that was a grace gift, they begin to turn around and give it away to others.

Listen, the only way that you're ever going to become a generous person is if you first remember how generous God in Christ has been to you.

If you are aware of how much you've received, you then can freely give.

Number two, in this family, we trust God enough to give.

In this family, we trust God enough to give.

Now, I want to I I worded this a very particular way and I want to draw your attention to it.

Um, we went through a series um on Matthew um earlier in the year, and in Matthew, Jesus has this thing that he says all the time.

First of all, Jesus claims to be the Son of God.

And so the people, you know, in that time are like, okay, you're the son of God.

Well, tell us what God's like.

Well, what's it like to grow up in God's house, Jesus?

And so Jesus is like, I'll tell you.

In the kingdom of heaven, it's like this.

In the kingdom of heaven, it's like that.

As a matter of fact, in Matthew's gospel, he's he's telling people over and over and over again, this is how what it's like to grow up in the household of God.

These are, if you will, the family rules.

Did you grow up with any family rules in your house?

Did you grow up with any any family rules that were unspoken in your house?

We don't talk about Bruno at our house, right?

We all grew up with a background of like this is what life in the family is like.

What's so interesting is when Jesus brings us into his family, he says, uh, you know, I understand that you grew up, you know, with a background in your family, but in my family, in the family of God, it's like this.

In this family, we trust God enough to give.

That's why in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapter, I think this is Matthew chapter six, um, Jesus tells everybody he's talking to not to worry.

Um, because your father in heaven knows what you need before you ask him.

Don't look at the lilies of the field, the birds of the air.

They don't sow, reap, or store a ray, and barge, yet your heavenly father feeds them.

In other words, in this family, we trust God.

We trust God to provide, which means that we can trust him enough to give away.

Does that make sense?

See, the fear, the fry-keeping fear, is once I get something, I don't know whether I'm going to be provided for in the future.

That that's why we that's why we hoard, that's why we keep, that's why we save, right?

Sometimes.

And what Jesus is saying is we don't just trust and honor God and his provision in the present, we also trust that he will provide in the future.

The end of the Sermon on the Mount says tomorrow has enough worries of its own.

It's kind of like, oh no.

Like there's gonna be, there's gonna be problems ahead.

That's how Jesus ends that little section.

And Jesus is like, yeah, but the same God who's here today is gonna be there too, and he's gonna provide.

In this family, we trust God enough to give.

I think that's isn't that one of the biggest reasons that we find it difficult to be generous to give away?

Is because I know I have now, but what who what's gonna happen if?

Who's going to take care of me when?

Now, go back to this story of the early church.

What's so interesting is that the early church becomes the family of God where they're actively taking care of each other.

And so it's like that thought of who's going to take care of me when is already answered because they're seeing this generosity lived out.

Do you see it?

That because they're all giving it to meet each other's needs, the question is not who's going to take care of me.

That's like, man, I've been brought into the family of God, and this group of people is caring for each other so well that it actually loosens my fear that I won't be cared for in the future.

Because I know that I have God in heaven and I know that I'm surrounded by a community who cares about my needs.

In this family, we trust God enough to give.

Now, listen, um, the radical nature of the generosity described in these six verses, um, where did it come from?

Was this just something that happened spontaneously?

Why did they get this idea, hey, we should sell our things and give to those in need?

Where did they get those family values?

Well, I want to argue they actually got them from Jesus himself.

Let me show you a few places.

Uh, first, like Luke chapter 12, verse 32, Jesus says, Fear not, little flock, for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

Luke 12:32

And the very next verse, he tells them to sell their possessions and give to the needy.

Here's the thing about generosity.

Generosity forces us to depend on God for provision.

Because when we give freely to someone else today, we are trusting God to give back to us tomorrow.

Um here's where I think a lot of us, though, here's where we get stuck with generosity.

I think we get stuck with generosity with this thought.

We say, Um, I'll be generous.

I can't wait to be generous.

It's gonna be awesome.

You know, I I love this idea of giving a bunch of stuff away.

And I'll be generous whenever I have enough.

That's what we say to ourselves.

Anybody else?

I mean, that's that's what I say to myself sometimes, right?

And here's the thing about that word enough.

It kind of feels like it's a moving target.

I gotta be honest.

What was enough, I'm 40 years old.

What was enough when I was 30 doesn't feel like enough now.

I've lived a little bit longer, I've known a lot more things that can go wrong.

I feel like I've got to get ready, right?

Enough kind of feels like a moving target.

And less, and listen, um, enough is kind of a moving target sometimes if you fall into uh the comparison trap in Charleston in particular.

Um, here's something I had to learn.

How many of you guys have moved here within the last five to 10 years?

Throw up your hands real fast.

All right, a bunch of us, okay?

Here's here's the thing that I've learned about living in Charleston, okay?

Um there's a lot of people that you see that you think that this is everyday life for them, but they're here on vacation.

Okay.

Six million people come to Charleston every year for vacation.

And if you start to compare like what the good life is by how these these people have been saving up all year for this week in Charleston.

Or whatever.

And if you start to compare yourself to them, you're going to compare yourself artificially.

They are literally on vacation, right?

You don't compare your ordinary self to their vacation self, okay?

All right.

That will move the arrow of what you think enough is.

Amen, somebody.

Here's the other thing that's true about uh Charleston.

A lot of people move here to retire.

You know what that means?

They've spent the better part of their life earning, and now they're in a place to retire, and they set that standard of what whatever living is for them.

And if you're here and you're not in that age and stage, don't you dare compare yourself to them.

Does it make sense?

Because you're gonna think, oh man, I just don't have enough.

Enough can be this moving, this moving uh definition for us that keeps us from ever engaging in real generosity.

And so if someone else's life ever becomes your finish line, you're never going to or feel like you've arrived.

Here's a thought-provoking question in this context.

What what what would have to happen to you before you felt like you had enough to be generous?

That's an interesting question, isn't it?

If you can't answer it, maybe the idea is not that you have to get to this level of enough.

Here's the other thing about generosity is a lot of us, you know, sometimes we feel generous intentions.

We intend to be generous, but we don't have generous, we don't actually act on it.

And generous intentions make us feel good, kind of, but doesn't actually help other people.

In this family, we trust God enough to give away.

Number three, in this family, we take care of each other.

In this family, we take care of each other.

Um, Jesus didn't just call people to follow him, he gave them a new family and he told them what life in that family should look like.

Let me give you a few examples, right?

Matthew chapter 25, Jesus tells uh three different parables.

Matthew 25 · chapter mention

The the very last parable, he starts to talk about the the his return, when the Son of Man returns, and when he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from goats.

And this is what he says.

Verse 33, Matthew 25, 33, he'll place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left.

Then the king will say to those on his right, Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared from you from the foundation of the world.

Hey, just pause real fast.

If we take Jesus at his word, you know what that means?

That if you are in Christ, there is a kingdom that has been prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

You want to talk not just about the gospel being past generosity, there's future generosity coming to you.

God Himself has prepared a kingdom that you belong to if you belong to Jesus.

Amen, somebody, okay?

And then Jesus says, For I was hungry and you gave me food.

I was thirsty and you gave me drink.

I was a stranger and you welcomed me.

I was naked and you clothed me.

I was sick and you visited me.

I was in prison and you came to me.

Verse 37.

Then the righteous will answer him, saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?

And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you?

When did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?

And the king will answer them, Truly I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.

Where did the early church get this ethic of caring for one another to this degree?

They got it from the very teaching of Jesus, that whatever they did to the least of these, their brothers, they were doing to their Lord.

How would that change the way that you view about caring for those who are in the family of God with you?

In this family, we take care of each other.

Here's another place where this where Jesus' teaching impacts what we're seeing here in Acts chapter 2.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

This is Mark chapter 10, verse 29 and 30.

Mark 10:29

Um, Peter is having a back and forth with Jesus, and um Peter basically says, Hey, we've left everything to follow you.

This is Jesus' reply.

There's no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and for the gospel.

Listen to this, who will not receive a hundredfold, 100x investment now in this time?

Houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands.

So think about this.

He's saying, a lot of you feel like you've left to follow me, but you're gonna get a hundredfold.

And then he uses this phrase, in this time.

So, church, let's ask the question.

When did these disciples ever experience a hundredfold mothers and brothers and sisters and houses and lands?

Do you see it?

It's fulfilled in Acts chapter two.

It's fulfilled in the early church because in the family of God, they're brought into a community with hundreds of spiritual fathers and spiritual mothers and spiritual brothers and spiritual sisters and houses and lands.

Do you see how they were going from house to house as they ate meals together?

Do you see how this was fulfilled in the early church?

And I love um, I told you in this passage, I love the words as any had need.

As any had need.

In other words, that a need of any individual in the community was a need for the whole community.

There wasn't this idea that, oh, that's your problem.

I was like, man, if you have a need, that should matter to all of us.

You know, we kind of hate the idea of our lives being at the beck and call of the needs of others.

But that ignores something I think is really important.

The the same need that we walk past might also be the purpose that we're searching for.

The very same need that we see and we walk past might actually be the very purpose we've been searching for.

I can't tell you how much this is like coming out in a lot of different books and studies.

There's a um, again, a guy named Arthur Brooks, who I read quite a bit of, and he uh studies well-being, happiness, enjoyment.

He's a professor at Harvard, and he engages in conversations with lots and lots of different Gen Z.

And one of the things that he says is that there's a deficit of meaning in Gen Z.

And one of the things that he observes is that the same culture that's shaping them to be isolated from others is also contributing to a lack of deep meaning in their own experience.

What he's saying is if you actually find needs around you and meet them, you'll actually find your meaning.

I think that's profound.

The very need that sometimes we walk past is also tied to the meaning that we've been looking for.

Here's the other reason that sometimes we mess this up.

We don't realize that if we walk away from a community that helps any that has need, because it might call on us, we are also walking away from the community that helped will help us when we have that need.

Um, I have a pastor friend, his name's Kyle Mercer.

He says he talks about this for community groups.

He says, Man, you need to get in a community group.

Do you know why you need to get in a community group?

Because you need relational life insurance.

That's what he calls it.

I love that idea.

Relational life insurance.

You need to invest in people that are around you before you need them.

Because guess what?

In this life, you will have trouble and you're gonna need them.

So, what we've seen in this passage so far, and in this series so far, we've seen that shared worship leads to this shared community, and this shared community leads to this shared generosity.

I'm not sure if we have this image on the screen, but last week I shared the image of the aspen grove.

Do we still have that picture, guys?

We might not.

Um, thank you.

You guys are awesome.

Um I shared this image of this aspen grove.

If you weren't here, um aspens are not just you know single organism.

If you see a bunch of aspen trees together, they actually are one single organism and they're all attached together by the root system.

Like if you could just you know have X-ray vision to look under a bunch of aspen trees, you would see an interlocked root system.

And what that means is it makes the aspen organism incredibly durable whenever there's a blight, whenever there's a drought, because what happens when part of the grove experiences that is just resources and nutrients are rerouted from another part of the grove.

And the aspen grove is incredibly long-living.

It lasts, it's very durable.

I think that's a wonderful picture of what the church of Jesus should be like too, that we have a shared root system.

We have a shared root system, first of all, into Jesus Himself.

And because of that, we have these rich relationships, and these rich relationships become the vehicle by which we care for each other.

So let me make it personal to you.

Let me just ask a question.

What do you have that could help someone else in this church?

What do you have right now that could help someone else in this church?

By the way, we're talking about generosity.

I know sometimes what comes to our mind is money.

I'm not just talking in the category of money.

Maybe it's like you have time that you can help and volunteer to serve.

Maybe you have a skill, an expertise that you can give away to someone else.

Maybe there's a mom that you know that is overwhelmed with childcare, and you could give her just some time to go out and enjoy herself by just taking care of her kids if the relationship is there, right?

Don't do that if you're a stranger.

That's weird.

Okay.

But if the relationship is there, then maybe you could offer to take care of the kids for a period of time so she can go and just be a human being for a little bit.

What do you have that somebody else in this community needs?

Now listen, let me um, I'm gonna fast forward a little bit.

Um if we if you fast forward a couple chapters to go to Acts chapter four, this is this this community life is building on each other through Acts chapter two.

I'm gonna be in Acts chapter four, verse 32.

This is what the text says.

Now the full number of those who believed were one heart and soul.

This is thousands of people at this point.

This is an extraordinary statement, but they were of one heart and soul here, that aspen root system.

That's that's the image I want you to have in mind.

And no one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own.

In other words, no one used that word mine.

But they had everything in common.

And with great power, the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.

Now look at this phrase.

There was not a needy person among them.

Now let me just pause.

Remember, fundamentally, what it means to be human, you guys remember this, is that we're all needy.

So that's not what the text means, is that people stop having needs.

What the text means is they were in such rich community that those needs were shared, that there was such a spirit of generosity that those needs were met.

So it could be said there was not a needy person among them.

By the way, this is I have a friend of mine who studies the Old Testament.

He points out that this is actually fulfillment of what Moses predicted about the nation of Israel, of how they were supposed to interact.

It's actually fulfilled in the new covenant people of God, the church, right here in Acts chapter 4.

Acts 4 · chapter mention

There is not a needy person among them.

For as many as were owners of lands or houses, sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold and laid it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.

You know, two years ago, to the week, Hurricane Helene swept the mountains of South Carolina and North Carolina.

And I came across this story.

This happened in a town called Swannanoa outside of Asheville on this street called, the street is um Edwards Avenue.

Uh it was right beside the river, and there's about 40 mil style homes that are right across from each other.

And um the waters rose so quickly that rescue time, rescue teams did not have time to get there to save those who are flooding or whose homes are flooding.

And so, what did people do?

They got on kayaks and they began to rescue their neighbors.

16 human beings were rescued by their neighbors in Edwards Avenue.

And um, and they rescued each other's pets.

Like it was, it was just this incredible act of community.

Now, what was so interesting is uh Washington Post ran an article about this, but was so interesting is that most of the people in these 40 homes did not know each other before that disaster hit.

But what came out of that disaster is they began to meet together, I think every other Sunday, they shared supplies, they had this supplies that they put in one yard, they shared meals together, and it knit that community together in such an amazing way.

And that story after story of generosity and literally people's lives being saved came out.

Now listen, I I don't think we Harbor City Church have to wait for a disaster to hit to begin to experience that type of rich community.

I think we begin to experience that type of rich community when we engage in generosity and helping meet each other's needs.

By the way, you know, if you are hearing me say the word generosity and you primarily think I'm talking about you giving to the church, you're missing the point of what we're saying.

The point of this passage is that the individuals in the church were taking care of each other's needs.

Now, listen, I know we give to the church.

We also give through the church.

It's one of the one of the ways that we help care for people in our city.

We had a pastor in um Goose Creek pass away very, very tragically.

We were able to give generously on behalf of you because you have given generously.

So we recognize that you give to the church and through the church, and at the same time, we're able to meet each other's needs directly and we become this amazing family of God that everyone here wants to be a part of.

Everyone wants to be a part of a community where you it's it's okay to be needy and you are also needed.

Let me tell you kind of just practically how that works.

You know, you might say to yourself, I you know, I don't know of any needs, you know.

You ask the question, what do I have that other people need?

And I don't know the answer to that.

Let me give you let me give you some next steps.

Um, one, get in a community group if you're not in a community group.

If you are in a community group, ask.

Hey, does anybody here have something?

Do you have a need that I can meet?

You want to be even braver than that?

Open up in your community group and say, hey guys, I haven't shared this yet.

But I've got a need.

We've got a need, and we've been afraid to ask.

And I want to just say, hey, this is what it is.

We could be we've been really lonely.

It could be we're going through financially a hard time.

Uh we're having difficulty with our kids.

Whatever it is, whatever scenario I'm in a job that I want to get out of and I can't seem to find it on my own, I have a need.

Can somebody help me find a new job opportunity?

Whatever it is, open up.

Uh, you want to know another way, like really practical way, to be generous on a regular basis, like be like, hey, I don't know what needs are here.

When you serve here at Harbor City Church, you are meeting other people's needs.

I think about this in a little, I'm gonna give you two examples.

One, when you serve in Harbor City Kids and you allow a mom who all week long has felt her mental and time and energy attached to caring for uh children, and they're able to come and know that somebody else is loving their kids for 90 minutes, someone else is caring for their kids for 90 minutes, so they can come and sit in a service and worship and have one less just for 90 minutes of 168 hours a week and be able to worship and have the word of God invest something in them.

Guess what?

You're being really generous to them every single week.

When you serve on a hospitality team, for example, and you help make a stranger who feels lost in a new city welcome.

You're meeting real needs.

There's there's all these different opportunities that we have around us, church.

We don't have to wait for a tragedy like a hurricane to live those out.

Now, let me give you the fourth and final point here.

In this family, we let our generosity point people to Jesus.

In this family, we let our generosity point people to Jesus.

Now, if you were to look back at the text in verse of verses 46 to 47, you would see see this praising God and having favor with all the people.

And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were receiving help.

Is that what it says?

No, church, is that what it says?

No.

And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being, what's the word?

Wait, so you're telling me that the the outside world saw the life of this community, they saw the generosity, the way that they were caring for one another, and it became so attractive that it didn't just result in people being helped, it resulted in people being saved.

Did you see that?

When we let people see our generosity, and it doesn't just point to us being great people.

You see what I'm saying?

But it points to how God has provided for us.

It can actually be one of the most attractive signs in a watching world that leads to someone else's salvation.

Isn't that amazing?

Listen, here's here's the truth that you don't want to hear, but you need to hear.

You are needy.

You've got needs that you can't meet yourself.

And God made you that way.

You're a finite being.

He's the infinite God.

You are needy.

And here's the other part of that, and you're needed.

The body of Christ needs you.

And we need each other.

You know what happens when a bunch of needy people get together and they have the spirit of generosity?

Relationships and community form in this unbreakable, powerful way.

And I do want to acknowledge this.

Um if you get to the point where you have the courage to share a need in the church, um, you might experience a time where it doesn't go immediately met or even met.

Uh what I'm not trying to paint and say that the church does this perfectly.

The church in Acts doesn't do this perfectly.

We go to chapter six, we see that some of the widows were neglected in the distribution of food.

Like the church is not this utopian, idealistic community.

It's a community full of real people who really need each other.

And so when that happens, we want to extend grace and we also want to look with compassion towards the needs of those around us that we can help meet those.

That's how we will be a generous church.

That's how we'll live the life of the family of God in such a way the watching world sees.

And I'm praying that that's how the Lord will add to our number daily those who are being saved.

Let's pray.

Father, I pray for a great work of your Holy Spirit in this church to make us a people who are generous, who are so cognizant of all that you have given to us.

Not just the air we breathe or the life we live, but the abilities we have, the talents we take credit for, the opportunities in front of us.

You you're such a good and generous God to us.

I pray that it would move us to being good and generous people ourselves.

And God, not just that we would give to others, but that we would be willing to ask for help when we need help.

Father, I want to pray for the person who's been here at Harbor City for some time and they feel like they have been suffering alone.

I pray that your spirit would work in us, that we can extend out grace and love and help.

I pray that you would give us each courage to share when we're the one in the need.

And that you would give us eyes to see that when someone else shares what that need is, that we have a loose hand on our possessions, our time, so that we can move towards them and help meet those needs, Lord, and bind us together all in love as we become the type of church family that you have called us to be.

We pray all this in Jesus' name.

Amen.