Spiritual Participation (Acts 4:32a)

 

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 10/3/2017 8:53 AM

 

My Worship Time                                                                             Focus:  Spiritual Participation

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  Acts 4:32a

 

            Message of the verse:  And the congregation of those who believed were of one heart and soul.”

 

            We wrote at the end of our SD yesterday that the verses in this section, Acts 4:32-5:11 can be broken up into two sections, “the sharing of the saints and the sins of the saints.  Today we look at the first sub-section under that first main section “The Sharing of the Saints.”  John MacArthur writes the following about this first main section:  “This concise passage forms the positive backdrop against which the negative portrait of sin in the church is portrayed.  From it four features emerge that illustrate the richness of the fellowship and sharing experienced in the early church.”  Today’s SD will be about this first feature.

 

            Numbering those who have become believers is not seen because the number of believes has grown so much and we can see the reason as to why this happened as we once again look back at verse 31 “And when they had prayed, the place where they had gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God with boldness.”  Being filled with the Holy Spirit caused them to speak the word of God with boldness which in turn caused many people to become born-again.  This church at Jerusalem, the very first church became a remarkable church indeed and because of this Satan was not happy with it and as we will learn he begins to attack the church from the inside, but in the verses we will study at the end of Acts chapter four we will see that the people who were believers did some remarkable things, things that truly show that they had been born from above.  We see that first of all they “were of one heart and soul,” telling us that there were not any doctrinal differences with them, for after all they had the apostles of our Lord to teach them the things that the Lord had taught them. 

 

            Let’s look more about this statement they “were of one heart and soul.”  We begin by looking at John 13:35 where we read that Jesus said “"By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another."”  Love for another, and that is exactly what these believers had.  John 17:21, which is our Lord’s High Priestly prayer we see He states “that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me.”  This first fellowship was truly an answer to this part of our Lord’s High Priestly prayer.

 

            John MacArthur concludes this section with the following paragraph: 

 

“The basis of their shared life was twofold.  First, they were preoccupied with ministering to each other.  So intent were they on meeting each other’s needs that they had no concern for gratifying their own desires.  Theirs was a humility stemming from seeing themselves in relation to Jesus Christ, and others as more important than themselves (Phil. 2:3).  Second, they were focused beyond themselves to reaching the lost world with the truth of the gospel.  That left them little time to bother with trivial personal matters.  Their unity stemmed from focusing on those priorities Jesus had left them; selflessly loving each other, and reaching the lost world.”

 

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I have mentioned in earlier SD’s that back in the 1980’s Billy Graham was preaching in a large city in western Canada and he told the people that he was talking to that it is difficult to serve the Lord in places like this great western city of Canada.  The reason was that they had many things that were satisfying them and therefore did not desire to serve the Lord because in their eyes had all that they needed.  The same is true today, but it was not true in this Jerusalem church we read about in the book of Acts.

 

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Not to get caught up in the things of the world, but trust the Lord to allow me to tell others about the truth of the gospel.

 

Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:  “In the church in the air” (1 Thessalonians 4:17).

 

Today’s Bible question:  “Complete the beatitude ‘"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs.”

 

Answer in our next SD.

 

10/3/2017 9:23 AM