Theme: Jesus Christ -
who creates, sustains and equips the Church
through His Spirit
Recently, we went looking for a
new oven. The old one had done very good service, but was a lot the worse for
wear over so many years of use. So, off round the shops
looking for a new oven. Finally, we found just the thing out at a
showroom in
With it safely installed at home, I phoned up the suppliers – and yes, they promised to send the missing timer button, and the handbook. But it would take a week. So for the next few days – not quite understanding entirely how it worked, we pushed, and turned at the switches and buttons, and managed to cook one or two things. Until a week later the timer button and handbook arrived. And what a difference ! Once the timer button was in place, with the handbook, at last the switches and buttons made sense. Now we know what we’re doing, which button to press, which switch to turn….
– it makes sense !
We may well we read the book of Acts, right the way through, and enjoy the way in which it unfolds in such a wonderful account of the Church in its earliest days, but the book of Acts only really makes sense, it’s real significance and importance only emerge as the book, the handbook, if you like, of how the Holy Spirit moves, and works.
We find again and again in the book of Acts, the Spirit, the Holy Spirit working, moving, inspiring, creating, shaping the Church, helping the Church to witness in new circumstances.
So is the book of Acts only important as a record of what happened at the very beginning of the Church ?
No – the book of Acts is
important for what it teaches us about the
In our own circumstances, the book of Acts has much to say to us,
about matters which have recently concerned the General Assembly and several committees – matters to do with the very future of the Church.
The book of Acts has much to say to us.
What is the message of Acts ?
Let’s think briefly of two themes contained in the message as we find it in Acts:
First, that it is Jesus Christ who creates, upholds and sustains the
Church
through His Spirit
And second, that it is Jesus Christ who equips the Church through His
Spirit to adapt for every new circumstance, with a new word for each situation
First, Jesus Christ who creates, upholds and sustains the Church
through His Spirit
In the opening chapters of the book of Acts, chapters 1 and 2
we see, on the day of
Pentecost, the Spirit, promised, and
sent by Jesus Christ, creating the Church, calling the Church into life
drawing men and women the believers together there in
The Spirit that Jesus sends, the
Spirit of Jesus, comes down on the crowd of believers blessing men and women as
rain blesses dry and thirsty ground, and the Church springs into life, green
and fresh and new……
Under the pressures of daily life, in the changing situation we find
ourselves,
in the rapid change
over the last forty or fifty years,
it is a great challenge
to the Church to face the years to come,
to begin to find a way
forward.
But , from the very beginning of the
Book of Acts, it is quite clear that
Christian hope and confidence is in
Jesus Christ who creates,
upholds and sustains the Church
through His Spirit.
Here is our hope, and our confidence.
Our hope -
because whenever and wherever the Church becomes dry, thirsty ground
we can look to Jesus
Christ,
and ask that He will send His Spirit,
and the Spirit will come in blessing upon us, and the Church will spring
into life, green and fresh and new……
Our confidence because
the New Testament declares that He is the One to whom all power has been given; He is the Head of the Church.
And the future lies in His care, for
all power,
all authority belongs………to Jesus Christ.
Perhaps you can sense what
enormous strength and confidence this should give us…….. the New Testament
declares that Jesus is the One to whom all power has been given.
He is the Head of the Church,
all power,
all authority belongs………to Him -
Jesus Christ who creates, upholds and sustains the Church
through His Spirit
Secondly,
it is Jesus Christ who equips the Church through His Spirit for every new circumstance, with a new word
for each situation…
This is exactly what Jesus promised, recorded in the Gospel of John,
That the Father in heaven would send the Spirit, and when the Spirit came,
He would give men and women the words to speak of Jesus – with genuine power, sincere authority………
So it is that Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, stands before the
leaders of the
it is Jesus Christ who equips the Church through His Spirit for every new
circumstance, with a new word for each situation.
And we see this as Peter speaks: Jesus Christ through His Spirit equipping Peter with a new word for the situation.
for it is Jesus Christ who equips the Church through His Spirit for every new circumstance, with a new word
for each situation.
And so it is in the book of
Acts, we see the apostle Philip in quite different circumstances on the road south to
speaking
in the Spirit to the chancellor of
far away
about Jesus: the lowly one, despised and rejected,
who has offered Himself for the sin of the world,
who has taken on Himself our weaknesses, carried our sorrows,
and by whose wounds we are healed.
And the chancellor of
for it is Jesus Christ who equips the Church through His Spirit for every new circumstance, with a new word
for each situation.
You know, a recent survey of the Church in
has come up with some
astonishing results……
Researchers, counting worshippers one Sunday counted
for the
2, 500 worshippers, for the whole city of Amsterdam……… cause for
concern, you might think, with so few
worshippers attending…………..
but on the same day – they counted 25,000 worshippers from the
world wide Church ! from The
The significance of Acts 11 is that
here we see Jesus Christ creating the Church
through
His Spirit among those who were strangers and foreigners to
And then equipping Peter with a new word for this new situation.
We meet Peter in Joppa. As he is praying on the roof of his lodgings, he is caught up in a vision, and as in the next few moments, he ponders the vision, some men come from Cornelius a Roman centurion who lives in Caesarea, a couple of days journey away, asking Peter to come with them.
Peter goes with them. And when
he gets to
And so the Church springs into being, in this, the household of a Roman centurion !
What an extraordinary thing.
Even in this town of
To say this once again………..
this is where our hope and confidence lie,
in focussing, not on ourselves, but on Jesus Christ,
for:
it is Jesus Christ who creates, upholds and sustains the Church
through His Spirit
and it
is Jesus Christ who empowers the Church
through His Spirit
for every new circumstance, with a new word for each situation.
Surely this is a word, not just for ourselves here in this congregation this morning -
but for every congregation in the land……
the whole Church.
For the Word declares:
the stone the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone……
AMEN.