learning to walk and share

learning to walk and share!

Acts Chapter 8 and 9

J. Hudson Taylor began to minister in China in 1857. He met many who had been seeking for a long time, as had their fathers. ‘How long have you known about this news in your country?’ he was once asked. Hudson admitted that England had known for many centuries. ‘My father died seeking, why didn’t you come sooner’.

Throughout these two chapters there is a strong theme that people are seeking truth. Paul was a Jew who sought God. Simon the Sorcerer was a man who sought power, but he recognised the power of God. The Ethiopian was seeking God. Many say that this seeking has died in recent years, perhaps that is true, but it is God who stirs the hearts of those who are ready to listen and it is God who places his word or messenger in the right place at the right time.

Another theme that runs throughout these chapters is the work of the messenger that God equips and then uses to share his good news.

It has been pointed out that God rewards faithful work with more faithful work. Philip had worked faithfully in Samaria and was taken to a quiet road in Gaza. He was possibly wondering why he had been taken from a busy area to a lonely road, but then this one individual was precious enough to deserve God’s divine action and his love to bring Philip to him to share the message and understanding of Scripture. It is hard to imagine the importance in the fact that God would have placed Jesus on the cross and allowed him to give his life for just one person, but here we get a glimpse.

God interacts in such a way as to take Philip to share with the enuch that he may be baptised. We do not learn whether the Holy Spirit came upon the eunuch but when Philip is taken away from him the eunuch obviously continues on his journey with reassurance and I am sure that God did not let his discipling end there!

I think the message of these passages for me is for us to be willing to study the Scripture and ask questions ourselves so that we are ready to speak to others when God opens the doors and provides opportunity. That we are prepared to share what we have learnt and walk alongside who ever God places us with.

Stone me

Acts Chapter 7:9 – end

Reading Acts we have to bear in mind that the speeches concerned Jewish thought so when we engage with the text we can learn lots about Jesus and the foundation of our faith.

These speeches may mean nothing to a congregation of seekers now. Of course there will always be those who will learn, engage and understand the historical relevance, but the impact and proof would not amount to the same as it did for the Jews with their belief and understanding of their history and its significance to the Messiah coming.

It was and is important however that the time line is laid out, that the basics were shared - so that we can all know and understand how things have fitted together. Stephens’s speech does this.

No doubt this is a Loooong speech. Not as long as some sermons we’ve been to though so read on!

Notice that Stephen’s speech does not end with a pardon. It does not offer hope and stone me the listeners did not like it. Perhaps a lesson to be learnt is that we all need hope, we all need a light to walk toward when we face a dead end.

Stephen

Acts Chapter 6-7:8

– This is another favourite section of Acts for me. Stephen, a man chosen to wait on tables - blows out of the window our modern conception and division of ministry and labour!

The problem: some were being neglected and so a solution had to be found. The leaders used great wisdom and in doing so did not allow division (or Satan) a foothold in the fellowship. Unity needed to be maintained, love and fellowship needed to be nurtured.

It is interesting that the Apostles studied the situation and recognised that if they were busy serving tables they would begin neglecting their duty of prayer and ministry of the word. And this deficiency would certainly have allowed space for more problems to develop. Men from among the disciples were to be chosen by the disciples. I think it is important to notice that it is the fellowship who are asked to discern those who should take on the new responsibility. No agenda’s are being followed here, simply a building up of the people of God.

When any fellowship faces problems it is also faced with opportunity.
Stephen was full
Full of the Holy Spirit 6:3,
Full of wisdom 6:3, 10
Full of faith 6:5
Full of power 6:8

In Scripture to be full means to be ‘controlled’ by. (Wiesbe p430)

Alexander Maclaren who wrote an Exposition of Scripture in the 1800s has some encouraging words for us:
He reflects that fullness is a growing fullness, that our spirits are infinite and are capable of indefinite growth …

‘the possible growth of a created spirit that is in touch with God, and is having itself enlarged and elevated and ennobled by that contact. The vessel is elastic, the walls of the cup of our spirit, into which the new wine of the divine Spirit is poured, widen out as the draught is poured into them. The more he is capable of possessing the more he will receive.’ (p205)


Through Stephen we hear of how God was using his people to love, share, teach and bless. The comments that he was full become literal as he stands in front of his accusers and stands in the name of Jesus.

I pray that we are all able to be as busy with our daily duties and as successful in them as Stephen and also able to be filled with the Holy Spirit that we be become wise and full of wisdom, power and faith. AMEN

Who would fight against God?

Acts Chapter 4:32-5-end

- Therefore, in the present case I advise you:

Leave these men alone! Let them go! For if their purpose or activity is of human origin, it will fail. But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God." Acts 5:38

This passage shouts out to me in so many ways that all attempts to hinder the message of God being spoken were failing.

Inside problems did not weaken the fellowship which supported and encouraged the message to be lived out.
Persecution and fear of going to jail did not stop the message being spoken.
Human authority and powers did not stop the message being spoken.

Acts 4:32-5:11
Lets first think about the lesson we might learn from Ananias and Sapphira:
Fellowship; this is such a powerful word; it is unity, generosity, love and honesty. The believers were of one heart and mind; this must have been such a powerful witness in itself. I remember being in Aberdeen - living in a community which had grown from a small fishing village to a commuter village. In the local community centre I asked one of the older members of the community why people did not visit each others houses for coffee etc. ‘Why would you do that?’ she asked. That community had never been a strong foundation to build a community of fellowship on. It was hard to make friends in and it had a very high depression rate.

God taught the early church members a lesson through Ananias and Sapphira – God loves His Church and is jealous over it. It was purchased by the blood of his Son and has been enabled on earth to glorify God and do his work, nothing less.

Acts 5:12-32
Lets secondly think about preaching the message and persecution.
Fear is natural and important. It tells us when to beware. It helps us to tread the right path and be safe. When your whole community turn against you it should be natural that fear would help you to determine what to do. These disciples were definitely bold and not stupid. They were not ignoring God because it was God who directed them in what to say and when to say it. The miracles no doubt helped their faith and conviction. They were convinced – and from what we read their conviction was infectious!

Acts 5:33-end
Lets think about human authority and power
Theudas and Judas the Galilean obviously had much charisma, power and authority, they were characters that had attracted much attention and following, but they did not have Gods power or authority and their work failed.

Who would fight against God? God will bless and enable his work to continue while other efforts may thrive for a while but will eventually dwindle to nothing.

Whats in a Name?

Acts Chapter 3 -4:31
Whats in a name?
- If I said to you ‘Blair has sent me’, its no guarantee you would entertain me, but you would know I came with a ‘name’ behind me... enough said – let’s see!

The Name - Peter uses many different names and titles in this address as he reminds the Jews of their act in crucifying Jesus: Ch3: v14 The Holy and Righteous One, 15 The Author of life, 17 His (God’s) Christ, 22 Prophet, 26 His Servant, Ch4: 11 The Capstone, 12 Saviour. He was clarifying who Jesus was. Obviously these names had a meaning and deep culture surrounding them. Listeners knew the scriptures and the teaching surrounding them.

The Miracles- were physical signs and certainly drew attention. We read of Peter and John reaching the masses through helping one individual. Jesus also helped individuals in his ministry and we see that again it is often helping the individual that masses were reached. Yes people came to be healed both with Jesus and with Peter but it was the message that changed lives – a lesson for us perhaps?

The message is vital with both Jesus and Peter – why?
It is the message which equates to the real life changing power and truth;

It is the reality of the message which is the wonder and authority of God;

It is the message which meets with his people. God calling them again to repent and turn back to God.

So with both the miracles and the blessing of the Holy Spirit and the new message from God the last days certainly seemed to have come, just as the prophets had foretold.

The miracles provided an opportunity for Peter to turn attention from his works (the miracles) to the name of Jesus and the message Jesus enabled to be pronounced.

A bit more for those who want it:
The Jewish people knew that God worked through people, they also knew the power of God was too awesome to comprehend. These witnesses were not saying ‘we are prophets, this is God’s message to you’, this was different. God had raised Jesus from the dead; now witnesses were telling that Jesus had ascended to heaven and that God’s Holy Spirit was working though his people. This was a powerful witness to the reality and truth of what was being said.

The Jewish people knew Gods covenant demanded that they listen afresh and continually seek Him with all their heart, mind and strength (Deut 6:5). He asks nothing less of us all these years later. Wiesbe has written ‘Calvary may have been man’s last word, but the empty tomb was God’s last word’ (p412*1) and that also still stands all these years later!

Peter addresses the crowd and 1. announces the crime, 2. gives the evidence and 3. offers a pardon.

In the crime they acted in ignorance
The evidence shows that this was God’s will and they knew not what they were doing.

The pardon began long back,
a quick scan through Lev. 4-5 and Num. 15:22-31 will show that an offering should be made for those sins done in ignorance, but, what about deliberate sin Numbers 15:30-31 states: 'But anyone who sins defiantly, whether native-born or alien, blasphemes the LORD, and that person must be cut off from his people. Because he has despised the LORD's word and broken his commands, that person must surely be cut off; his guilt remains on him. This is an important point for later on in Acts when we find the pardon being left off the end of the message.

So what is in the name of Jesus? Actually just as with the name of Blair, it’s the person and the character. As we learn about Jesus we should be able to put our trust and loyalty wholeheartedly in him.

Proof

Acts Chapter 2

– Peter was convinced and he stood up to tell it out loud. But what convinced him?

Wiersbe wrote:

‘The ministry of the Holy Spirit is to -

glorify Christ in the life and witness of the believer’.*¹

When John the Baptist speaks of Jesus he is careful to emphasise that Jesus is first, He was before, and He is greater than …. The focus is shifted to Jesus. Luke, when writing about John the Baptist, is also careful to state that John ‘prepared the way’ for Jesus. It is Jesus who is the focus.

In Acts 2 Luke is again careful to record that it was Jesus’ death and resurrection which had enabled this day of out pouring of the Holy Spirit. Jesus is the focus - even the dates point to Jesus’ fulfilment of prophecy and Scripture.

Pentecost, known as Harvest or the ‘Feast of Weeks’ is the birth date of Judaism. It comes seven weeks (50 days) after Passover when the Israelites left Egypt.

• It is the festival which celebrates the giving of the law to Moses on Mount Sinai.
• It is the festival which remembers their dependence on God; on the same day that they were given the law, 3000 souls had died due to disobedience.
• It is the festival in which God told the Israelites to offer two loaves of bread with seven male lambs as a peace offering (wave offering, see Lev 23:19). ‘It was one of the days on which all Israel was to meet God and one another, at the place which the Lord should choose’ *².

It is not surprising then that so many people were glad to hear Peter’s words and believed. They expected God to meet them – expected. Do we have that expectancy?

Peter gave four proofs that Jesus had risen from the dead:

1. The person of Jesus – Those listening would no doubt have heard if not witnessed Jesus. He had lived, ministered and been crucified and in his life no wrong could be found against him. He was the talk of the town!
2. Prophecy of David – Psalm 16:8-11 – verses which obviously could not apply to David who was already dead and buried.
3. Witnesses to his being risen. After his death many had seen him in various places, from a BBQ on the beach (John 21:9) to a conference of 500 (1 Cor 15:6). From a group of disbanded, sad, dejected, men and women suddenly people were saying – No, we were wrong – he is not dead- now we understand who he was/is. He is risen.
4. And now the last proof – The Holy Spirit – the promise of God that would come in the last days to God’s people. He must be alive for this to be happening. He must be who he said he was. And now they understood. Do We?

Acts ch: 1 They Believed

Acts Chapter 1

They believed

In what and why?
Risen Christ – The people of Galilee had known of Jesus or seen him, a preacher, teacher, healer, friend and master. He had travelled through out the region, often followed by masses of people. He was definitely known - even political and other documents of the time and contemporary history books confirm that there was a figure Jesus who is the same person we learn of. His followers, who saw him die and then be buried, knew he had died and when they came to the grave yard and found his tomb open they still needed proof that he was risen and they got it!

He appeared and disappeared to many, in public and private places, during a period of forty days. He ate with them, invited them to touch his body, gave instructions, and taught them. Luke tells us that ‘he (Jesus) gave proofs’ and what ever they were they must have been convincing because these people were prepared to make fools of themselves, be martyred and continue preaching though told not to. Are there proofs that you have found that help you believe? It is often helpful to hear from friends and to remind ourselves.

Kingdom – Jesus does not rebuke the disciples' question about the Kingdom Acts 1:6, after all he had opened their minds to Scripture (Luke 24:44-45), they knew what they were asking, probably far more than we understand! But Jesus does explain that it is not for us to know the time or place but it is for us to be spiritually changed. And it was and is time for us to be part of sharing this spiritual Kingdom with those who want to hear the message. The assured hope is that Jesus has ‘given us our future’ and it is good to look forward to that, but it is also important to be busy in the present. Thinking of our earthly lives and careers we can draw a parallel in that we work hard for our future - do we not!

Each Other – A group of humble, devoted, holy followers huddle together - Doubting Thomas, Denying Peter, the ‘wanting to be greatest’ brothers - James and John, the unloyal brothers of Jesus, the list could go on. A very holy bunch! Those assembled could have blamed each other and doubted each other but they did not. They did not. They believed in each other and bound themselves together in unity they also believed in Gods leading - in one accord. ‘One accord’ is found six times in Acts – (1:14; 2:1, 46; 4:24; 5:12; 15:25 and note 2:44)

Now there is a challenge!

Pre-amble to Acts

Hope you all had a great summer and feel organised and ready for the new year –long may we feel organised!
The - aliveandonline biblestudy group – is ready to start, hope you find it uplifting and enlightening as we learn from each other and build up our fellowship, knowledge and love in these unsettled times.
Peace in Christ – is the name of the game. A little effort from us but I hope it good for us all, let me know if you think something is not working or could be done differently.

I am very happy to send you a paper copy of studies and readings if it makes life easier for you.

Rosanna

Pre-amble:
It’s interesting that Acts is named 'Acts of the Apostles' when in fact Luke’s attention is focused on the preaching and activities of Peter and Paul leaving aside other Apostles and preachers. Luke gives a detailed account which enables readers a fuller historical understanding of how Christianity spread.When I think of Acts the ‘upper-room’, the ‘coming of the Holy Spirit’ and ‘Paul’ are my main memories. We will discover that it is firstly Peter who holds the key for the door to be opened to the Gentiles to enter the Kingdom of God. Paul then becomes the main figure with his band of ‘merry men’ travelling through ~Turkey, Greece and finally to Rome.

There are many interesting and diverse figures, themes and messages, I look forward to hearing what you discover and sharing mine also.

Here is a thought for you:
Luke hopes that we 'may be confident in all that we have been taught' (Luke 1:4).Are you a sports person, a musician or do you have a love of travel?
Do you believe what you are told about a match or piece of music by those commentating?
Do you read about a country and decide to go or not based on what you have read?

Some of us hear what is said and believe what we are told without questioning - we simply enjoy what we are doing and go with the flow. This is fine, but Luke’s readers were probably not like that. He had written one book explaining up to a point in Jesus’ life and now he was going to write about the life of the disciples and apostles – The effect of Jesus death if you like! I find it striking that Luke wrote his first book so that the reader may be confident in what he had been taught. I want to encourage you then that our aim should be confidence in what we have worked out and believe. That means a healthy mix of enjoying what we are learning and going with the flow and also wanting to question and look at things from a different angle. We need to have worked out what we believe and why!Acts is the story of the history of SALVATION (the act of saving or protecting from harm, risk, loss, destruction, etc) and REDEMPTION (paying off, as of a mortgage)
The resources I am likely to use are:
http://www.seite.co.uk/seitecms/ Up to date online resources via links from the SEITE theological porthole

Wiersbe, Warren W. 1989 The Bible Exposition V.1 Acts (Victor Books) SP Publications

Barclay William 1956 The Daily Study Bible (The Saint Andrew Press, Scotland)

Maclaren Alexander D.D 1826-1910 Expositions of Scriptures - Acts

Calender for studies

My hope is that we will have a study put online every two weeks, the first and third Sunday. And the last Sunday (Sat if people prefer) of the month will be the social.

I also propose we go through ACTS 2 ish chapters a month.

Sept ch.1 and ch.2
Oct ch.3-4:31 and 4:32-5
Nov ch.6-7:8 and 7:9-end
Dec ch.8 and ch.9 (notice the 2 themes)
Jan ch.10 and ch.11-12
Feb (quiet day ch.13 and ch.14) ch.15-ch.16:5 and ch.16:6-end
Mar ch.17 and ch.18
Apr ch.19 and ch.20
May ch. 21-22:21 and ch.22:22-23
June ch.24-25:22 and ch.25:23-end
July ch.27 and ch.28

Calender for socials

The last Sunday of the month will be a social where we will get together with friends and do something fresh and family orientated. Invite friends, family, associates.

Here is the proposed social calender Sundays 3.30-5.30pm
Sept 11th 8pm Coffee or Wine and web at 11 Oatfield Drive (for us to see site and chat)

Sept 28th Walk in Angely Forest back for Hotchoc, sarnies n marshmellows
(this went really well with such a bright dry day, the kids loved acting as frodo with firns on their heads!)

Oct 18th Vestry Hall, Louise leaving party

Nov 30th Chilli BBQ Fun Bring and Share

Dec 21st christingle prep &christmas Party (changed week) Church House

Jan 4th No social unless someone invites us all to their house!

Feb SAT 28th Quiet Day children can spend day with Rosanna while parents have a retreat! minimal cost of about £10

Mar 29th Hastings Chips on the Beach

Apr 10th Hot cross Bun service (if it is still on?)

May 31th Lights and Candles Fun bring n share Church House

June 28th Pool Play (cant promise we wont all get wet) bring n share

July 19th BBQ bring n share

Intro to aliveandonline cell

Hi Rosanna here

from last year it was obvious that there are many of us for whom a cell in a home is just not easy to attend. This is probably because our husbands or wives work abroad alot, travel to work and get home real late etc.


With the business of family lives or just life I hope those with and without children for whom this style of cell may work will be able to study, fellowship and have input.

My hope is that doing 'cell' this way will give us the time to begin reflecting on a study with it fitting into our lives conveniently.

We can study as individuals and if we find it helpful also as a community; being able to share, discuss, challenge and question in our own space and time via the comments bit at the bottom of each study.

Enjoy