Transcript
Throughout the series, we’ve said that technology can help connect us. It actually can, but it can never replace the importance and priority of face-to-face, in-person fellowship that God created us for. And if you think about how God created us, he made us first of all for himself, and then he made us for one another. He made us so that we would live in community with one another. As the Apostle John wrote, 2 John 12 (ESV) “Though I have much to write to you, I would rather not use paper and ink.
Instead I hope to come to you and talk face to face, so that our joy may be complete.” John wasn’t against writing. He wasn’t against pen and paper. He just said it’s superior to be in person. It’s better to be in person.
And I’m not against screens and smartphones and those kinds of things. They can help us, but if we get them out of order, they can also be a hindrance to our relationships. In our series theme, we’ve been following the four devotions. The four sermons actually followed the four devotions of Acts 2:42 (ESV) “And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.”
Today we’re on that fourth devotion – prayer. And we’re going to be talking about the importance of praying together.
We know how to pray alone and it’s good to pray alone, but it’s just as important to set a priority of praying with God’s people, praying together. And we’re going to be talking about that today. Now, all of us know how to communicate a prayer request. You just post it on Facebook, right? Here’s my prayer request.
And then you get the prayer emojis and you know people are out there praying for you, right? And so that is helpful, you know, and we know how to inform people of our prayer needs, but it’s not the same. It doesn’t communicate as much as what we see in the scripture that you could bear one another’s burdens, that you could come together in person and actually lift up each other and lift up prayers for each other and find real strength. Some burdens become lighter when shared. Some fears begin to lose their grip when you open up about them. Some trials require more than a prayer emoji.
They require God’s people together with you in person, somebody putting their hand on your shoulder or holding hands with you and lifting up your prayer request, your burden together in prayer. It helps to lift them off of your shoulders to the very presence of God. Now, we all want to know that someone will stand with us when life gets hard. We all want to know that. And that desire is not just limited to grown-ups.
Children feel it too. They feel that same desire to come together. And that reminds me of a popular family movie that’s out right now. I think it’s in part 5, Toy Story part 5. I think I’m like three behind on this one.
But I was looking into this because this weekend we had our grandchildren over. Robin and I had our ten grandchildren over for our annual event that we call “Grandparents Weekend.” We used to call it the “Grandparents Trip” and then there were ten of them, and we’d need to buy a bus. And so we said, let’s just have them at the house for the weekend. So they dropped them off Thursday at 5:00 PM, and pickup was at noon on Saturday.
We had them for two nights, and it was great. The first thing I said to them when they showed up was, “Hand me your phones and your screens, and here’s where they’re going to be. They’re going to be upstairs in your bedrooms.” And by the way, if any of you saw photos of what happened at our house over the weekend, you couldn’t even walk in the bedrooms because we had blow-up mattresses. And so they had to walk on each other’s bedding; it was just really great.
And it was a great weekend. At the end of the weekend, my wife Robin asked the kids, “What was your favorite part of the weekend?” They could have said swimming in the pool, shooting basketball, playing ping pong, eating all these great meals, but you know what they said? They said that it was Papaw’s stories at night.
And so every year, I write stories and each of them has a part. They’re called “The Cosmic Cousins” and they all have parts. One of them at the end of the second night, stood up; I think it was Kenzie. She stood up and said, “Oh no, we have to wait another year?” because I ended it with a cliffhanger again.
I found out, and maybe you could learn this too, that they can still sit still for a story. They can still be quiet and be together without a screen. They can have a meal and have a conversation with their Papaw and their Mingie, which is what they call Robin and not be looking at a pad. Now, maybe they can only do it for two days; I don’t know what the parents are doing with them now, but we got through two days without it.
So back to Toy Story, because I had grandkids over and it inspired me to look into this thing. There’s a little girl, she’s 8 years old, she’s named Bonnie, and she has trouble making friends, as the story goes. And so her parents think maybe because they see all the other little kids have a pad called “Lily Pad,” maybe if she gets one she could be accepted. And then, of course, she stops playing with her real toys, and so then there’s that Toy Story dilemma. There’s this new toy that is, you know, grabbing all of her time – “Lily Pad.”
She’s in a chat, I guess, on the “Lily Pad” and she becomes friends with some of the little girls in her dance class. They invite her over to a sleepover, but ultimately they end up making fun of her online. And so the thing that she was seeking to be accepted, she found out was the very thing that was injuring her little heart. I’m surprised, thankfully surprised, that Hollywood put out something that I think is probably pretty good and timely and useful for parents to consider now. Not that pads are bad, but they have their place and they need to be used responsibly. Well, that’s kind of been the setup for this series.
That’s not what this message is about. What this message is about is a better priority, and life is better face to face. That leads us into Acts chapter four, where we’re going to be looking at this devotion of prayer and how it’s one thing to give people the information about your prayer request. It’s a whole other thing to get together and to pray together. In the book of Acts,
Luke described, after the Jewish leaders had arrested Peter and John and threatened them to stop speaking in the name of Jesus, how they immediately went to their brothers and sisters and prayed together. I believe today that we can bring those things that threaten us, those trials that we’re facing, and we can pray together and experience real help. As we look at the text today, I’m going to see together with you four reasons why the best help we can find for the trials that we face, in order to answer God’s mission for our life, is found in our text today. Four reasons why we can get real help in praying together. Chapter 4 of the book of Acts.
Acts 4:23-31 (ESV) 23 “When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them. 24 And when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them, 25 who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit, “‘Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples plot in vain? 26 The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers were gathered together, against the Lord and against his Anointed’ 27 for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, 28 to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. 29 And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness, 30 while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.
31 And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.” This is God’s word. Amen. We’re looking for three reasons why praying together helps us face trials and fulfill Christ’s mission. Here’s the first reason:
1. Because it helps us lift our shared burdens to God’s throne.
It helps us lift our shared burdens to God’s throne. Look at verse 23. It says, “When they were released…” Released from what? From jail. They had spent the night in jail.
They appeared before the court of the Sanhedrin that morning, and they were threatened to no longer speak in the name of Jesus. Why were they arrested? Why were they jailed and brought before the Sanhedrin, which was the Jewish leaders, the high priest and others? Why? Because in chapter 3 of the book of Acts, they had been going up to the temple to pray, Peter and John, and as they went up to the temple, they encountered a crippled man who had been crippled since birth.
Probably, the family or friends would carry him up there every day to the gate called “Beautiful” and he would beg – “alms for the crippled, alms for the poor” and he rattled his dish. And so as Peter and John walk by, Peter looks at him and he says, Acts 3:6 (KJV) “Then Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk.” And he takes him by the arm and pulls him up.
And the man doesn’t just walk. The man, who had never walked in his whole life, goes dancing behind Peter and John into the temple and leaping and crying out that he’d been healed. And a great crowd gathered in the temple courts, and Peter, never one to waste an opportunity, preached Jesus. And he got arrested for it. And he was threatened not to do it again.
So as soon as he got out, he didn’t stop by Chick-fil-A on the way home. He didn’t go get something to eat. They spent the night in jail and didn’t get a night’s sleep. No, they went straight to the house where the people had been praying for them. And the people that were praying were probably thinking, we might not ever see Peter and John again.
Again, it hadn’t been but a little while since they had crucified Jesus, and it’s this same crowd now that have their own Peter and John. We might not ever see them again. And then Peter and John come to the door. That’s what all happened before we get to this: Verse 23, “When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them.”
They told them, ‘Hey, we got threatened. We were told to never talk about Jesus again; not to do that anymore.’ And so they could’ve stopped right there; this is what happens sometimes at some of the prayer gatherings maybe. Maybe the people think, what we need to do now is give Peter and John some advice – maybe you shouldn’t have been so loud in the temple and you attracted attention to yourself or maybe you should’ve…
They didn’t do that. They came in with their prayer request and gave them their report, and guess what the people did? Well, let’s look and see. Did they give them advice? No, it says in verse 24 “And when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them,”
You know what they did when they received the burdens that Peter and John brought to them? They didn’t offer them advice. They didn’t try to fix it. They didn’t say, you should have done this, or maybe you could try this next time. You know what they said?
We’d better pray about this. Let’s lift this up to God. Let’s go to God’s throne room. Well, Gary, why do you say God’s throne room? Well, let’s look at how the prayer began: “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them,”
”Sovereign Lord,” King of the universe, sovereign over all sovereigns, Lord God. That’s how they start. “Sovereign Lord.” And then Creator God, “who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them.” They started in the throne room.
They didn’t start in the room where the Sanhedrin were. They’re not in authority. They claim authority, but they have no authority. The only authority given to them is that which is released to them through the Sovereign Lord. So that’s who they addressed.
When Peter and John came in and told them their prayer requests, they said, ‘Hey, let’s bring these burdens up to the Sovereign Lord. Let’s take them into the throne room.’ And do you know what? They didn’t have to knock at the door. They didn’t have to stop at the secretary’s desk in heaven and say, ‘Hey, Angel Gabriel, could you see if we can get an appointment with the Father?’
No, the door is flung wide open. The temple curtain is rent from top to bottom. The Holy of Holies is wide open. They just could come right on in. Not because they knew how to pray well, not because they were somehow able to earn that position, but Jesus had paved the way.
He had paid all the price. They were able to say, “Sovereign God” and they did this together. It’s helpful to do it together. It helps us to do it together because we often try to bear it alone.
And when we bear it alone, we’re so bowed under the weight of our own trials, we have a hard time looking up. But together we can bear one another’s burdens. We can share them and lift them to God’s throne. The book of Galatians says, Galatians 6:2 (ESV) “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” We teach this all the time here —
“You can’t do the ‘one anothers’ without one another.” How are you going to bear one another’s burdens if you don’t get together? You have to get together face to face. Phones are great, pads are great. It’s not the same as face to face.
Bear one another’s burdens, pray for each other. And we have the right to the throne room because Hebrews says, Hebrews 4:16 (ESV) “Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” We can come on in because the door’s been flung open, because of what Jesus has done for us. We can cry out to the King and the Creator of all things, and He hears us. And when we cry out together, it helps those of us that are burdened down to lift our eyes up.
It gets us together in this. Have you ever tried to move something heavy on your own and you think to yourself, I got this? Some years ago, we had just moved to Roanoke, Virginia. I bought my wife a piano. It was a nice piano. We really loved this piano, and the movers put it where we told them to.
We bought a two-story house that was kind of built into a hill, and so you could also walk around to the deck and you were on the upstairs side because of the way the hill hit the house. And so they put the piano upstairs where we told them to, and then we found out we didn’t really like the piano upstairs, We really wanted it downstairs. So my brother came over, my younger brother. I said to him, “I think me and you can move this.” He says, “Do you think we can get it down those stairs?” I said, “I have an idea.
What if we take it out to the back upstairs deck; there’s only three steps off the deck to the yard, and then we’ll walk down the hill in the yard and then carry it downstairs through the downstairs door. We’ll avoid all of those steep steps.” He says, “That’s a long walk.” I said, “We can take a rest once in a while.” I mean, look at me, you know, right? And so we head off.
I said, “I’ll be the guy who goes backwards.” I’m the big brother, you know. And so we carried the piano around, and right when we almost made the last step, we had done so well, my brother stumbled a little bit and dropped his end, and broke the leg of Robin’s new piano. If you ever go over to my son Stephen’s house, it’s right as you walk in the door. We gave it to him.
Somebody in the church gave us a better one. We’ve got that one in our living room now. Here’s the moral of the story: we thought we had it. I thought we could carry that burden without calling more friends over. I was wrong.
And that wasn’t the first time, and that pains me to say it. It’s not the last time that I have said, ‘Hey, I got this.’ Famous last words of Gary.
It’s better to share the burdens with others. And bring it into the throne room. The Sanhedrin threatened the apostles, but they didn’t occupy the throne. We can share burdens and lift them up to the throne room. Here’s the second reason:
2. Because it helps us see our circumstances from God’s perspective.
It helps us see our circumstances from God’s perspective. We’re at verse 25 and following. They prayed to the sovereign Lord, the sovereign Creator, Then verse 25, “who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit, “‘Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples plot in vain?” Somebody in the room felt Scripture come into their heart, and they verbatim prayed Psalm 2:1-2. They referred to it like this. Instead of saying, ‘the Lord just put on my heart Psalm 2:1-2,’
they said, “who through the mouth of our father David,” because David is the one who wrote the Psalm. But he didn’t write it in his own power. “….your servant, said by the Holy Spirit,” It’s beautiful. Then they quote it verbatim. Go look at Psalm 2:1-2.
There it is verbatim. They quoted it.
And they prayed, and then they prayed the psalm out loud. “Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples plot in vain? 26 The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers were gathered together, against the Lord and against his Anointed” and then they apply it
to their present day. They took something that was written hundreds of years ago in God’s Word, in the book of Psalms, and they saw its fulfillment had happened in their day. In prayer, this happened. Now, how did this come about? How did they get this perspective?
Wait a minute, it’s because they had saturated their hearts and their minds with God’s Word. They’d been students of God’s Word. And so then when they’re praying together, the Holy Spirit goes through the file in their mind and tells them to pray this one. It has to be there first, by the way. That’s what’s so good when you pray with other believers is that somebody here has a verse and you don’t have that verse necessarily memorized, but this one does or that one over here does.
And then you’re praying. And when you offer your prayer requests and people have said, “Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name…” and you’ve already done the big ‘Sovereign Lord, Creator Lord.’ You’ve done that, but now you’re at this place of quiet. And then somebody starts speaking scripture. I get holy chill bumps on my arms when that happens.
That’s the Lord speaking through my friend right here next to me, my brother. And then all of a sudden, I’ll feel what I’m supposed to pray. See, that can’t happen by yourself.
It doesn’t happen like that by yourself.
And then you pray, and then somebody else in the room feels the Holy Spirit tap them, and then they pray. They haven’t even offered their prayer requests yet. They’re just praying scripture over each other, and they’re applying it to their present day. And they say, ‘look, this very scripture that David wrote centuries ago, we just saw this happen in this city.’ 27 “for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, Jerusalem, they were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed.”
The word, “anointed,” is in the Greek, “Christos,” (who is your ‘Christos’) Both Herod and Pontius Pilate, they name them, the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, people who never would have been friends became friends. They gathered together. See, Satan’s people, the world’s people, they know how to gather together. They conspired together.
The book of Luke actually says that it was the first time that Herod and Pilate became friendly over something. It says, Luke 23:12 (ESV) “And Herod and Pilate became friends with each other that very day, for before this they had been at enmity with each other.” They became friends over crucifying Jesus, over the trial for Jesus. The Gentiles and the Jews became friends. The Romans and the Sanhedrin became friends.
And the world will conspire against God’s people. But they said, ‘God, you saw this coming.’ That’s how they’re praying –this didn’t sneak up on You, Sovereign Lord. You saw this coming. And so they say in verse 28, “to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.”
Jesus wasn’t crucified because he fell prey to some political mess and just made a bad decision and it should have never happened. No, before the foundation of the earth, it was planned that Jesus would come and die in our place. It was according to God’s hand, his activity, and his plan, his will. And they’re praying like that. You know what they have?
You know what’s happening in this prayer? They’re getting God’s perspective on it. Has their burden been lifted yet? No. Has their circumstance— has the threat been erased?
No, the threat’s still active. But do you know what’s changed? It is their perspective. They now see it all from a higher place, and they recognize there’s no such thing as a coincidence with God’s people. There are only “Godincidences” with God’s people.
Anything that touches me has to first go through His fingers. He has to allow it to touch me, and if he allows it to touch me, then he’s going to cause it to take up to be my good, for my good. And so I can just live, and I can trust him, and I can lift this up together with others. And so we see in Romans chapter 8, which I referenced just now, Romans 8:28 (ESV) “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” Some years ago, in 2010, we made an offer on this old Regal Cinema that we’re sitting in right now.
And I was so excited. One of our members, Mike Laramee, is a pilot. I asked him, “Hey, is there any way you could fly over this thing and I could get some photos from the air?” And so he borrowed a friend’s plane that had one of those wings that’s kind of beneath the cockpit.
I didn’t have my smartphone. I had an actual Canon camera holding it like this. He flew over and I said to him, “Man, all I got was the wing. The wing was in the way.” He says to me, “Oh, I can fix that.”
And so I’ve got my camera leaning over. And he turned the plane upside down. And all of a sudden, I’m like this. And the camera’s about putting my eye out.
And I’m clicking – click, click, click, click, click, click. And I didn’t know if I got anything till I got back home. But I got some great pictures. It all looked different from up there. You could see how it all laid out.
It was a different perspective, and that was just from flying over. Everything looked small down here.
All the big stuff down here looks small, and it all looks small from God’s perspective. Prayer may not change our circumstances immediately, but it can change how we see them. All things are small from God’s perspective. And that leads us to the 3rd reason
3. Because it helps us align our requests with God’s purpose.
It helps us align our requests. Notice they started with where God is in his throne room, God’s word and his perspective, praying consistently with God’s perspective. And now they’re going to finally give their prayer requests.
A lot of times when you pray with people, sometimes— be aware of this— we start with our laundry list too early.
And sometimes we might pray out of order because we haven’t really thought through who we’re talking to and what access we have and how thankful we can be for that access and how his word gives us wisdom and we can pray about wisdom. Save those prayer requests a little later in the prayer. That’s when things start coming into alignment with God’s purpose. Look at verse 29 and 30. We finally get to some prayer requests.
They are finally going to ask him something. Verse 29, “And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness, 30 while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” Verse 29, “And now, Lord, look upon their threats…” That’s the first prayer request. There it is in verse 29. Lord, you look at their threats.
You look at it, we’re not going to worry about it. We know they have threatened us, we know there’s trouble, we know there’s trials. Would you look at that? We’re going to stay busy over here with what you told us to do. We are not going to let that fill my mind and heart.
You look at that, you worry about that, Lord. Not that God worries, because he doesn’t. You let that be your concern. I can’t control it anyway. Most of my worries come from things that I think I can control but can’t.
So you look at it.
I’m not sure I would have started there if I was praying. If I was praying to God and I wanted to give him advice on how he should handle it— I know you don’t pray that way, but sometimes y’all pray for me because sometimes I think, now Lord, could you do it like this? If you could just send a lightning bolt down and wipe out the Sanhedrin, that would be helpful.
Well, Pastor, my goodness. Sorry.
But then the Lord gets a hold of me. And that’s it. That’s what happens if you pray your requests before you get in alignment.
Another way you might say before you get in tune— Brother Eric is over here on the electric guitar. That’s my guitar of choice too. I like the fact that you got one of those early Fenders going on here, man. That’s a good one. I like that one.
But he’s got a rig over here. It’s got all kinds of buttons. I didn’t grow up with that, so I don’t know how to use all of those buttons, but I know one of them is a button that turns the volume off, so you can check tuning between songs without everybody out here knowing. Because if Eric plays out of tune— and that’s the thing with stringed instruments, they can go out of tune in the middle of a thing— and somebody in the audience that’s not even a musician will think, something ain’t right up there.
They don’t know what it was, but there was something not in tune. And sometimes we pray “out-of-tune” prayers because we haven’t started in the throne room. We haven’t got God’s perspective from God’s Word. But if we start there, we bring our prayers into alignment. And so they started there.
They said, we’re not going to worry about this, Lord. I’m not going to pray my worries to you. I’m just going to leave it to you. I’m going to leave that at the foot of the cross. I’m going to leave that in the throne room.
You look at their threats. Now fill that in for yourself today. What do you feel threatened about today? What are you scared of? What’s causing you anxiety?
Say, ‘Lord, could you look at that for me? Look into that for me, Lord. I’m not going to look at it anymore.’ Here’s their second prayer request in verse 29, “… and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness,”
That’s their second prayer request. It’s exactly the one they were ordered not to do by the Sanhedrin. Lord, we know it’s your will. They’re praying consistent with his will. Lord, you look at the trouble, you handle that.
It’s out of our control anyway. Help us to do what you called us to do. Help us not to allow the world, Satan, and even our own temptation to distract us for the purpose you made us for.
I thought that’s a prayer request right there.
And they’re not finished. They have another prayer request. Lord, help us to do what you’ve called us to do, because there is something for us to do. Lord, you look at it. Help us to, to keep speaking your word.
And then what? Verse 30, “while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” So Lord, as we do our part that you’ve called us to do, you do that which we can’t do.
Heal marriages, heal broken relationships, heal people that have addictions, heal people that are in trouble. Heal their bodies; the doctors told them they have cancer or some other thing. Lord, we can’t heal anybody, but we can talk about Jesus.
Now, I don’t know why you do it. You show up here, a lot of you, every Sunday— not all of you, but a lot of you— to hear this guy get up here, waving his arms and talking about Jesus. I see those hands.
It’s kind of strange. I can’t do a thing for you. I’m just like you.
But if I do my part and you do your part, we talk about Jesus and lift Jesus up, we can all say, ‘Father, stretch forth your hand as we do the part you told us to do.’ And so when I preach, when I get up to preach, Lord, if I just get up there without you, if I show up without you, nothing happens.
But Lord, help me to disappear and they only hear you so that you can stretch forth your hand and heal. That’s how they prayed, but they weren’t finished. They got a fourth prayer request:
, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” Verse 30, “…And signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”
Miracles.
Aren’t they a little presumptuous praying for miracles? No, they started at the top. Verse 24, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them,” All of those threats happened according to your hand and your plan.
No, it wasn’t presumptuous. They were praying like they were talking to the sovereign Lord, Creator of the universe. They were praying to the one that can do anything according to his will. Do you pray like that?
Miracles.
We’ll do our part, Lord. We’ll lift up Jesus. That’s all we can do, and we have to have your power to do that. But you do what you can do.
So we pray in tune. And as we sang earlier from John 15:7-8 (ESV) “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.” He’s in me and I’m in him, and I pray according to him in me, and then he does miracles in me. I bear fruit not from myself but from him.
And one of the greatest benefits of praying together is that it keeps a church in tune with God and one another.
4. Because it helps us open our mouths with God’s empowerment.
This past week in my community group, something happened. The first part of the group time was a little bit stiff. We had some first-time guests, and so sometimes when you have first-time guests, you try to be on your best behavior, and then you end up being a little bit too formal or whatever. But then the men and women broke for prayer. There were more men than women this past Wednesday night, and we finished first, because we have fewer words.
And the women went upstairs. By the time the women came down, we were on the front porch trying to figure out which star we were looking at. I mean, we were holding up our apps – that looks like that’s Venus over there. But the women came down, and all of them had tear-filled eyes. And this preacher thought, uh-oh,
what did those women upstairs do? And on the way home, my wife told me that miracles happened. I can’t tell you the details because what’s said in the group stays in the group, but miracles happened. It started out a little dry that night but ended up wet because they prayed together. They prayed real prayers.
Have you ever been there? Well, here’s what it looks like, not just what happened at my community group, but what happened back there in the book of Acts,
verse 31, “And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.”
Some say it was an earthquake. The Greek word here seems to be a motion produced by wind or storms, not so much a shaking of the ground as it was a shaking of the place. It says the place, doesn’t it? The place they were meeting was shaken. It seems like a similarity to chapter 2 at Pentecost when the Holy Ghost came in like a wind.
It seems like something similar to that, but whatever it was, it shook the people up. Have you ever been to a prayer meeting like that?
Dr. John Gill says “This was now shaken with a rushing mighty wind, as on the day of Pentecost, and was a symbol of the divine presence, and a token that their prayers were heard.”
Wow. Gathered together and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. And what was the outcome? They continued to speak the Word of God with boldness, the very thing they prayed for. They spun out of that room with their hair on fire talking about Jesus.
And they fulfilled what Jesus commanded in Acts 1. He said, Acts 1:8 (ESV) “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
Everything you have needs to be recharged, and they keep changing how you plug them in. You thought you had all the charging things you needed, and then they come out with a new device and you have to go buy something else to charge it. We all know they don’t work, these devices we have, if you don’t recharge them. We know that about our devices, but do you know that about your soul?
Do you know that there are things about your soul that will not recharge alone? They will only recharge when you become devoted to the apostles’ teaching, gathering in the temple courts and public places on Sundays like this. There’s no replacing this for recharging your soul. And that rhythm of temple courts and house to house, big groups and small groups, that rhythm. Why try to invent something new, friends?
This was the priority of the first century church, and oh, how it grew, and oh, how the place they met was shaken, and oh, how they spoke the word of God boldly.
If we want to be a church that grows, we’ll be devoted to that rhythm.
Something that’s breaking my heart right now that I learned this week— we’ve been able to take attendance of the children. I know that we’re growing, but I don’t know if you were here because we don’t take your attendance on Sunday morning. I can know by memory when I look at you. If I don’t see you for a few weeks, I’ll start to notice, but it’s hard. There’s really four services, and plus we have another campus with two services.
There are two in here, two next door. It’s hard to keep up with individuals. Our community group system is really our strategy for keeping up with people and caring for them. But here’s the disturbing statistic. We’ve been looking at our stuff, and we thought, we can’t check people in, but we can check children in.
And so we know how many times a month your children come to church, which can give us a little sense of young families at least. We don’t— we’re not sure about singles and people that are empty nesters, but we’re pretty sure about young families. You know, the national average according to Barna is now the American member that says, “I’m a committed member to the church,” attends 1.5 times per month, which is pretty tragic. And I thought, surely we’re better than that. But if we just look at young families that check in their kids from nursery to 5th grade, I thought, surely we’re better than that.
I’ve never known this number until this past week.
It’s 1.3 times per month – 35% frequency rate, because there’s so many things competing for our young families and our children. So many great things, important things— playing music, playing sports, education— wonderful things.
But the priority of the rhythm of life, of getting together for the apostles’ teaching, for the fellowship, for the breaking of bread and prayer. It’s become a lost priority, and we’re putting so many things in front of it. It’s breaking my heart. It’s breaking my father’s heart, my grandfather’s heart.
Would you pray about it with me and do more than pray about it and say, Lord, help me to get my priorities in order.
As we think about these four reasons that we can lift it up to the throne of God, that we can get his perspective, his purpose, and we can move with his boldness, his empowerment. It’s not the power of our prayer, it’s not the quality of our prayer, it’s not the fellowship of each other and how that makes us feel more accepted. It’s all based on the finished work of Jesus. It’s all based on the one who prayed for us and died for us on the cross and went to the cross alone so that we could be together with the Father and with him. He died on the cross for our sins.
He was raised to life so that we could have eternal life. This is the basis on why we can approach the throne boldly.
We are not trying to persuade a distant God to care about us. Through Christ, we’ve already been brought near. We’re not trying to earn God’s favor. In Christ, we’ve already received grace. We’re not gathering because our faith is always strong.
The truth is we often gather with our faith being weak. But when I’m weak, he is strong. So what burden are you carrying today? Who knows what you’re really facing? Who in this room knows your name because you told them and you said, pray for me, and you opened up your life to community and you decided to gather faithfully with God’s people
and to experience a real shaking in your life?
This same Jesus who saved us gave us another gift. He gave us one another.
Make it a priority. Let’s pray.
Lord, I pray first of all for the one that’s in the room and you’ve never given your life to Jesus. You came in on a thin thread today. Someone invited you. You looked us up online, but you’re missing something and you’re looking for it.
And it’s been Jesus looking for you the whole time. Why not commit your life to him today? Why not pray with me right where you’re seated right now, right where you are? If this is your heart’s desire, pray with me right now. Dear Lord Jesus, I’m a sinner.
I repent of my sin, and I come to you believing that you died on the cross for my sin, that you were raised from the grave, and that you live today. I believe that, and I confess you as my Lord and Savior, and I receive you as my own. I ask you to receive me and to forgive me and to adopt me into your family as a child of God. I want to follow you all the days of my life. If you’re praying that prayer of faith, believing, he’ll save you and welcome you to the family.
Others are here today and you’re a believer. Maybe you’ve even been attending here for a while, but you have yet to plug in. You’ve yet to really take advantage of the “one anothers;” to really be able to share life in community. Why not make a commitment to the Lord and say, Lord, forgive me for trying to live on my own. Help me, Lord, to make a commitment today to be involved in what you’re doing with your people. We pray in Jesus’ name.
Amen.