Hi, my name is George Sinclair. I'm the lead pastor of Church of the Messiah. It is wonderful
that you would like to check out some of the sermons done by Church of the Messiah,
either by myself or some of the others. Listen, just a couple of things. First of all,
would you pray for us that we will open God's Word well to His glory and for the good of people
like yourself? The second thing is, if you aren't connected to a church and if you are a Christian,
we really, I would really like to encourage you to find a good local church where they believe the
Bible, they preach the gospel, and if you have some trouble finding that, send us an email. We
will do what we can to help connect you with a good local church wherever you are. And if you're
non-Christian checking us out, we're really, really, really glad you're doing that. Don't
hesitate to send us questions. It helps me actually to know as I'm preaching how to deal with the types
of things that you're really struggling with. So God bless.
Okay, hopefully. So just tell me when we're live. Now? Good morning. Ooh, I don't know if it's
welcome. Glad you're able to be here. Let's stand as our service begins. And as Christians,
well, let's pray. Let's just bow our heads and pray. We give you thanks and praise that you have
gathered us together. We ask, Father, that your Holy Spirit will fall with gentle but deep power
upon all of us who are here, those who will be caring for the children outside of this room,
those who are still making their way here, for those who are joining us online live and
and for those who will be joining us downstream. Father, I ask that your Holy Spirit would fall
with gentle power upon us. Help us to know, Father, that you are God, that you are the creator
of all things, sustain all things, you're sovereign over all things, and that we are coming. Just as we're
about to go into a time of singing God's praises, just a couple of sort of gentle, just stay standing.
First of all, we're really thankful. Deborah Reid, our worship leader, is on holidays. And this is my
son and my daughter-in-law, who have left St. Paul's Presbyterian to come and lead us in singing. So
we're really grateful that they're here with us. And we might have some sound difficulties today.
That's because our normal sound team is gone. But we will just soldier on. And anyway, it's good
that you're all here. We'll remain standing. Let's sing God's praises.
Great is thy faithfulness, O God, my Father. There is no shadow of turning with thee. Thou changest
great is thy faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness.
Great is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning new mercies I see. All I have need.
It's not thy compassions, they fail not. As thou hast been, thou forever will be.
Great is thy faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness.
Lord unto me.
Great is thy faithfulness. Lord unto me.
All I have needed. Thy hands hath provided. Great is thy faithfulness. Lord unto me.
Timothy and thy grace.
Emma hath.
Tonight, dim not while bleep sea, tonight.
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We meet Sarah at the glory of Jesus Christ Jesus Christ in Jesus Christ in death.
mercy and love.
Great is thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning
new mercies I see.
All I have needed
thy hands hath provided.
Great is thy faithfulness
Lord unto me.
Pardon for sin
and a peace that endureth
thine own dear presence
to cheer and to guide.
Strength for today
and right hope for tomorrow.
Blessings all mine
and thousand beside.
Great is thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning
new mercies I see.
All I have needed
thy hands hath provided.
Great is thy faithfulness
Lord unto me.
Great is thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning
new mercies I see.
All I have needed
thy hand hath provided.
Great is thy faithfulness.
Lord unto me.
I love you Molly police.
Lord
I love you Lord
oh your mercy
never fails me
all my days
I've been held in your hands
From the moment that I wake up
Until I lay my hand
I will sing of the goodness of God
All my life you have been faithful
All my life you have been so, so good
With every breath that I am able
I will sing of the goodness of God
On your voice
You have led me through the fire
In the darkest night
You were close like no other
I've known you as a father
I've known you as a friend
I have lived in the goodness of God
All my life you have been faithful
All my life you have been so, so good
With every breath that I am able
I will sing of the goodness of God
Your goodness is running after me
It's running after me
Your goodness is running after me
It's running after me
Your life laid down
I surrender now
I give you everything
Your goodness is running after me
It's running after me
Your goodness is running after me
All my life you have been so, so good
With every breath that I am able
I will sing of the goodness of God
All my life you have been so, so good
With every breath that I am able
I will sing of the goodness of God
What gift of grace is Jesus my Redeemer
There is no more for heaven now to give
He is my joy, my righteousness and freedom
My steadfast love, my deep and boundless peace
To this I hold, my hope is only Jesus
For my life is fully bound to His
Oh, how strange and divine
I can say, all is mine
Yet not I, but through Christ in me
The night is dark, but I am not forsaken
For by my side, the Savior He will stay
I labor on in meekness and rejoicing
For in my need His power is displayed
To this I hold, my shepherd will defend me
Through the deepest valley He will lead
Oh, the night has been one
And I shall overcome it not I
But through Christ in me
No fate I dread
I know I am forgiven
The future shows
The price it has been paid
For Jesus' name, for Jesus I am
For Jesus lived and suffered for my pardon
For Jesus' name, for Jesus died
And He was raised to overthrow the grave
To this I hold, my sin has been defeated
Jesus' name, for Jesus' name, for Jesus' name
Jesus now and ever is my plea
All the chains are released
I can sing
I am free
It's not I, but through Christ in me
With every breath
I long to follow Jesus
For He has said
That He will bring me home
And day by day
I know He will renew me
Until I stand with joy before the throne
To this I hold, my hope is only Jesus
All the glory evermore to Him
When the race is complete
Still my lips shall repeat
Yet not I, but through Christ in me
When the race is complete
Still my lips shall repeat
Yet not I, but through Christ in me
Just a pause, remaining standing
The cross is going to the back of the church
Those who would like to send their kids to Sunday school
Can follow the cross
And let's just bow our heads in prayer
Father, thank you so much
That you are not
That you, Father, we give you thanks and praise
That you are the creator of all things
You sustain all things
You are sovereign over all things
You are the great transcendent, glorious God
But you are not just a God who is far away
Father, that you sent Jesus to be our Savior
And that when we put our trust and faith in Jesus
Father, that Jesus brings us to you
He makes us right with you
And you put the Holy Spirit within our lives
So that, Father, you actually live within your people
And Father, we are so grateful for this
We ask that your Holy Spirit will move with gentle power
In our midst as we worship
And in the lives of these precious children
And their teachers as they go off to Sunday school
Or some other type of care
And we ask this in the name of Jesus
Your Son and our Savior, Amen
Please be seated
The flow of our worship
We are still in sort of the first part of our worship
Is that Jesus gathers his people
And then we will go into a time
Where God speaks to his people
Through his word
Then we go into a time of Holy Communion
Through the Lord's Supper
And then the Holy Spirit sends us out
And so we are still in that part of time
If you just think about it for a second
If Jesus was to appear
We would want to be with him
We would sing songs
We would probably quote scripture back and forth to each other
And that is the part of the service that we are still in
And so we are going to say Psalm 98 responsively
And it is from the New International Version
The words should be up on the screen
Sing to the Lord a new song
We have done marvelous things
His right hand and his holy arm
Our salvation for thee
The Lord has made his salvation known
And revealed his righteousness to the nations
He has remembered his love
And his faithfulness to Israel
All the ends of the earth have seen
The salvation of our God
Shout for joy to the Lord all the earth
The earth can do a song with music
Make music to the Lord with the harp
With the harp
The sound of the king
With trumpets and the blast of the ram's horn
Shout for joy for the Lord
Let the sea resound and everything in it
For the world and all who live in
Let the rivers clap their hands
Let the mountains sing together for joy
Let them sing before the Lord
For he comes to judge the earth
He will judge the world in righteousness
And the people of the agony
And together we pray this ancient and very profound prayer
Almighty God
unto whom all hearts be open
All desires known
And from whom no secrets are hid
Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts
By the inspiration of your Holy Spirit
That we may perfectly love you
And worthily magnify your holy name
Through Christ our Lord
Amen
Our Lord Jesus Christ said
The first and great commandment is this
Hear O Israel
The Lord our God is the only Lord
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart
With all your soul
With all your mind
And with all your strength
The second is this
You shall love your neighbor as yourself
There is no other commandment greater than these
Amen
Lord have mercy and write these laws in our hearts we pray
One of the things we're going to be talking about in the sermon today
Is a common life
And one of the things that a church like ours
A church of the English Reformation does to sort of mark that common life
Is that not only will we announce things like small groups
And try to get people involved in that
And you know alpha courses and all of that
But we also in a sense which I'll talk about more
We're connected to missionaries and the larger church
And we're also connected in a sense have a bit of a common life with the church
Which is before us
Not that we pray to the saints
But that we pray common prayers with them
And so we're going to pray now these two prayers
The first one is for the collect of the for the 18th Sunday after Trinity
And when we pray this prayer
It's a prayer that Christians have been praying for literally centuries
And we'll pray all around the world today
And then the second one of course is a prayer for Thanksgiving Day
And these prayers are both a prayer that we can pray
And a very concise gospel theology of the Christian life
Let's pray this first prayer together
And is it up?
If we don't pray it together I will pray and you will all listen and say Amen
Is it there?
Is it the...
What's that?
Start with the Lord we beseech you
That's perfect
Let's pray this together
Lord we beseech you
Grant your people grace to withstand the temptations of the world, the flesh and the devil
And with pure hearts and minds to follow you the only God
Through Jesus Christ our Lord
Amen
And let's pray together the collect for Thanksgiving Day
O almighty and...
Is that there?
Not yet
But...
By the way just...
You know no pressure for money
But if one of you has five or six million dollars
You don't know what to do with
If we could buy our own building
I'll have a screen at the back of the church
So I can see what you can see
And that's just if you have that extra five or six million dollars to buy a property
We'd...
We can talk
You know what?
I'm just gonna pray it
And then you folks can just say Amen
Let's do that
O almighty and everlasting God
Who crowns the years with your goodness
And has given unto us the fruits of the earth in their season
We yield to you our humble and hearty thanks
For these your bounties
Beseeching you to give us grace
To use them rightly
To your glory
And the relief of those in need
Through Jesus Christ our Lord
Amen
Well be seated as the Bible God's word written is read
The Bible reading today comes from Acts chapter 2 starting at verse 42
And they devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and the fellowship
To the breaking of bread and the prayers
And awe came upon every soul
And many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles
And all who believed were together and had all things in common
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 and generous hearts
Praising God and having favour with all people
And the Lord added to their number day by day
Those who were being saved
This is the word of the Lord
Thanks be to God
I invite you to stand for the reading of the Gospel text
And just before I read this
So this, what I'm about to read is part of an ancient eyewitness biography of Jesus
Matthew in fact was one of the apostles who wrote this
And it's taking place a day or two before Jesus dies on the cross
So that's the context of this
The Holy Gospel is found in the Good News according to Matthew
Beginning at the 22nd chapter on the 34th verse
Glory to you, Lord Jesus Christ
But when the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees
Just sort of pause if you're unfamiliar
Those are sort of two, I guess we'd call them now denominations within Judaism
So he's had a controversy with the leaders of one of those, the Sadducees
And the leaders of another group have heard this
I'll read it again
But when the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees
They gathered together
And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him
Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?
And Jesus said to him
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart
And with all your soul
And with all your mind
This is the great and first commandment
And a second is like it
You shall love your neighbor as yourself
On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets
Now while the Pharisees were gathered together
Jesus asked them a question
Saying, what do you think about the Christ?
That's another word for the Messiah
What do you think about the Messiah?
Whose son is he?
They said to him, the son of David
And Jesus said to them, how is it then that David, in the Holy Spirit
Calls him Lord, saying, the Lord said to my Lord
Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet
If then David calls him Lord
How is he his son?
And no one was able to answer him a word
But from that day, nor from that day
Did anyone dare to ask him any more questions?
This is the Gospel of Christ
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ
I invite you to remain standing and join with me
In confessing the Christian faith
In the words of this very ancient creed
I believe in God, the Father Almighty
Maker of heaven and earth
And in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord
Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit
Born of the Virgin Mary
Suffered under Pontius Pilate
Was crucified, died and was buried
He descended into hell
On the third day he rose again from the dead
He ascended into heaven
And is sitting at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty
He shall come again to judge the living and the dead
I believe in the Holy Spirit
The Holy Catholic Church
The communion of saints
The forgiveness of sins
The resurrection of the body
And the life everlasting
Amen
Father, we ask that your Holy Spirit
Would bring your word deep into our hearts
And we, Father, give an invitation and permission
For your word to speak deeply into our hearts
And form us so that we will be free
And bring you glory
And do much good for your great praise
And we ask this in the name of Jesus
Your Son and our Savior
Amen
Please be seated
Some of you who've heard me preach before
Know that usually when I begin a sermon
I begin with some type of a problem
Or issue
And then I go ahead and talk a little bit about
How it is that the Bible addresses that problem
Or that issue
And I'm going to do something a little bit different today
It's a little bit
I was thinking about it in an odd way
It's a bit similar to how I speak at funerals
When I get to speak to a very, very mixed crowd
And if you're at a funeral
One of the things I will say is
You know, I know people here have lots of different views
You come from all sorts of different backgrounds
As we gather here to remember, you know, the deceased
And to pray for those who mourn and grieve
And then I say it's just my great privilege
To be able to share with you what my hope is
As a Christian in the face of death
And that's sort of what I do
And this sermon is a little bit similar to it
In the sense that there's a funeral
Or anything like that
And it's not to put anything down
But it's just, you know, I wasn't raised
In a church of the English Reformation
I stumbled into it
And I sort of stumbled into it
And I sort of stumbled into it with lots of doubts
Like I didn't really think Anglicans were Christians
And I sort of stumbled into it
But just one of the things
I guess I just want to share
I've just been so blessed
As the years have gone by
As I've become aware of just the English Reformation
And the documents
And the life that emerged from that
And like I just really love it
Like I just think it's so wise
And I'm not saying that
If you're here as a guest
And you're a Baptist or a Pentecostal
Like I'm not saying that to put anybody down
I just share that it's been like an ongoing delight
To just to see how it is that the English Reformers
Went about in a sense setting up and launching a church
And one of the things which they did so relevant
And that's why it's going to fit into this
And I know this sounds like a bit of a criticism
And I guess it is a tiny bit of a criticism
And I ask your forgiveness
But like technically speaking
I can't receive communion at a Roman Catholic Church
Like technically speaking
Now in the city of Ottawa
My guess is that if I was to go into just about any Anglican
Roman Catholic Church for a mass
And I was to tell them that I was a priest
And could I take communion
And they'd almost definitely say yes
But technically they're breaking the rules
And it's not just like on that one side of the Christian spectrum
Some of you are familiar with very closed brethren churches for instance
And in closed brethren churches
I wouldn't be able to receive communion there either
In fact they would probably think that we aren't a church
And that I'm not even a real Christian
One of the things which is
When I was in my previous church
I was way up the Ottawa Valley
In a place called Eganville and Killaloo
And Clontarf and Tremor
And after I had been in the church in Killaloo for a couple of years
This elderly lady started to attend the services with her sister
And I discovered over time that she actually went to one of those closed brethren churches
When I was driving there I'd drive by this little gospel hall
Tucked off
Very picturesque
Just off to the side surrounded by trees
And it turned out that
I mean and she was breaking the rules by coming to hear me preach
And to receive communion with me
She'd come to my nine o'clock service
And then the gospel hall met at eleven
But in her case
She was just I guess in held with such high regard in the church
That they didn't kick her out
And she started coming to the church
Because I discovered after that she was a war widow
Her husband had actually been an Anglican minister who died
Serving as a chaplain in the Italian theatre of the Second World War
And so she was a war widow
And I discovered she actually
I reminded her of her husband
And so she would come to the church with her sister
And I
But here's the point
When the English Reformation was going on
One of the things they wanted to do was not to de-church or unchurch other churches
Like that was very very clear to their heart
Even though they were trying to reform the Roman Catholic Church
They didn't want to say that all Roman Catholics were bad
Or that there was no Christians or no godliness there
They really wanted to work very hard in terms of how they were launching the church
This reformed, renewed, revived church
In such a way that it wouldn't unchurch or de-church other churches and traditions
And I think that they were very wise in that
We have to be very careful as Christians to not put up walls that the Bible doesn't put up
We need to understand the walls that are there
There's some boundaries
But when there's no boundaries
We have to be very careful about making walls where the Bible has an open door
And I mention all of that because what we're going to look at today
We're preaching through the book of Acts
And today they're for theology nerd types
This text that we're looking at today is a very famous text
Because it has the four marks of the church
And John Stott argues
And I'll just share very briefly
I think there's actually five marks of the church there
But there's four marks of the church
And it's a very common understanding
And so let's just have a look at it
If you have your Bibles
I'm using this ESV study Bible
Just of this journal Bible
There's a few Bibles there if you don't have your own
And I think we have extras of these
If you'd like your own journal Bible of just the book of Acts
I think we have a couple extra here at the church
And we can give them to you
And we're looking at Acts chapter 2
And we're going to begin reading verse 36
Just to give you the context
And if you're unfamiliar with this
What this book is
Is this is in a sense part 2
Part 1
The fellow who writes the book
Was a pagan who became a Christian
And he himself was not an eyewitness of what Jesus did
But he interviewed eyewitnesses
And wrote a very profound true eyewitness biography of Jesus
And then after he wrote that
He writes this eyewitness based biography
Of the early church
The first 30 years approximately
Of the Jesus movement
And what it accomplishes
And so we're very
At the beginning of this ancient biography
Luke himself was an eyewitness for some of the events
And others he had to interview people
And this eyewitness biography
Or history of the church
Is written when many of the eyewitnesses were still alive
And could correct it
And so what's just happened is
For this part 2
The book of Acts
First there's a bit of a
Just a very brief summary of the fact that Jesus
After had died on the cross
That the grave was empty
And the reason the grave was empty
Was not because the body was stolen
But because Jesus was alive
Physically alive
And he proved that in many ways
In fact Acts begins with Peter
Peter with Jesus sitting at table
Eating with them
I mean if you think
If you think
If by the way if you wake up in the middle of the night
And you go down to the kitchen
And you think you see a ghost
And you pass the ghost some toast
And he eats it
It's an intruder not a ghost
Okay that's just sort of a general rule
It's not a ghost
It's a you should call 9-1-1
Because you have an intruder in your house
And so Jesus
This is like just a very subtle little way
That Luke is emphasizing
That Jesus had actually risen from the dead
The grave is empty
And then he talks about the ascension
Jesus ending his physical appearances
He ascends into heaven
And then Luke describes how the whole group of Christians
Were gathering together
To pray together
Waiting because Jesus said
I'm going to send the promise of the Father
I'm going to send you power from on high
And then just a little bit before this
The Holy Spirit
Which we now call the day of Pentecost
Comes and it makes a huge noise
And it comes and people speak other languages
And praise God
And everything from the loud praising of God
To the loud noise of the wind of the Holy Spirit
Draws this huge crowd
To figure out what's happening
And then just immediately before this
What we looked at last week
Is that the very first sermon by a Christian
Is ever preached is preached
And now
And here's where we take up
And what we're going to do is
We're just going to catch the end of the sermon
That's verse 36
Here's how it goes
Let all the house of Israel
This is Peter preaching
Let all the house of Israel
Therefore know for certain
That God has made him
That's Jesus
Both Lord and Christ
That is Messiah
This Jesus
Whom you crucified
Now
When they heard this
That's the culmination of the sermon
I want you all to know
This Jesus whom you crucified
Is risen from the dead
We've seen it
We're witnesses
And this vindicates him
He is the Lord
He is the Messiah
And you meant harm to him
By crucifying him
By abusing him
But he's alive
He's Lord
And he's Christ
He's vindicated
And then verse 37
The crowd
When they hear this
They were cut to the heart
And said to Peter
And the rest of the apostles
Brothers
What shall we do?
And Peter said to them
Repent
And be baptized
Every one of you
In the name of Jesus Christ
For the forgiveness of your sins
And you will receive the gift
Of the Holy Spirit
And for the promises for you
And for your children
And for all who are far off
Everyone whom the Lord our God
Calls to himself
And just sort of pause here
So we have here a very very simple
You know
What's your response?
Response is to repent
And in the New Testament
In the Bible
To repent
Always includes believing
Or trusting
And trusting and believing
Always includes repentance
If they go together
And so
Repent means to turn
So that your orient
Your whole life is now oriented
Around the man
Jesus
Who is also God's son
The Lord
And is our savior
To turn and orient your life
Around him
And as a sign of that
A public sign of that
You are to be baptized
To show that you have
You know
And I talked last week
About the three different things
That baptism types of symbolizes
And you will receive
The forgiveness that you receive
If you turn to Jesus
Repent
You will receive the forgiveness
Of your sins
And you will receive
The gift of the Holy Spirit
Means the Holy Spirit
Will actually come and live within you
There's these three things
That you receive
You put your faith and trust in Christ
As your savior and your Lord
And
And what he did for you on the cross
And when you put your faith and trust in him
All your sins
All of your things that you've done wrong
All of the good things that you do
That you shouldn't
That you didn't do
That leave you embarrassed and ashamed
All of these things are forgiven by almighty God
In the person and work of Christ
And not only that
He actually puts the Holy Spirit
Within every person
Who puts their faith and trust in Christ
You become in a sense
This deposit
That God himself will dwell
And abide within you
And he will never leave you
And this begins
Even for ordinary human beings
Like us on this side of the grave
And it will continue even beyond the grave
Into eternal life
So you receive
All of your sins are forgiven
They're wiped away
Your Holy Spirit lives within you
And he receives you to himself
He takes you to himself
Yet you might not feel it
Some people when they become Christians
C.S. Lewis famously said
If you've never heard of him
He was a famous writer
And thinker and scholar
And Christian
From the sort of the middle part of the 1900s
And he describes
When he became a Christian
He was the most dejected convert
In all of England
And that's because
He was such a proud man
And he didn't want to have to
Give up his life so to speak
But others have great joy
And what happens is
Whether you feel it or not
That God himself
Takes you to himself
That's what happens
When you put your faith
And trust in Jesus
This is the wonderful news
There's no other way
To have God
The living God
The creator God
The triune God
To receive you for himself
Than to put your faith
And trust in Christ
Your sins are forgiven
The Holy Spirit indwells you
God receives you for himself
Verse 40
And with many other words
He bore witness
And continued to exhort them
Saying save yourself
From this crooked generation
And so those who received his word
Were baptized
And there were added that day
About 3,000 souls
And I talked a little bit
Last week about how
This is one of the many, many, many proofs
That historically
Jesus
The grave
Nobody would have become a Christian
If they could show you the body of Jesus
And there is no better account
For the start of the Christian movement
Than the real defeat of death
And resurrection by Jesus
There is no better explanation than that
It's true
It happened
And it's profoundly good news
Now what we're going to look at next
Which is actually the bulk of the sermon
The next 22 minutes or so
Is we have the first of several summary statements
In the book of Acts
We get a summary statement
And here's how it goes
And they devoted themselves
Verse 42
To the apostles teaching
And the fellowship
To the breaking of bread
And the prayers
Now
I'm going to come back to all of this
But these are the four marks of the church
And I'm going to explain them in a bit
They devoted themselves
To the apostles teaching
And in the original language
That devoted themselves
Applies to every one of the four things
And if you notice
You don't have to put your hand up
But some of you are English nerds
We know who each other are
And for English nerds
It's really interesting
The definite article is before each of the four of them
Isn't it like a really neat English nerd type of thing?
And so that's why there's the four marks, right?
And so, you know, the first mark is
They devoted themselves to the apostles teaching
They devoted themselves to the fellowship
Or the koinonia
They devoted themselves to the breaking of bread
And they devoted themselves to the prayers
Now, before I go on and read this next little bit
It's really important to understand what happens here
Okay, what did not happen
What did not happen
Is that it didn't happen that the twelve apostles
Gathered the hundred and twenty
They said, okay, you three thousand people
I'll go find a nice place to have some shawarma
And some tabbouleh
And after you've had some shawarma and tabbouleh
And maybe some roast lamb or something like that
Just come back
And the hundred and twenty went off into a room
And Peter got up and said
We're going to look at our strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats
And so we're all going to break up into small little groups
And first we're going to all share with each other
Like what some of the strengths are about this Jesus movement
And write them down on some full-scat paper
And then after you've done that
We're going to tape them all up on the wall around the room
And now we want to do through
Now we've done the strengths
Let's do some of the weaknesses
And then let's do some of the opportunities
Let's do some of the threats
Okay, and then after the facilitator has done all of that type of stuff
He says, here we have a couple of little stars
You each have four stars, five stars
And we want to go to the strengths
And I want you to put the star beside the strength ones that you think are our strengths
And then we'll count them all up
And then we'll see if we can group a few of them together
And then we'll come up with some type of an action plan
That didn't happen
What happened is something both natural and supernatural just happened
It wasn't thought through
There was no institutional structure to plan it
They, on the day of Pentecost
On the day of Pentecost
Nobody knew what was going to happen
Like all of those 120 people in the upper room
When they woke up that morning
They didn't wake up and say
I think the Holy Spirit's going to fall
And it's going to create four marks of the church
No, they just woke up
That's all they did
And you know, there were more than 120
And, but some of the people
They, you know, they went off
Because, you know, people have to work
And, and so some of them went off to do work
And, and some of them didn't have to work that day
And they gathered and they spent some time in prayer
And then lo and behold the Holy Spirit falls
And then lo behold Peter gets up and preaches this sermon
And all of a sudden they go from about 500 people to three, over 3,000 people
And that just all happened with no plan
And then the next thing you know
Is there's just something natural and supernatural
And that these four marks
The way to understand these four marks
Is that in a sense four seeds
Are planted in everybody's life
That are going to grow
Or another way to understand it
Is that the Holy Spirit
Between knowing who Jesus is
And what he's done for us on the cross
And the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives
Four quests begin
And one of the things which is so brilliant about this
Including the next little bits
Is it doesn't say
All of the, the, the little
It doesn't come up with this detailed strategic plan
It just gives you these four seeds
And it happens time and time and time again
It's, it's why they're considered to be the marks of the church
Is that when people hear about Jesus
And hear who he is
And what he did for them on the cross
They hear about his life
And they trust their life to him
And he really takes them to himself
And the Holy Spirit really enters into them
And, and the Holy Spirit places four seeds in your life
Or launches you on four quests
And they all fit together
And they're going to be contextual
There, it's, it's so neat
Because, um, so, you know
In, in, uh, six years ago
I, I had the great privilege
I was able to go to Angola for a while
And, um, and, and one of the, the, the, the, the, the, one of the groups I got to be able to visit
Was, uh, at some of the missionaries that we supported helped plant a church
In this area of Angola
That in many ways was using similar farming methods
As they would have used 200 years ago
Like this is, you know, beyond the beyond the beyond the beyond
And they planted a church under a tree
But that church has these four marks
And you can read the story of Tim Keller
Planning a church amongst the intellectual and the rich in Manhattan
And their church has these four marks
That there's something very dynamic and contextual about it
And it's not as if there's this whole pile of rules
That bangs you over the head
That you have to follow every little thing
It's, that's what I say
It's like a, a, it's a seed that grows where it's planted
And it's gonna, that seed is still recognizable
And will grow in urban
And, and, and, and, and, and, uh, down
More urban, suburban Ottawa
And it, it will grow in Eganville
And it will grow in Angola
And in Nigeria
And in Singapore
And in Hong Kong
And in secret
In Tehran
I, I just saw a report
That they estimate that
Over half the mosques
In Iran have been closed
And I just read a report
That one of the senior clerics in Iran
Blames the secret conversions of Christians
To, from Islam to Christianity
In Iran
Is causing the mosques to be shut down
And they're going to be shut down
Brothers and sisters
That blows my mind
That just blows my mind
They risk losing everything
To give their life to Christ
Like, their life
If not their life
Their job, their occupation
My, my wife's reading a
I haven't read yet
I started it
But, uh, reading a, a, a
I, I, it's supposed to be
A very profound book
Everything sad
Uh, everything sad
Becomes, has become untrue
Or something like that
And it's the story
Of, um, an Iranian man
Whose mother was a dentist
I think it was a dentist
And she became a Christian
And due to persecution
She had to flee Iran
And leave all of her, her wealthy life
Uh, she had to leave her husband
He didn't want anything to do with her
And ended up coming to Oklahoma
And it's the story about him
This Iranian boy
Trying to figure out
How to live as an eight year old
In, in Oklahoma
Of all places
And, uh, it's, uh, I've heard many people
I'm, I'm looking forward to reading it
After my wife has finished it
It's a, a brilliant book
But, but, you know, here's the point
These are these four marks
And, and they're gonna look different
In different contexts
But they're there
When the gospel is preached
Well, let, let's just finish reading this
Because it sort of fleshes it out
And, and then I'll go back
And very briefly say
We'll look at each of them
What they are
So we'll just read verse 42 again
And they devoted themselves
To the apostles' teaching
They devoted themselves
To the fellowship
They devoted themselves
To the breaking of bread
And they devoted themselves
To the prayers
And awe came upon every soul
And many wonders and signs
Were being done through the apostles
And all who believed were together
And had all things in common
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 and generous hearts
Praising God
And having favour with all the people
And, um, you know how in English
You can have double entendres
And, uh, one of the things
That kids' movies discovered
A few years ago
Is that they could make kids' movies
In such a way
That the kids could follow it
But often when they say certain things
The adults would realize
It's, there's like a second meaning to it
Like they're making some film reference
Or some political reference
Or whatever
You can have, like the same words
Have two sort of multiple meanings
And, and that's what happens here in this
And so, uh, the original people
Hearing this biography
Or this history in the original language
They would have heard
Praising God and having favour with all the people
In other words
People had good will towards the Christians
But it also says
They were praising good, the God
And they had good will towards all the people
In other words
It's a context where they
The Christians
Had good will to Jerusalem
And Jerusalem had good will towards them
And the Lord added to their number
Day by day
Those who were being saved
And that's what John Stott
And I agree with him
Says is the fifth mark
That people
The church grows
That people come to a saving faith
In, in Jesus
That God does this work
And this is a summary statement
And the rest of the book of Acts
Will show that
This was a, a sweet time
In their life
But that problems would come
Like at the very next chapter
There's both a miracle reported
But also an arrest reported
And, and, and eventually
There'll be martyrdoms
Stephen will be martyred
And James will be martyred
And, and that's going to all develop
But this is the summary statement
And, and so let's go back
To the marks
And, and if you could put up
The first one
That would be very good
And they voted themselves
To the apostles teaching
Now, obviously in that, those days
That meant something very, very specific
I, they didn't have to read
The book of Matthew
Cause they could have said
Oh, there's Matthew
Let's go listen to him talk
They didn't have to read
The book of John
Cause it could say
There's John
Let's go hear him talk
Um, most ancient Christians
Believe that, uh, Peter
Was the genius
Behind the, the ancient biography
That we now call Mark
So people didn't have to read Mark
They could just say
Oh, there's Peter
Let's go listen to him talk
Right?
And that, that's how it would have
Been back then
And not just the, the, the, and
But now it's, it's a very commonly understood
That when we say
They devoted themselves
To the apostles teaching
That what we have
In the New Testament
Is the apostolic teaching
Jesus taught the apostles
And that is what the apostles
In a sense guaranteed
Is included in what we now call
The New Testament
Just a little while ago
I, I had a conversation
With somebody in a, in a coffee shop
And, um, they were asking me
Some questions about the Bible
And they were actually very surprised
They thought that the Jewish people
Had a Bible
And that Christians had a Bible
I said, one more moment
We don't really have separate Bibles
They said, and they looked at me funny
And they said, well, what's going on?
I said, well, actually
What you can understand is
If you put on a piece of paper
Jesus and like a line on either side
And there's Jesus
And then above the line
Is what we would now call
We call the New Testament
And below the line
Is what our Jewish friends called
The Tanakh or the Torah
And we call the Old Testament
And, uh, in a sense
All of the things in, in the Tanakh
Are things that were written before Jesus
And the things in the New Testament
Are what was written after Jesus
Ultimately, Jesus is the guarantor
Of the truth of the New Testament
And it's because of Jesus
That we trust the truthfulness
Of the Old Testament
It all centers on Jesus
And I said, so our Jewish friends
They accept all underneath the line
But we as Christians
We as Christians
We accept both what's underneath the line
And above the line
Our Jewish friends
Think we've gone too far
And we Christians think
Our Jewish friends
Haven't gone far enough
And hopefully we can be friends
Although hopefully
They'll also come down to Jesus
I didn't say that to the person
I was asking about it
I was just trying to explain the Bible
To explain the Bible
But what we see here then
Is they devoted themselves
To the apostles' teaching
Here, I think the way I put it
That you should be able to see
Up on your screen
Is the first mark of the church
Is a devotion to hearing
And understanding God's word written
And you know, when I said that
These are things that are all natural
And supernatural
They're natural in this sense
You know, one of the very common themes
In movies
When you see somebody
Who's really grieving
The death of a loved one
It's a very, very common bit
In the movies
Is that they
They don't cancel the phone number
Of their beloved
And they
Time and time again
They call their beloved's phone number
So they can hear their voice
Their voice
And the message machine
Because they want to hear the voice
Of their loved one
And some of you
Who've lost loved ones
And then maybe
You discover some letters
From your loved one
That you'd forgotten
You're doing some house tiding
You discover some letters
Or something like that
For younger people
There are these things
That used to exist
Called letters
Where you'd write on paper
And put a stamp
And mail them
And if you've ever been
To know people in that situation
They're just so
Overjoyed
To hear their loved ones speak
And so at the heart of this
Is something very, very natural
Because you see
We understand
That God loves us so much
That he sent his son
To die for us
So that when we hear
What we call the New Testament
What we're hearing
Is we're hearing God speak to us
And we want to hear God speak to us
We want him to speak to us
It's both very natural
And in a sense
It's also supernatural
And then look at the second mark
And this is the one that gets
In some ways
People the most worried
To the fellowship
Or to the koinonia
And I put it
The second mark
Is a devotion to having
A common life
With your brothers and sisters
In Christ
And
And it's going to be
A common life
That's going to involve money
Just, you know
Give me a little bit of grace
Here
It's a common life
That's going to involve
Involve money
And it's just a natural thing
We human beings are social creatures
If things are working properly
Like we understand it's a tragedy
When a child has both of his parents
Or her parents die
And it's even a bigger tragedy
If there's not an aunt
Or an uncle
Or a grandparent
That can care for that child
And step in
And in many times
In places in the world
That child could just have been condemned to death
Unless there's something like an orphanage
But we understand that there's something just natural
And holy
About something like a family
That we're meant to be social
And what happens when you put your faith and trust in Christ
Is you become part of the family of God
And it's
If you have no desire to all be with your brothers and sisters
In some type of concrete, not an imaginary way
Then there's something which is missing in your Christian life
And if there's not some type of financial involvement with that
There's something missing in your Christian life
And so Christians have understood that there's this desire
To have some type of a common life
That's going to be very contextual
It's going to look very different
If, and I don't think she'll mind
I know that every week
Anne, who's in her 90s, watches this service
She can no longer come to service
Is it?
She watches
Hi Anne
Like you're watching this right now
And we have to figure out ways to include people who get shut in
And there's some people who are watching this
And they could leave their house and come here
And that's not being part of a common life
Like I don't want to lay a guilt on you
But we need each other
And that common life is everything from having prayer partners
It's being parts of small groups
It's helping out on a Sunday morning
It's coming to worship
And it could involve very, very costly things
Of financial help for people
We've, in this congregation in the past
Had to help members of the congregation
Who've been in financial distress
For them to be able to continue to live in their house
And it's not just something for your local church
And this is one of the things I so love about Anglicanism
Is that we are connected to other churches in the city
Both within our tribe
Those are the churches of the English Reformation
But those outside of our tribe
We're connected to other churches
Putting on an apologetics event
Where in a couple of weeks
Hopefully we're going to have somebody come and speak
Because we're part of a group of churches
Not just from the English Reformation
A group of churches
And we team together
To partner with a group of churches
Amongst the very poor in Guatemala
And we raise money
To give to those churches
For them to reach the poor in their community
And that's koinonia
That's fellowship
One of the things we're going to pray about
I don't know if Victor will
But I'm going to pray about
If Victor doesn't pray about in our intercessions
Is that we support missionaries throughout the world
And one of the missionary families that we support
When his son
They're missionaries in Israel
And when their son turned 18
And he's basically lived his whole life in Israel
He knows no other
I mean technically I think they're New Zealanders or something
But that's just like a foreign country to him
He's grown up in Israel
He's fluent in Jewish
In Hebrew
And when he turned 18
He had a choice to make
Either he would do his military service
In the Israeli defense force
Like other citizens
Or he would have to leave
And go back to New Zealand
And so he chose to stay
This is a missionary
Aaron and Michelle
We support them as missionaries
And I got a picture yesterday
Because their son got called up
Because of the horrendous terrorist attack by Hamas
And I got a picture of their son getting in the cab
To go serve in the war
But that involves us
We're in Koinonia with him
And we'll pray for him
And just imagine how hard Aaron and Michelle must be praying
And his brothers and sisters
For their oldest son to go and fight this war
And that's part of what it means to be in Koinonia
And it involves our money
It involves our prayer
It involves our time
And it might look different when you're in your 90s
And it's going to look like when you're 18
And it might look very different when you're 50 and able-bodied
And for a mom with five or six young kids
It's all going to look like that desire to have a common life
That's what's there
And I need to hurry up over the last two
If you could put up the next one
The third mark is a devotion to holy communion
With the triune God through the Lord's Supper
Look what it says, verse 42
And they voted themselves to the apostles' teaching
And the fellowship and the breaking of bread
Now just to be clear
If you went back in a time machine
They would not do communion the way we do communion
They almost definitely would have done
What they would have almost definitely done
Is they would have had all of us group up in varieties of tables
And we would have all had a big potluck
And in the midst of the pot
And we would have arranged beforehand
So Uzo's going to bring
I don't know, he's going to bring the beef
And Diane's going to bring the egg salad sandwiches
Because she has a spiritual gift for that
And she's famous for it
And I don't know
And Owen would bring some type of spectacular gift
And I don't know, maybe Susie and her husband
Would bring some smoked brisket
Or something like that
That they'd do in the barbecue
And then we'd all have a nice meal
But as part of that meal
We would also have the Lord's Supper
And I love the way Anglicans understand the Lord's Supper
Here's the theological understanding
And most of the things which is so beautiful
About the English Reformation
Is it teaches Christian truths through prayer
And here's what we say
This is like in a sense
At the root of the English Reformation
About communion
The body of our Lord Jesus Christ
Which was given for you
Preserve your body and soul
Unto everlasting life
Take and eat this in remembrance
That Christ died for you
And feed on him
In your heart
By faith
With thanksgiving
It's not just remembering
It's a time to feed on Christ
In his person
How do we do that?
Well, you know what it means a little bit
You know, if you see a grandmother
Who gets together with her grandchildren
And she just feeds on their presence
You know, or you get to be with your family
Or your loved one
And you just sort of
What do we say?
You're eating it all in
You're drinking it all in
It's not just that you remember the good times
You just
That's what communion is
So what are the marks?
We're committed to hearing God speak through the Bible
We're devoted to it
We're devoted to having a common life together
We're devoted around the Lord's Supper
And the final thing is the prayers
And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching
And the fellowship
To the breaking of bread and the prayers
The fourth mark is a devotion to common prayer
And so it goes beyond just having your private prayers
It means that there's times when you have common prayer
And that common prayer might be that if you join a small group
And part of your small group time is you share prayer requests
And you have common prayer
And it also involves common prayer at a time like this
Which is more formal
Where Victor's going to come up in a few moments
And he's going to lead us in some intercessions
And we listen to him as he speaks to God on our behalf
And then we all say, you know, we all agree with him in some type of way
And say amen at the end
And that's a decisive part of the church
And all of these things are very, very natural
And they're also supernatural
They're natural because we want to hear loved ones and important ones speak to us
And so we want to hear God speak to us
They're natural because we want to have a common life with others
Whether it's with friends or family or whatever
And we want to have that
And we want to have a common life with our brothers and sisters in Christ
And it's a common, it's a natural thing
Because we drink it in being with people that we love
And people that we're, and so we want to, we want to, to keep the God's
We want to, to keep the gospel in front of us
And, and, and drink it in
And, and feed on who he is
And what he's done in his presence
And our, and, and, and love for us
And, and then, and then we want to speak to people
We don't want to just be like, like they used to talk about kids
I don't know in the 40s or the 50s
They should be seen but not heard
No!
Our Father in Heaven wants to hear us
He wants us to tell him about our
Our, he wants to tell, he wants us to tell him about the fact that we
We're worried about finding a parking space this afternoon
And about the job that we need
And about our loved ones who need to know Jesus
And about peace in the Middle East
Like he wants us to pour out our hearts and pray to him
And he doesn't just want us to do it by ourselves
He wants us to do it as part of our common life
That's so wonderful
And the fifth mark is just the end of that little section
If you put it up, the fifth mark is a life of humble prayer and witness
That the Lord uses to bring people to himself
I mean, we have lots of empty chairs here
But let me tell you, if for some reason God did a wonderful work
And every single chair here was filled
I would say to the wardens, go out and get some empty chairs
Because we always want to have room for one more person
If you have a small group, you have empty chairs
And hope that it gets so big we have to have more groups
Like we always want to have more
God is continuing to call people, ordinary people, to himself
Let's stand, please stand
Let's pray
Father, we give you thanks and praise that you reached out to us and called us
That you called me
Worthy as I am
You called me to be your son
By adoption and grace
And many, maybe all of us who are here or who are watching online
Father, that you've called us to yourself
Father, we give you thanks and praise for your great love and kindness to us
And we thank and praise you, Father
That when we put our faith and trust in Jesus
You take us to yourself
We belong to you
As your son, your daughter, your friend
That you live within us
You forgive us of our sins
You give us this new life that will
Survive death and go into the new heaven and the new earth
And that you put these seeds within us, Father
These quests within us to continue to hear your voice
And speak to us so that we have your wisdom and insight for living
And that you put within us a desire to have a common life with our brothers and sisters
And to remember Jesus and to feed on him in our hearts by faith with thanksgiving
And to join together in prayer for ourselves and each other's needs and for the needs of the world
And Father, we give you thanks and praise that these are the marks of the church
And that you use us as worthy as we are in evangelism
And we ask, Father, that you would grow these
These streams
These propulsions within us
And that you would help us to live them wisely
And we ask these things in the name of Jesus, your son and our savior
Amen