Pastor Prince

Acts 4:32-37 tells how the infant church practiced extravagant generosity.  It says that none of the members of the church was in need.  The reason why was that much grace was on them all.  They had received God's grace and were relaying it to each other.  From this sense of grace, no one felt his possessions were his own.  Everyone shared what he had.  Sometimes, people sold pieces of property and laid the proceeds at the apostles' feet.  The apostles distributed them to people according to their need. Extravagant generosity begins with God's grace.  It begins with the insight that God has been extravagantly generous to us.  His ultimate act of generosity was the gift of his Son.   Throughout church history, Christ followers have practiced the spiritual discipline of giving.  In particular, giving a tithe or giving back to God ten percent of what he had given them.  They've seen it as a spiritual discipline like prayer and meditating on the scriptures, and

Acts 13 tells us about the sending of the first Christian missionaries.  The church at Antioch had grown rapidly, and its members fasted and prayed about what God wanted them to do.  The Holy Spirit told them to set apart Barnabas and Saul for the work God had for them.  After another time of prayer, the church laid hands on these two and sent them off. Today, most American missionaries go to their mission fields with good support.  But for Barnabas and Saul, their journey was full of risks. Included among them were crime, violence, persecution, sickness, and even death!  The only resources they had were the Holy Spirit and a little money! But off they went.  And the rest, they say, is history.  The world would never be the same again. Early Christ followers learned about risk-taking mission from Jesus himself.  Jesus proclaimed that his mission was to bring good news to the poor and oppressed (Luke 4:18-19).  He told his followers that God would judge them according to how th

Acts 2:24ff describes the activities of the early church of Christ.  Listed first is that they devoted themselves "to the apostles' teaching."  Before he ascended to heaven, Jesus commanded them to make disciples (Matt. 28:18-20).  This passage shows them fulfilling his command.  They were telling new Christ followers about everything Jesus did and said. New Testament writers emphasize that discipleship is a life-long process.  A leader as great as the apostle Paul said that he hadn't arrived at all he should be, but he was working on it! (Phil. 3:12-14).   The early church was fruitful because it had an intentional discipleship process.  Fruitful churches today have the same.  They focus on both introducing people to the Lord Jesus Christ and helping them grow in Christ once they follow him. Historically, churches have had various processes for making disciples.  Growing up, I attended what we Baptists called "Training Union."  We kids and

Flowing from its sense of mission, a fruitful church practices radical hospitality.  We see this in the great snapshot of early church life in Acts 1:42-47.  It says one of the things early Christ followers devoted themselves to was "the fellowship."  The Greek word is koinonia .  It refers to a strong sense of commonality.  Early Christ followers held in common a bond to Christ. This bond led them to form strong bonds to each other. Because of this koinonia , they shared everything with each other, including their possessions.  If one in their number had a physical need, others within the congregation met it.  They ate together in their homes, loving and supporting each other. Though they shared strong bonds with each other, their koinonia was open to outsiders.  Luke tells us the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.  It seems early Christ followers cared as much for outsiders as they did for each other. The idea of koinonia is