I Believe, but Not in His Church

Do you long to be faith filled but find it hard to? Do you wish for more follow through and less fall through? Maybe you think, “I believe in God, but forgiveness is impossible.” Maybe you believe in God but are scared to share your faith. Or “I believe, but do I really have to be part of a church?” Join us as we try to move forward in belief and practice.

Do you believe in God but wonder, “Is church really that important?” This Sunday we will explore this question with wisdom from the early church in Acts 1:4-8 and Acts 2:42-47.

Transcript

Happy Sunday. My name is Brian. I’m one of the pastors here at Community Covenant Church. And not surprisingly, I am a weekly church attender. Thank you for those laughs. You might be thinking, “Of course you are, Brian. You’re the pastor.” Yes, I am the pastor. So, of course, I’m here. But even before I went uh became a pastor, which was about seven years ago, I was a regular church attender. I went to church weekly. Partly because when I was growing up, I had an experience at a summer camp where I was inspired to make church a priority in my life. And I still like attending church. We were gone in China for a couple weeks this summer. We weren’t here. There’s not a lot of churches in China if you didn’t know. And so I genuinely missed it. When I got back here, I was so excited to sing at the top of my lungs with you. Somebody even grabbed a picture of me. I was standing over here. I had like my hands raised really high. I was like so excited to be back at church.

You may be a regular church attender like me. Or this may be your first time attending church. Or it’s maybe your first time attending church in a really, really long time. At Community Covenant Church, we know that almost every Sunday, we have somebody in every one of those categories. And so, whatever reason you’re here today, we are excited that you’re worshiping with us today.

Research done by the University of Chicago using cell phone data. So, this is like not like self-reporting. This is actual data. So research by the University of Chicago says 5% of Americans go to church on a weekly basis. This even accounts for people who maybe miss once a month because hey, maybe you’re traveling to see family, you have something else going on. 21% of people attend church roughly once a month, which means that 79% of Americans do not go to church on a regular basis. Going monthly apparently is the definition of regular according to whoever these researchers are. Which begs the question, why do you go to church? Why are you here? Maybe somebody invited you. Maybe you feel like you have to be here. I don’t know. Whatever the reason, we’re glad that you’re here today because we’re talking about church. We’re talking about why we do church. What is it? What does it mean to be part of church? and what does it mean specifically to be a part of this church community covenant church.

So this is part of our unbelief series that you saw the intro to. Our theme verse comes from Mark chapter 9 24 and it’s a it’s a father who asked Jesus. He says I believe help my unbelief. And our whole series is based on this idea that belief and practice are actually linked together. In Jewish kind of thinking, Hebraic mindset, belief and action could not be separated. If you believe something, you did it. If you didn’t believe in it, you didn’t do it. So, we’re working our way through different biblical beliefs that tie together with things that we struggle to practice today. 79% of Americans not regularly going to church. So when it comes to church, a lot of people will say, “I believe in God, but I don’t want to be a part of the church.” Or, “I believe in God, but do I have to be a part of a church?” I think these are legitimate questions.

John chapter 4, a woman at a well asked Jesus about the place that she has to worship. And Jesus is like, “It doesn’t matter where you worship, you can worship God anywhere.” So, some people have used that to point to the idea that I can worship God anywhere. I don’t need to be at a church. I totally 100% agree with you. Others will say, I have direct access to God. I don’t need someone else to mediate my experience. I can talk to God myself. Again, I would agree with you. The Holy Spirit since Acts chapter 2 has come upon his people and you can talk to God yourself. You don’t need me to mediate that experience. Finally, some people would say the church has hurt me. Maybe uh you know they’ve experienced something around the abuse of authority or or hypocrisy, judgment, manipulation. The list can go on and go on. And I want to acknowledge that those are legitimate excuses. If you’ve been hurt by someone, it’s legitimately hard to go back. That is legitimate. And yet, I think each one of these is missing something.

Jesus says to Peter in Matthew chapter 16, “On this rock,” meaning Peter, “I will build my church, and the gates of Hades or hell will not overcome it.” In other words, the church was Jesus’s idea, not our idea. We’re not making the church. Jesus is building the church. What Jesus started when he was on earth is what we continue to do today. Not in our own strength because we’re not building the church. Jesus is the one building the church.

So, we want to look back today at what did Jesus start? What was he starting when he began the church? And we’re going to go back to the origin story of the church. Everybody loves a good origin story, right? Thank you, Jeff. We’re going to be in the book of Acts. The book of Acts. Uh, the author begins by recalling the final 40 days of Jesus life on earth. If you remember the the gospel stories, if you’ve read the Bible, Jesus dies. Spoiler alert. But then he comes back to life and he has 40 days that he’s living on the earth and he’s going around and he’s connecting with people and he’s teaching them about the kingdom of God and he’s showing them convincing proofs that not only did he die which they saw on the cross but he was also now alive.

And then one day in Acts 1:4, on one occasion it says, “While he was eating with them, he gave them this command.” Do not leave Jerusalem. That’s where they were. But wait for the gift my father promised, which you’ve heard me speak about, for John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. Then they gathered around him and asked, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” to which he said, “It is not for you to know the time nor the date the Father has set by his own authority. But, and this is important,” you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you. You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

This is the beginning of the church. Jesus tells the disciples that they will receive power. They’re going to get this power that comes on them when the Holy Spirit comes. And what does that mean? They didn’t know yet. But we do. We’ll see in a moment. We know that it will result in them becoming witnesses. What is a witness? It’s somebody who bears testimony to an experience that they have had. And they’re going to be witnesses in Jerusalem, in the surrounding regions of Judea, in Samaria, the place where their enemies lived. Uh, and then they’re going to be witnesses to the ends of the earth. Kind of the scary places, you know, the I don’t know about that places.

And sure enough, just as Jesus promised, 10 days later, Jesus promise was fulfilled in Acts chapter 2. And a ton of people are in Jerusalem. They’re there to celebrate one of the big Jewish festivals, and something strange happened. The Holy Spirit came on them and there was like tongues of fire it says that somehow rested on their heads and people are like what is going on? I don’t know what that looks like. But they started to tell people about the good news that Jesus had been talking about. They told them about the experience that they had with Jesus and they were doing it in languages that they had not even studied. That’s weird. Some people were really amazed by this. Like, what is going on? But other people were like, “Are these people drunk? This is really weird.”

So, at that point in time, Peter, one of the disciples, one of the apostles, stands up, gathers the crowd’s attention, and begins to tell them what is happening. He he begins to interpret the experience they are going through, and he tells them about the Old Testament. Now remember, these are all Jewish people, so they know their Old Testament really well. They’re all there to celebrate the festival. So he’s telling them, starting with the Old Testament, the law and the prophets, and he’s telling them what is happening today, and that the things that they have been reading and studying are actually happening today. This is happening. And it’s kind of exciting. And by the end of the sermon, Peter is calling them to repentance. Repentance is a is a term for turning directions, changing directions. And somehow Peter’s message was compelling because it says 3,000 people accepted the message and got baptized that day.

And let me tell you, it wasn’t like it was common for Jewish people to get baptized. Yes, we know John the Baptist did some baptizing at the beginning if you read some of the gospel uh testimonies there, but still not overly common. So, for 3,000 people to say, “Yes, I like that message. I’m in.” Kind of a big deal. And Peter becomes the first mass evangelist or mass witness in scripture. So, as a result of these 3,000 people saying yes and all these people getting baptized, they had to do something, right? Beginning of the church. So in Acts 2:42 it says they devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and to the fellowship to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and they had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

We’re going to slow down in this section. We’re going to camp out here because in this passage we see the habits of the early church and these are the habits that we are still continuing today. So they were gathering in the temple courts. These are large gathering spaces all around the temple of various sizes. Conceivably some of them fit as many as three or more thousand people because now we’ve got 3,000 people that have said, “I want to follow Jesus.” So they’re gathering together in the temple courts and they’re also meeting in each other’s homes. So they’re connecting in smaller communities. So they gathered in large groups. They gathered in small groups just like we do today. We gather here on Sunday mornings in large groups. There are other churches around the town, around the country, around the world that meet together in large groups and then we gather together in small groups to further get to know one another and to continue our study of God’s word. So it’s one of the reasons that community covenant church we encourage everyone to get involved in smaller community because this is part of the natural pattern of the early church.

So the question is what was the purpose of those gatherings? What were they doing when they came together in these large gatherings at the temple courts or when they came together in these small communities? Well, the text tells us they gathered to learn the apostles teaching. The apostles were the ones with direct experience with direct access to Jesus and his life and his teachings. So if you think about it, the primary purpose of the early church and of the church today is to be a learning community that we would continue to learn about Jesus, learn about the teachings of Jesus, the ways of Jesus. Everyone here is learning to be a disciple of Jesus. We’re learning to love God and to love other people. And everyone has something to learn about how to love God and how to love people. None of us have it all figured out. And that’s why we continue to gather together to continue learning.

The text says they also gathered for fellowship. Fellowship is kind of a word that only Christians use. Maybe you’ve heard somebody use this. We had great fellowship. And that means that they got to hang out together. They got to do something fun. Maybe they went over to somebody’s house or they went to a baseball game together. I don’t know. It was great fellowship. They were hanging out together. Well, I’ll tell you that that is at least in part true. It does have to do with hanging out with one another. But this uh word fellowship is actually the Greek word koinia and it means togetherness or even more than that it means a deep sharing. So they are sharing their life, their time, their energy. They’re sharing their stuff together. And we get a picture of this in verse 44 and 45. They had everything in common. What does that mean? Well, the word for common is another Greek word for sharing. It’s koinos, which means they were sharing everything together, their possessions and all the things. And it shows us one way that they did that in verse 45 is that some of them, many of them sold their possessions so that they could give to those who had need, anyone in the community who had need. And this wasn’t just a one-time impulse. A few chapters later in Acts chapter 6, we see the church appoints people specifically to serve the daily needs of people who are vulnerable and who are being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. It’s kind of like the sharing that you might see in a family because Jesus was actually starting something new. He was starting a new family that wasn’t related by blood but was committed to following Jesus.

The text also says that they gathered together to break bread and eat together. This is another form of sharing. And food is one of those personal things. When we did campus ministry, we used to host an international student potluck. And so students from around the world would come together and they would share their food from their culture with us. And they were so excited to share that food because it was personal. It meant something to them. And so when we share something with others, there’s something deep that happens. There’s a personal connection that happens. We share part of our lives, part of who we are when we eat together. We get to do that today. We mentioned we’re going to be doing a picnic afterwards. We’re doing a potluck because you get to bring something from yourself. And if you didn’t bring anything, it’s okay. Other people bring enough. And that’s how the family works. Like not everybody has something, but some people have enough and they share it with one another. We’re koinia-ing when we get to do the picnic today. Uh scripture also, you may have noticed, break bread is kind of a symbolic word around communion. And so this also includes communion. We do this still today. We practice this. We remember this is something that Jesus also started. We remember that Jesus died for us, that he gave up his body for us, that he his body was broken for us, and that he bled for us. So communion is another aspect of sharing and eating together that the church does.

Finally, uh the text tells us that they gathered to pray or some of your versions if you’re reading different versions of scripture, ours doesn’t say this, it’s singular, but other versions will have prayers plural. And uh Tim Mackey, a Bible scholar, says that this is probably because in Jewish tradition, there were prayers that they did at morning, noon, and night. So they were praying all day long at various times and they continued these same practices and some Christian communities continue this to this day. They have the offices of prayer. Sandy and I have participated in this at different times in our lives where we have these specific prayers. We do it morning, midday and evening. It’s a great practice if you want to try something new in your own spiritual life. Uh but also, you could sort of expand this out to essentially, they’re gathering to worship. So, the early church gathered for prayers and worship to do those together. And all of these practice practices put together, all these habits that the early church did were a powerful witness to the community around them that they were centered on Jesus. And the author tells us that the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

I think when we simplify all these things down, all these, you know, different parts of what the early church is doing, it really comes down to this. Followers of Jesus, we’re learning and sharing. Learning about Jesus and sharing Jesus, coming back together to learn about Jesus and share Jesus. And at Community Covenant, we’ve taken these ideas and we built our discipleship guide around them. We talk about how we want everyone to become more like Jesus and everybody’s somewhere. There should be a um graphic up there for us. Can we get that up there? Um yeah, I’ll come back to that in just a moment. Can we go to the uh picture of the circle? Yes. Thank there you go. Our discipleship process. So, we talk about how at Community Covenant Church, we want everyone to become more like Jesus. That’s to do that. We need to learn more about Jesus. So that’s why we gather here. We gather in our small groups and then we worship. We do generosity together. We do serving together. We do community together. These are the practices that we have in our community to help us to become more like Jesus.

So, what does that mean for the church? Well, it means that the church has a rhythm of gathering together and scattering. We gather together to learn about Jesus, to pray and worship, to eat together, to do life together, to encourage one another. That’s why we gather together. And then we scatter out into the community, our neighborhoods, our workplaces, our schools, our families to share what we have been learning here in the church. Not in a sort of I know better than you sort of way. That’s not what we’re trying to do here. but in a I wonder if what I’m learning about Jesus wouldn’t be something that would be interesting to you and maybe it would be helpful for you. The church is for everyone. I want to be clear about that. So, the church isn’t a building. It’s not a worship service. It’s not something that you even attend. It’s something that we become together as a family.

So, in essence, now we can go back to that previous slide. The church is a group of people gathering to learn how to center their lives on the person of Jesus and then they’re living together as a family and scattering out to witness. That’s what a church is. And spoiler alert, you can’t do that alone. You can pray alone. You can read scripture alone. You can worship God alone. You can even listen to a sermon alone. But you can’t have koinonia alone. You can’t share life together alone. You can’t share your life. You can’t share and serve the people that are around you. You can’t practice generosity towards people that you’re not connected to. So, the truth is that the Christian life was never meant to live alone. That’s why church is important. That’s why our gathering here and in our small groups is important so we can share life together.

In his book, Life Together, Dietrich Bonhoeffer says this, and I think I have this quote perfect. “Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize.” In other words, we don’t make it ourselves. Rather, it is a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate. In other words, the church is not built around our own preferences. Bonhoeffer is warning about an idealized picture of what Christian community should be. We often think if I could just find the right church, the right people, the right pastor, the right small group, then whatever you fill in the blank. But Bonhoeffer says that the kind of idealized vision that that kind of idealized vision can actually destroy community because we’re comparing real people with an imaginary Christian community that just doesn’t exist.

Instead, we’re called to receive the people that God has actually given us. Look around. That means that Christian community involves difficult people. It means that Christian community involves irritating people. Not you irritating people, but the people who are irritating. I just want to clarify that. It also includes people who disagree with you, who disappoint you, who need patience, who need forgiveness, and quite frankly might point out some of your sins. Ouch. I don’t like that. That’s not fun. But that’s precisely where Christian community becomes formative. So Christian community isn’t just something that makes us feel connected to one another. It’s one of the ways that God makes us more like Jesus. Because when you point out where I’m sinning, then I have to choose if I’m going to do something about that.

So, what does this mean for us today, people here at Community Covenant Church on a Labor Day weekend? Well, I want to invite you to take one step closer to community. So, if you’re new to community, keep showing up on Sunday. Keep meeting the people around you. If you’ve been here a while, consider joining a small group community where you can get to know a smaller group of people a little bit more. If you’re part of a small group, consider making a habit of inviting one of those people in your small group to come over for a meal together so you can eat together and experience that kind of koinia fellowship. Share the food that you have for part of your life. And then if you’re already deeply connected here, consider who isn’t connected, who’s not here that you could help get connected to Christian community.

Our discipleship cycle. Can we go back uh forward a couple of things? There’s uh yeah, one more or two more, I think. There you go. Our discipleship cycle shows us how this works. This is kind of how we think about things here at Community Covenant. You hear a word from God. So, you’re hearing the word of God today. I’m preaching to you, telling you about the word of God. You hear that, and then you respond in some way, shape, or form. Maybe you don’t respond. Either way, you debrief that. You talk about that with your community, with your smaller community, somebody like a spiritual mentor who can come alongside of you. You talk about that and you interpret that together.

Because I don’t know about you, but kids, they’re great observers. Sometimes they’re terrible interpreters. And quite frankly, as adults, sometimes we’re great observers, but terrible interpreters. So, we need a community to help us interpret our experiences. And you can’t make sense of things by yourself. Sometimes you need a community to come alongside of you. And it’s the debrief that helps our growth stick in our lives. And then oftentimes in that debrief, we hear the next word of God. And the cycle just keeps going. We hear the word of God. We respond actively in some way, shape, or form. We debrief that with our community, and that leads us right back around to hearing from the Lord. And we keep running around in that cycle over and over and over again. That’s how we do things here at Community Covenant Church.

All right. So, as church leaders, we can create gatherings like this all day long. We can create small group gatherings that facilitate learning about Jesus and his ways, his teachings. But, and this is a big butt, we can’t make you share your life with another person. I can’t force you to go hang out with other people. I’m not going to do that. And quite frankly, I can’t do that. So that’s something that you have to choose for yourself. You have to make the decision to engage in community. But the good news is you’ve already chosen to be here today. Two thumbs up. Well done. You’re on the right track.

So as we close, I want to be honest with you. Sometimes, as much as I love church, I actually don’t want to go to church. Sometimes, as much as I love my small group, I don’t want to go to my small group because I’m too tired. Maybe I’ve had a really bad day and I don’t want to be honest about how things are really going in my life. Whatever it is, like I got a million and one excuses. And I I don’t know about you, but if you’ve ever invited somebody to church, there are a million and one excuses out there. I mean, there are I I I tend to think of like we’re competing against every possible way that you could spend your free time. And so sometimes this those same things are happening in my life and I don’t want to show up.

But I can tell you fortunately I am paid to do this. So I do show up. Hopefully the Lord can speak to you and you do show up. You can make the decision to show up. And even before I was a pastor, I found even when I didn’t want to show up, when I did show up, God showed up in some unique way. And by sharing my life, maybe the thing that I didn’t want to share, somebody came alongside of me and prayed for me and cared for me. They checked in with me maybe later that week and I left going, “I’m so glad that I went. Thank you, God. I needed that.”

The surgeon general published an 82-page document in 2023 titled our epidemic of loneliness and isolation. In the document, he warns that loneliness is associated with greater risks of cardiovascular disease, dementia, stroke, depression, anxiety, premature death. I don’t know how many other things you could add to that list. But he says this effects are essentially similar to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. And they’re worse than the effects of obesity. I want you to imagine what could happen if our church started to be an Acts two church. I imagine there would be a lot less lonely people in this world. And maybe that’s part of what it looks like for us to move from I believe but not in his church. Because living out the Acts 2 community can put a dent in our own loneliness and then the loneliness of those around us.

Let’s pray. God, thanks uh for the church. Thank you that you are building the church and that we don’t have to. Man, if I had to build the church, I’d be in trouble. Uh thanks that you’re building the church. Thank you for these people that are a part of this church. And God, would you help us to be more like the Acts 2 community church that we see here? Loving one another, sharing our lives with one another. For that, God, we’re going to need your help because sometimes it’s hard to show up. Sometimes it’s hard to deal with difficult people, with people that point out our sins. Uh, it’s hard. Being an Acts church, Acts 2 church is hard. So, we’re going to need your help. We’re going to need your help to show up. We’re going to need your help to continue to reach out and to care for and invite the people that aren’t here that haven’t experience the Acts two church. So help us with that, Lord, because we can’t do it alone. Amen.