"One Heart and Soul"

One Heart And Soul

Read Acts 4:32-37 (NLT):

Illustration

A pastor thought God gave Him an idea, and he presented it in the monthly council meeting. After giving his most impassioned plea and really “selling” the idea to the council, the council voted and voted down the pastor’s proposed changes 12-1. The moderator looked at the pastor and said, “Well, pastor, it’s 12 votes to 1. Looks like you’ve been outvoted. Looks like time is up for the evening, so will you please close in prayer.” The pastor, not wanting to give up yet on what he felt God was leading him to do, then led in prayer. As he prayed, he lifted his hands up to heaven and prayed, “Loooorrrdddd – I know my brothers here do not have the same vision you have given me. Please help them to see that this is not MY vision, but YOOOOUUUUURRRR vision!” At that exact moment, a lightning bolt with a loud clap of thunder burst in through the window in the meeting room, striking the table, splitting it in two and knocking all the council to the floor. As the dust cleared, the pastor looked at the moderator and said – so, what do you think about that? The moderator, dusting himself off, sighed and said, “Well, I guess that’s 12 votes to 2, then…”

This passage is a small interlude between the prayer and speaking the Word with boldness, and the first of the internal struggles of the early church. Here we get another picture of life in the early church. And the recurring theme is unity.

In this passage, we will see that there are four keys to spiritual unity for the church.

Same Passion – Christ (v.32)

The whole church had the same heart, a heart set ablaze by Jesus. Their passion was to know Him in the power of His resurrection, the fellowship of His sufferings, and be conformed to His death. Christ is the main source of unity. He was the focus of their individual lives, and thus when they came together, they really were together. They were in love with Jesus. They lived their lives for Him and His glory.

Read Philippians 3:8 (NLT)

Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ.

Illustration

The Sunflower is probably the most amazing flower God created. They literally follow the sun. Now I don’t know about you, but one of the most amazing things I have seen is a field of sunflowers. Watching one follow the sun is cool. Watching hundreds in absolute unison follow the sun is actually quite incredible. Something I found out recently is that sunflowers continue tracking the sun’s direction long after sunset. Through 360 degrees, they ensure that they are always oriented in the direction of the sun. Their unity is totally dependent on one thing: their relationship to the sun.

We are not called to be cookie-cutter believers. But there should be a common desire in all our lives for Christ. A common drive that causes us to pursue Jesus. A common thirst for which we all crave, and thus we gather together to drink deeply from the Water of Life. When division or disagreement exists, we must be willing to examine our own hearts and see if our passion at that moment is the fame of His name. If disagreements affect our pursuit of Christ, they must be dealt with. My questions are these… Is Christ the preeminent one in your life? Is pursuing Him the most important thing to you? Is He your treasure that you would sell out to gain?

Same Convictions – Word (v. 32)

The word used here is psuche, which can be translated as soul or mind. I prefer to take it to mean mind because the word heart really conveys feelings, and so does soul. But I think Luke is making a point by saying that they also thought the same things. They were able to achieve this feat by allowing scripture to dictate their thoughts. They had a common standard upon which to determine a thought’s correctness.

Read Philippians 2:2 (NLT)

Then make me truly happy by agreeing wholeheartedly with each other, loving one another, and working together with one mind and purpose.

Historically, we have been people of the Bible, but our society, culture, and religion have not made the Bible the anchor in recent years. Lazy discipleship has produced a generation or two or three that do not know the scriptures. Politics and church growth movements came along and gave us all these new ways to do church better and more culturally relevant and more palpable; and we did not line them up with scripture. And so now we are faced with the task of realigning an existing structure with the Bible. But as our confession states, the Bible is the only rule for faith and practice.

Rugged individualism in America teaches us to try things in the courtroom of personal opinion, public opinion, or expert opinion. This makes one person’s statements just as valid as another. We are people whose worldview is based on a Creator God who gave us the manual. But the sooner we get back to judging all things first upon scripture, the more unified we will be. We desperately need to develop a deep respect and conviction for all that is found within our Holy Book!

Same Focus – Evangelism (v. 33)

Every chapter in Acts mentions and exemplifies the evangelistic fervor that the early church demonstrated. So, it will probably be a consistent theme in the preaching of this book. But that is the point! Evangelism was the primary goal of the church then, and it still should be today. Their focus was on their mission, and this created a unity of purpose.

Read Philippians 1:27 (NLT)

Above all, you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the Good News about Christ. Then, whether I come and see you again or only hear about you, I will know that you are standing together with one spirit and one purpose, fighting together for the faith, which is the Good News.

Illustration

On the sheet that listed the PROBLEMS, such things were listed as: • Should not serve coffee in church • Should serve more coffee in church • Should have shorter sermons • Should have longer sermons • The music we have is terrible • It’s terrible we don’t have more music like what we have.

On the sheet with the heading of WHAT IS NEEDED, things were listed like: • Need to spend money on more chairs • We don’t need to spend any more money • Pitch all the songs and start over • We need a new preacher We can see the humor in that illustration, but there is something else we can see, too. We can see the unhappiness of those in that church. We can see the lack of unity as a body of Christians, and there is one more thing … we can see a church that has dropped the ball in its teachings because nobody mentioned Jesus Christ. I would say the biggest problem that church had was that everybody was focused on what they wanted, and nobody was focused on what Jesus wanted.

Great power and great grace will be upon those whose focus is winning people to Jesus. When we are focused upon how we can win people to Jesus, we don’t have time to fuss about the temperature in the building.

Budgets come into focus when we think in terms of reaching people. We don’t get mad about things that are petty when we are “seeking and saving the lost.” That is part of the reason that we don’t evangelize and grow—because we are concerned deeply about tradition, and the kind of music, and whether or not we have our own building, but very little about the lost around us. We need to realign our church with the goal—making hard-core, sold-out, self-sacrificing, faith-sharing disciples for Jesus.

Same Perspective – Stewards (v. 34)

Having the same passion, same thoughts, and same focus led to or flowed from having a biblical perspective on life. Luke includes for us again the reality that in the early church, it was common for people that were better off to sell property to relieve the suffering poor. And they did it so much so that they eliminated poverty in their midst. Critics say that this was too far-fetched, that Luke made up this outlandish idea, and it never existed in reality because it is too good to be true. But it is true, they viewed the world and all its things as simply a means to an end. They were given the use of possessions, technology, livelihoods, families, etc., to glorify Christ. And so they viewed themselves as stewards. And that is why they were so quick to sell off possessions for kingdom needs.

There was nothing in the world whose purpose is not to glorify Christ, so it’s all dispensable.

Read Hebrews 10:34 (NLT)

You suffered along with those who were thrown into jail, and when all you owned was taken from you, you accepted it with joy. You knew there were better things waiting for you that will last forever.

When we come together in church, each one with the perspective that everything in their lives is owned by God and simply to be used at His disposal to bring honor to Himself, unity flourishes. Whatever resources God has granted you stewardship over are to be managed his way. So, your job is God’s way of financing His kingdom. Your car is a way of raising up disciples and evangelizing and serving others. Your time and talent are to be used for the kingdom’s goals. With this attitude, there is no fighting over money because it is not ours, it is His. We will spend money the way that He wants it spent. You see, our passion is Christ, our guide is the Word and the Spirit, and our goal is evangelism to the glory of God. But as well as our passion, our thoughts, and our goals, we must fight to keep the Bible’s perspective on money rather than the world’s.