Acts 4 - Wednesday 7th February

Today’s chapter is Acts 4

Tom writes:

They were family. Pete had all his people with Pete. After his showdown with the Sadducees the text makes clear that Pete and John returned “to their own people”. They were a recently assembled rag-tag bunch of individuals and yet so quickly they identified as a “people”. It was as a people that they gathered to acknowledge Jesus as Lord and ask him for courage. It was as a people they did a scavenger hunt through the psalms, finding yet more evidence that Jesus was the fulfilment of every promise. It was as a people that they shared possessions so that - as a people - they would not have need. I want to be part of a people. Don’t you? In truth we are already in a people - we are part of Pete and Abraham and David’s people if we have put our faith in Jesus. So what I mean is that I want to be part of a people who both think and act like a people. I want to do life together with others who want to explore together and seek together and love together. To see an end to the barrage of “I can’t make it” messages just as a gathering is starting, or the lack of any contact at all. Instead I long to be part of a people who have had that seismic shift in their subconscious so they no longer think of themselves just as individuals but as individual parts of a people.

That is what a Spirit-filled church looks like. And the way the Spirit gives birth to such a thinking is to raise up Josephs who can be renamed Sons of encouragement. These Josephs (more commonly known as Barnabases) are the glue in the church. They give, they smile, they cheer, they reach out, they love. Somehow they buy into being part of a people before the rest of us have even woken up in the morning. They pray for the church over breakfast. They care for the church over coffee and they encourage the church over their evening meal. They are delicious “family builders”; often undervalued, except by Jesus. If you are one of them; we love you. If you want to be one of them; Godspeed to you. And if you know one of them; emulate them. For it is only when we follow their example that the people of Jesus can begin to live like the people of Jesus.

Question for reflection

How could you help build a sense of the church being “a people”?

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