This is Living Waters of Grace, the teaching ministry of Clark
Wofford, senior pastor of Calvary Chapel of Westmoreland,
County of Greensburg, PA. Now here's Pastor Clark as he
continues teaching through God's Word.
They had a unity. There was no division and
complaining, I don't want to do it this way, We're going to do
it this way. No, this is my ministry.
This is my vision. This, there was none of that
stuff. There was one vision and it was
Christ in his glory. And anything that we had an
opportunity to do back then as well as now is a privilege.
It's not a right, it's a privilege to serve the Lord.
And we, we serve him together. We don't serve him independently
of one another. We endeavour to try to do things
as a team. Unity in Christ is like a choir
singing one perfect song, each voice blending for His glory.
In today's message, Pastor Clark conveys how the early believers
shared a single vision, free from complaints or personal
agendas. You see no one claiming this is
my ministry, my way. Their focus was Christ alone,
shining in His glory. Serving him is a privilege, not
a right. And you're called to do it
together, not solo teamwork. And faith reflects his heart.
Are you serving Christ in unity with others and embracing it
now? Here's Pastor Clark in the book
of Acts Chapter 2 with today's edition of Living Waters of
Grace. Jesus said by this people will
know you're my disciples by the love you have for one another.
Nope, your criticism or judgmentalism or holier and thou
thank God we're not going down those paths here.
None of us are better than each other.
Well, the purpose of the church, the fellowship is that right?
Helping one another. And sometimes you might not want
to be helped because you think you can do it yourself.
Well, you, you need help. That's what it is.
It's a blessing to serve people. It's not an inconvenience, is
it? That's what we do as Christians.
We care for one another. We love one another.
We want to help each other. We want to be there for one
another. That's the fellowship.
You know, being together. Some of you make a practice of
getting together with different people, whether it's dinner, you
have them in your home, you have a coffee or you go to a Bible
study or you know, doing life together, fellowshipping.
That's what they did in the early church.
They were in the word and they fellowship like we do.
And then it says in the breaking of bread and that is the Lord's
Supper. Some people say, well, why do
you guys have the Lord's Supper every week?
I'm used to only having it once every six months.
Well, the early church had it every time they gathered.
So I'm not going to, like, try to reinvent anything, are you?
Let's just do what they did. We won't go wrong if we follow
what the ingredients are in the beginning stages of the New
Testament church. The farther we get away from the
principles of the New Testament church, the weaker the church
becomes. And so they broke bread together
and they had this remembrance of what the Lord has done for them
and the death of Christ and his burial in his resurrection.
And then it says in prayers and in prayers, as the church was
Jewish, they had certain times of the day of of prayer.
And so they followed their tradition of the times of prayer
during the day. And so there were certain
prayers that they remembered from their upbringing as Jewish
people. In regard to worshipping the
Lord God Jehovah, prayer is the foundation of the power of God
in the church. Without prayer, there is no
power. Pastor Lewis, every Sunday he
comes, he says, has anybody prayed for you yet?
I said no. He says, I feel bad for you, let
me pray for you. No, you guys are all praying for
me. Before you come, you pray for
me. While I'm preaching, you pray
for, you know, we're so grateful for your prayers.
But you know, Ted prays for me in the hallway every Sunday.
He meets here early to pray and hold up the church and you guys
and me and everything that happens in the ministry.
Lewis, Pastor Lewis lays hands on me and prays for me.
Without prayer, I can't do anything.
And without prayer in the church, God is quenched.
His Spirit is quenched. I can't emphasize it enough.
All all week long, we get text 2020 of us on the prayer line.
This person needs prayer. This happened, this crisis, this
praise, this answer. It's just wonderful to see this
church being a place of prayer and the people let us know how
they're doing because of the prayer.
The prayers that have been answered, the miracles that have
occurred, the healings that the Lord has done, the people who
have gotten saved, the people who have turned away from wicked
ways because of prayer. I mean this answers and answers
and answers prayer and then it says in verse 43, then fear came
upon every soul and many wonders and signs were done through the
apostles. The apostles had special power
from God. I'm not an apostle, I'm a pastor
teacher. I believe God does miracles and
I've seen him do miracles and I've received miracles, but I am
not the agent of miracles for you.
So only Christ can do a miracle, but he chooses to do miracles
through each of us. That's not a pastor or a teacher
through the body of Christ. You praying for someone?
Some of the pastor. Can you pray for me?
Yeah, But you can get anybody in this church to pray for you.
Their prayers are just as effectual as mine.
So we don't have apostles today. Some people claim to be
apostles, but they're not false Apostles everywhere trying to
RIP people off of their resources.
But these men in the early church, these 11 plus Matthias,
who they had voted on, were involved in this foundation of
the church. And the church is built upon
Jesus Christ being the chief cornerstone, right?
He's the one that holds it all together.
And upon that cornerstone, that foundation is the apostles and
prophets. And it says there's no other
foundation that can be laid then this foundation, which is the
Church of Jesus Christ Christ, the chief cornerstone and the
foundation of the apostles and prophets.
So as corporately as believers in New Testament churches, we're
not reinventing the wheel. We're not changing the the, the
system. We're not saying, well, we need
a different cornerstone, let's get Allah in there or let's get
Buddha or Muhammad or whatever. No, Jesus is the only one that
can make this work. It's his.
And we're not looking for new apostles and new prophets to, to
tell us how to do this. No, we're depending on the
apostles that are written in the Bible and the prophets that are
written in the Bible, period. Anybody that thinks they have
new revelation or new information.
I completely say that there's a door head on on.
We don't need anything else but what we have here right Sola
script or so the the Holy Spirit was moving in the church.
Miracles are happening because of what's being done in the
church is brand new. The Lord, if you may advertise
his power through these signs and wonders, where people were
all the sudden overwhelmed and in fear of this holy God that
showed up in these meetings and did wondrous things.
And then it says in verse 44. Now all who believe were
together and had all things in common and sold their
possessions and goods and divided them among all as anyone
had need. Now this was not something that
was being advocated by the Lord per SE, that every generation
does this until Christ comes again.
But they were in Jerusalem at the time, unemployed, the
majority of them, and they needed help from one another to
get by. So the way they got the eye is
that they pulled their resources together and they helped each
other and they shared, and they had all things in common.
This didn't continue very long after this because the church
was spread out through the persecution and they went all
over the place. But they had such a heart in the
early stages of the church that whatever was mine was yours and
whatever was yours was mine. And we would figure it out so
that there was no one that was without and everyone had food
and everyone had shelter and everyone was being taken care of
and they distributed it out as anyone had need.
Now, the way it works, people give offerings in the church and
the offerings are budgeted by the man who handles the finances
in the church. And there's finances that are
set up for the radio station. There's finances that are set up
for paying the salaries of the church.
There's finances that are set up for paying the utilities and the
rent. There's finances that are set up
for the benevolent need of people who are in the church,
who are in crisis, that need help for a period of time.
So we do the same thing, but it's done independently of us
doing it all together. We're throwing all our stuff in
one pot. We give what we're able to give
to the work of the ministry, and we put it in the offering
bucket. Should we mail it in or however
we do it online. This is how the church works now
in regard to sharing the needs financially that may arise
within the community. The church and verse 46 it says
so continuing daily with 1 accord in the temple.
They had a unity. There was no division and
complaining. I don't want to do it this way
We're going to do it this way. No, this is my ministry.
This is my vision. This there was none of that
stuff. There was one vision and it was
Christ in his glory and anything that we had in our opportunity
to do back then as well as now is a privilege.
It's not a right, it's a privilege to serve the Lord and
we we serve him together. We don't serve him independently
of one another. We endeavour to try to do things
as a team, as a, as a body of believers, that we have oneness,
that we have unity of, of the Spirit, doing things according
to the word of God, by the instruction and teaching of the
Spirit of God. And they broke bread from house
to house. They had meals together, they
gathered together, they took the Lord's Supper together in each
other's homes. They ate their food with
gladness and simplicity of heart.
Boy, isn't that a beautiful simple vision?
Ate their meals with simplicity and gladness of heart.
We can learn something from how these people live their lives in
simplicity, not complexity. Do you ever feel like life gets
way too complicated? Yeah, well, we're, we're really
good at doing that, unfortunately.
But just to get back to some simple basics of this, being
grateful for the daily bread that the Lord provides for us
and not take it for granted. When you look at the people in
Ukraine right now that are being dispersed everywhere and they
have a backpack of a few belongings on their back and the
communities are devastated and the infrastructures are
destroyed. You know, the the food issue is,
is in crisis, man. It doesn't take too long after
watching some of those news feeds that you are grateful you
don't live in Ukraine. And then they were praising God,
which is what we desire to do here.
Praise God and having favor with all the people.
And that's what we want to have. We want to have God's favor and
we want to have favor one another in this church as we do
his work together. Because when we have favor from
God, then wonderful things occur in our lives and in our
families. To live life without God's favor
is a disaster. But they had favor with all the
people. And because of all this, we're
reading here, it says, and the Lord added to the church daily
those who were being saved. It wasn't man that added to the
church. It was the Lord who added to the
church. I had nothing to do with you
being here today. The Lord drew you here today.
The Lord's the one that grows the church.
And a church that's growing is rooted in the teachings of the
principles that we're looking at here today.
It's not the number of people that come to the church that
make the church powerful. It's the kind of people that
come to the church that make the church powerful.
People who are filled with God's Spirit, people who love God and
love other people, people who are humble, people who have a
desire and a thirst for the Word of God and the things of God in
each one of your lives are being impacted by one another.
And as you go out into your world and your life and your
community, you and the Lord go together and you have an impact
on other people's lives, your neighbors, your relatives, the
coworkers. Some of them then ask you, well,
what is different about you? What makes you different?
And you tell them about Jesus, right?
What he's done for you. And then sometimes they're
curious. Would you go to church?
Yeah. Where's it at?
Can I go with you? What's the address?
When do they meet? How do I have to address or
whatever? They want to know a little bit
about where you hang out and where you learn about God.
And the Lord then adds to the church daily those who were
being saved. You know, I don't save anybody,
and you don't either. Only God can save people.
We can point people to the message of the gospel and
salvation, but it's God that does the work of salvation.
It's not any of us who led you to the Lord, the Holy Spirit.
He's the only one that can lead us to the truth.
Now Peter and John in chapter 3, they went up together to the
temple at the hour of prayer, the 9th hour, 3:00 in the
afternoon. So they're still following a
little bit of the tradition of of being Jewish people.
The Gentiles really hadn't come on the scene yet in a dominant
way. And a certain man, lame from his
mother's womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of
the temple, which is called beautiful, to ask alms for those
who entered the temple. So this man, about 40 years old,
was always lifted up and taken up.
This was one of the gates at the temple.
They say it was about 75 feet high, double doors, brass, just
beautiful. The sun glistened off of it.
It was the best place to sit if you were a beggar because most
of the people came through this gate into the temple and he
would ask alms from those who entered the temple.
Alms were something that Jewish people did because it was part
of their ritual and part of their way of worship.
So you wouldn't walk by a beggar and ignore them.
You would be compelled to give them something.
So I'm sure the guy was taken care of from the graciousness of
the people that entered into the temple.
And fixing his eyes on him with John, Peter said, look at us.
And so the man's used to just someone dropping something in
there, clinging the cup. And Peter looks at him and says,
look at us. Just don't look at the hands
that are going by throwing money into the basket or whatever.
He had to collect his offerings. They were compelling this man to
look at them, Peter and John, and so he gave them his
attention, expecting to receive something from them.
Then Peter said silver and gold I do not have.
So this guy's probably hearing that.
Why you want me to look at you? The only reason I'm here is that
I need money, and you're telling me you don't have any.
So what's in it for me? But they didn't stop there, they
said. But what I do have I give you in
the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.
And he took him by the right hand and lifting him up, and
immediately his feet and his ankle bones received strength.
Only a doctor could communicate what's happening here.
Specifically something with the ankles, something with the feet
were out of whack. And Luke is telling us, Doctor
Luke here, who wrote the book of the act, that this was a miracle
physiologically. That also could be explained
medically here, that this guy's feet and ankle weren't hooked
up, right? It's a miracle.
It says in verse 8, he leaps up, stood and walked and entered the
temple with them. They didn't give him crutches or
a Walker. I mean, this guy was fully
healed instantaneously walking, leaping and praising God.
And all the people saw him walking and praising God.
Then they knew that it was he who sat begging alms at the
beautiful gate of the temple. And they were filled with wonder
and amazement at what had happened to him.
Think about all these people, all these years that were going
into the temple, seeing this guy day, day in and out, week in and
week out, year in and year out, nothing changing.
The poor guy just can't move. He can't walk, he's lame.
And now they all recognize him as the one who was lame.
It's no longer lame. The power of God moving by the
Spirit of God and the lives of the people of God.
People don't follow the Lord because of miracles.
Many times Jesus did miracles and they would forget about Him
and never go back and praise Him for what He had done.
But one thing about a miracle, when it occurs in your life,
there there comes a testimony out of a miracle.
And whenever you can tell someone something that God has
done for you that was unexpected, it gets people's
attention. The Bible says that they're
redeemed to the Lord. Say so, whom He's delivered out
of the hand of the enemy. And I could, I don't have the
time, but I could tell you times that God has touched me
supernaturally, physically, by His grace.
And sometimes I wanted a touch and I didn't get a touch.
But God does all things after the counsel of his own will, not
my will. And we always have to have that
humility. We can ask God for the miracle
and if it comes praise Him, but if it doesn't praise Him too
because we have to be like Jesus and say not our will but your
will be done right and be OK with that knowing that He knows
what's best for us and he loves us.
He's our ABBA father. I've been studying lately about
this father heart of God and how much he loves us, how much he
loves you. He doesn't love you for what he
wants you to become. He loves you right now for who
you are right now. God won't love you anymore
tomorrow than he does today. And he doesn't love you any more
than when you become more holy than you are tomorrow than you
are today. And that's hard for us to grasp,
isn't it? Because we're all used to
measuring things in life, and more must be better.
But no one can really wrap their mind and their hands around this
love of God, because it's. It surpasses human
understanding, the love of God. So you're here, and God doesn't
want you to be ashamed. He doesn't want you to feel
unloved or rejected or not good enough.
He wants you to know that He loves you right where you are,
right with what you're dealing with right now.
You may be in a bad place and you know it, but God isn't
turning His face from you. His face is pointed right at
you, waiting for you to come to Him.
He's wanting to draw you closer to himself.
He's a merciful God, and He's a God who's patient, and He's a
God who's gracious. There's not one of us in here
today, including myself. That's exactly where I should be
all the time with God. We're all works in process,
aren't we? We're all growing in the grace
and the knowledge of God. None of us are perfect, right?
He's perfect and he loves us with a perfect love, an
unconditional love. His love is never based upon
what I've done or I've not done. The Bible just simply says God
is love, doesn't it? And we have a hard time handling
that because somehow we think we got to pay him back somehow and
we could never pay him back enough, right?
He just simply wants us to have our arms open to him and say,
Lord, have your way in my life. Fix what you know needs to be
fixed. Change what you know needs to be
changed. I'm willing, Lord, I just want
to be close to you. I want to worship you.
I want to magnify you. I want to honor you, Lord.
And I'm so thankful, Lord, for what you've done for me.
If you're here today and you're without Christ today, you can
just say, Lord, forgive me for everything I've done in this
life that I know has been wrong. Forgive me and cleanse me and
Lord save my soul and he will. Faith in the Lord.
Repentance is a change of mind, a change of direction, a
willingness to go God's way and not your way.
Lord, when we come before you now, we just want to thank you
today for what it is you've done for us.
We want to thank you, Lord, that there's never been a time that
you haven't forgiven us. There's never been a time where
you've given up on us. There's never been a time when
you've spoken evil about us. Lord, we're your kids.
Lord, we're tender, tenderly loved by you, our heavenly
Father. I pray, O God, that you would
help us as a church, to be a church, Lord, that understands
the greatness of your love. And because of that love that
we've received, that we would show that love to one another,
that we would love, Lord, our enemies, that we would love
those who hate us and say, O manner of evil about us for your
namesake, Lord, that your love would so overcome your bride,
your church, that it would the shine with hope to a world that
is hopeless, Lord and people who desperately need hope and
Savior, protect us from dead religion.
Lord, protect us from ritual. Protect us from things that
don't bring life. Lord, fill us afresh today with
your Holy Spirit. Thanks for joining us on today's
edition of Living Waters of Grace, a ministry of Calvary
Chapel, Westmoreland. Today, Pastor Clark is teaching
about the book of Acts. And as we learn more about Acts,
it becomes clear that the early church didn't miss a single
opportunity to share the gospel. In nearly every chapter, you see
apostles like Peter and Paul stepping into conversations,
crowds, and crises with boldness, ready to proclaim the
name of Jesus. Their example challenges us to
consider how we might step into gospel moments in our own lives.
What doors might God open this week for you to speak truth,
offer hope, or live out your faith in a way that points
others to Him? The story of Acts reminds us we
are part of the same mission. Today, let's live with eyes open
and hearts ready to respond. We hope you are challenged by
today's message. If you're in the Greensburg, PA
area, we'd love to see you in person this Sunday at 10:30 AM
at 400 E Pittsburgh St. Unit 6B.
For more information, visit calvarychapelonline.com.
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