Welcome to the Liberty Baptist Sermon Archives.
The message you're about to hear was preached at Liberty Baptist
Church in Easton, MA. You can find out more about us
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message from God's Word will be a blessing to you.
Let's take our Bibles. We'll be in Acts chapter 4
tonight. Acts chapter 4 and verse #23 And
we'll read from verse 23 down to 35.
Acts chapter 4, verse 23, verse 23.
The Bible says. And being let go, they went to
their own company, and reported all, all that the chief priests
and elders had said unto them. And when they had heard that,
they lifted up their voice to God with 1 accord, and said,
Lord, thou art God, which has made heaven and earth, and the
sea, and all that in there them is.
Who by the mouth of thy servant David hath said, hath said, Why
did the heathen rage, and the people imagine vain things?
The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered
together against the Lord and against His Christ.
For a truth against thy thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast
anointed. Both Herod and Pontius Pilate
with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together
for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined
before to be done. And now, Lord, behold their
threatenance, and grant unto thy servants, that with all boldness
they may speak thy word, by stretching forth thine hand to
heal, and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of thy
holy child Jesus. And when they had prayed, the
place was shaken where they were assembled together, and they
were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake the Word
of God with boldness. And a multitude of them that
believed were of 1 heart and one, and of one soul.
Neither said any of them that ought of the things which he
possessed was his own, but they had all things common, and with
great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of
the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.
Neither was there any among them that lacked for as many as were
possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the
prices of the things that were sold, and laid them down at the
apostles. Feed and just, and distribute
and distribution. I'm sorry, distribution was made
unto every man according as he had need.
I want to preach this evening really quickly on the title.
That's my crowd, that's my crowd.
Let's pray. Father in Heaven, Lord, we come
before you again wanting to praise you and thank you for all
that you've done for us. Thank you for salvation.
Thank you for your unconditional love and your mercy and your
grace that you bestow upon us. Thank you for your
long-suffering. We don't deserve anything that
you have done. You are such a great God, a good
God towards us and we fail you daily.
I just ask you that you be with us tonight.
Your word says where there are two or three gathered in your in
Your name, there you are in the midst of them.
And what I just ask you that you speak to our hearts through the
preaching and teaching of Your Word.
Encourage us, challenge us, and change us.
In Your name we pray. Amen.
Imagine being part of a church that is growing by the leaps and
bounds. A church where 3000 are saved at
one service and another 5000 are saved at another service.
Imagine being part of. I know that gives all people
that are introverts anxiety, right?
Yeah. Imagine being a part of a church
where the extraordinary is normal and miracles are a part
of everyday life. Imagine being part of a church
that's witnessing God, answers, answer and prayer immediately,
where all the members love one another, where the power of God
is evidence, and where Jesus Christ is truly the centerpiece
of everything that happens. Imagine a church where everyone
is in love with the Lord. If if I could find a church like
that today, I would say that's my crowd.
Well, an early church in Jerusalem that we just read
about when you when we read the book of Acts.
The early church there in Jerusalem was just that.
They enjoyed miraculous displays of the presence and and power of
God on a daily basis. They saw people getting saved in
abundance. They were living in a day when
the extraordinary Mary was the order of that day and but all
wasn't sunshine and roses. When you go all out for Jesus,
the lost and religious crowd, they're not going to like it
very much. So it was for this people, for
these people here. After a lame man was healed at
the beautiful gate of the temple, the people of Jerusalem
really began to listen to the message of the apostles.
When, when this happened, you know, the religious crowd here,
the religious elite, they had arrested John and Peter and they
threw them in prison, you know, and then brought them before the
Sanhedrin for trial. And at this trial, John and
Peter preached the gospel. The Sanhedrin then issued an
order forbidden them to from preaching in the name of Jesus
any longer and let them leave. And when that meeting was over,
those two disciples returned to the place where the church was
gathered. And no doubt that church when,
when, when John and Peter were in prison, no doubt that church
was praying for John and Peter, you know, And so they had
returned there where they were praying, where the church was
gathered and praying for their leaders.
And when John and Peter told the folks at the church what
happened, what you know, what was going on, what transpired,
instead of the church, instead of the crowd being upset,
instead of them being fearful, a worship service broke out.
That's what we just, that's what we read about.
A worship service broke out instead of them being upset and
fearful. I would like for us to look at
these events that we read moments ago and see how these
people conducted themselves in the midst of persecution, in the
midst of persecution. And as we see them respond to
this situation, we're given a glimpse of their heart and we
can see why the hand of the Lord was so active in their midst, in
their midst. First of all, they want us to
see, number one, that they are a worshipping crowd.
They are a worshipping crowd. When we look back at verse 24
through 31, the Bible says. And when they heard that, they
lifted up their voices to God with 1 accord.
So it wasn't just some people that were worshipping, it was
the entire body of Christ that was there.
It was everyone that was there. They lifted up their voice with
1 accord and said, Lord, thou art God, which hath made heaven
and earth and the sea, and all that, that in them is who by the
mouth of thy servant. David hast said, Why did the
heathen rage, and the people imagine vain things?
The kings of the earth stood up in verse 26, and the rulers were
gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ, for
a truth against thy holy child Jesus in verse 27, whom thou
hast anointed. Both Herod and Pontius Pilate
with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered
together. For to do whatsoever thy hand
and thy counsel determined before to be done.
And now Lord, behold their threatenings grant unto thy
servants with all the boldness they may speak thy word by
stretching forth thine hand to heal and the signs and that the
signs and wonders may be done by the name of thy holy child
Jesus. And verse 31 I love verse 31.
So they're talking to the Lord, they're worshiping him, and in
verse 31 says, and when they had prayed, the place was was shaken
where they were assembled together.
Can you just pitch that in your mind?
Can you picture that if we were gathered when we were gathered
this morning or this evening, that when we were praying that
all of a sudden the place started to shake?
Now, if we lived in California, that would, that would, that
would be normal because everybody would think, oh, it's
just an earthquake, you know, you know, But you know, if you
know these people here, the Bible says that, you know, the
place was shaken together and they were all filled with the
Holy Ghost and they spake the word of God with boldness.
They were a worshipping crowd. When these early Christians
heard the reports of the apostles, they didn't react with
fear and they didn't react with trembling.
They did not seek for a place to hide in fear.
Instead, they turned their hearts to Lord, to the Lord, to
worship. That's what they did.
They worship. You know when you know, when
things you know you know were turning for the worst.
Persecution was coming to them and you know, they decided to
worship. They worshiped the God and with
their presence they were present there in verse 24.
And when they heard that, they lifted up their voice to God
with 1 accord. They were there and present.
It wasn't that some of the church was gathered together in
the building and some were not. Now, if you're sick, if you're,
you know, in the hospital, that's one thing.
But if you are healthy and able to be in church, you ought to be
in church. You ought to be in church.
And in this early church here they were together and they were
worshipping with their presence. When it came time for them to
meet, they, you know, they didn't have to go round people
up and hunt people down or entice people to come.
Now, if you, you know, you know, if you remember, I've told you
my testimony before. You know, in the past, I'm a bus
kid, you know, and I, you know, I started going to church, you
know, I went to church the last day of VBS and I was in, you
know, I went to church for a piece of bubble gum.
I wanted to church. I wanted to get something from
them in order for me to grace their, grace them with my
presence at church. And so I was like, what are you
going to give me if I go to your church?
And I got a Bubblicious bubble gum.
I did. And then, you know, and so then
they asked me if you're going to.
So after I went that first time and I got my bubble gum, they
asked are we going to come back next week?
And I was like, only if you're going to give me something.
And literally I was, I started going to church and I was going
to church because I was getting tangible.
I was getting things from them. Bubble gum, whether it's bubble
gum, candy or whatever. That was my motivation to go to
church at the beginning. And it was today, too.
No, I'm just kidding. Just seeing if you're paying
attention. No, you know, I I stopped that
last week. No, you know, So what?
One, one year Was it for Christmas?
My so my 40th, right? Yeah, my 40th birthday, you
know, a couple years ago, you know, Susanna Samantha's, you
know, sister, you know, bought me a a bucket of bubble issues
bubble gum for my birthday. And, and and she brought that,
you know, so and that that's just showed me or somebody does
listen in teen stars go class, you know, and so she bought
bought that as a gift and that was hilarious and I loved it.
But, you know, so this early church here, they were a
worshipping crowd. They worshipped with their
presence. They were in their place when it
when it came time to worship. We all realize that there are
times when, when it's necessary for people to miss church again,
if you're sick or if you're, you know, we, we want, you know, our
pastor mentions this all the time.
You know, we, you know, if you're a police officer, a
doctor, you know, EMTEMS, whatever.
We want those people to work. We don't want those people to
have like if you, if you have an an emergency on Sunday, you
don't want to call 911 and then tell you, I'm sorry, we're all
off today, you know, come back tomorrow.
And so it's necessary. I get it.
You know, we have people in our church, you know, we have
several police officers, you know, and in our church and that
day when they can't be there on a Sunday because of their
schedule and that's fine. Yeah, well, we get it.
We understand that, you know, if that's the job that God
provided, you know, to you, we understand that, however.
But you know, there are some people who have who have got and
they've become really good at making every excuse that they
can to miss church. They've become really good at
it, you know, and you know, oh, you know, my cat died and I
can't go to church. I've heard that before.
Well, didn't your cat die last week too?
You know, I've heard, you know, I've heard people, you know,
make excuses of why they can't go to church and then they
forget the excuse that they had mentioned the previous week.
And it's the same one the next week, you know.
And so, and I know that's not any of you guys because you're
here tonight and we're, I'm praising the Lord that you're
here, you know, and that you're here worshipping God in this
place, you know, And so, you know, if the problem is the
preacher, then I would suggest, you know, you tell someone and
maybe God will send you somebody else.
But the problem isn't your preacher.
You know, the problem isn't, you know, and you know, the problem
is probably a little closer to our, you know, to home, which is
our own heart. If we're trying to miss church
and get out of church, you know more than you know, if we don't
want to be there, let me let me take it back.
COVID, we all remember COVID when COVID started, right?
You know, I know this happened in our church and I'm sure I
know it happened in other churches.
But people that were looking for excuses to get in to stop going
to church, they found their excuse when COVID started and
they stopped going. But yet those same people who
would say I'm not going to church anymore because of COVID
and I'm not making light of COVID at all.
But people who would say that I'm not going to go to church
because of COVID will still go to the grocery store on Monday
morning, went with a larger crowd and and be and be there.
It's not stopping them from going to the grocery store.
It's not stopping them from going to a sporting event or
going going anywhere else at all.
Neither should it stop us from being in the House of God and
worshiping Him. I heard someone say this.
I don't remember who but I had it written down in one of my
bibles. Don't wait until the hearse
hauls you to church. Don't wait until the hearse
hauls you to church. If you do, you will go
regardless of the weather that day.
There's going to be beautiful flowers there, but guess what?
You won't be able to enjoy them. The pastor will say some good
things about you, but you're not going to be able to hear them.
There will be beautiful music, but you won't be able to enjoy
it. There'll be heartfelt prayers,
but you won't, but they won't touch your heart.
There will be friends and relatives there, but you won't
be able to see them and worship with them.
You will go. You will go no matter how many
hypocrites are there. You will go no matter how much
you are needed at home. You won't be concerned about
whether you're dressed right. After that final trip, you'll
never have to decide whether to go to church or not.
So don't wait until the hearse takes or hearse takes you.
You'll never get another chance. And why not decide that as long
as you're living and breathing, as long, as long, as long as God
gives you the ability, as long as you're healthy, why not
decide I will be at church, I will worship the Lord, you know,
and I will be there. And so that present crowd is my
crowd. They were worshiped, you know,
they were a worshiping crowd. They worshiped with their
praises. Verse 24 through 28, we won't
read it again for time's sake, but when you read verse 24
through 20. 8. Their worship begin in these in
these verses here it included an element of praise.
They begin their prayer by calling on the Lord and blessing
his name. They praise you know they praise
God for who he is and what he and what he did and you know and
by the way, these are the you know the very same reasons that
lead that led them to praising the Lord and and are still a
true as true today for you and I.
We should praise God for his person and verse 24 they said
again with 1 accord, Lord, thou art God, which has made heaven
and earth and the sea and all that in them is so they praise
they praise God for his person. They begin by praising him for
who he is. Who is he?
He's God. That is a very reason that you
and I should praise God and that our praise should never cease
for Him. Every St. of God you know should
take the time to praise Him for who He is and for the attributes
that make Him God. What is His attributes?
He's holy should praise Him for His Holiness.
We should praise God for His grace.
We've all experienced the grace of God in our life, right?
And we experience it every day. We should thank God for his
grace and praise him for his grace.
We should praise him for his glory.
We should praise God, you know, for, for hope and all that God
gives us, you know, is ample reasons for you and I to praise
his lovely name. When you read the book of Song
of Solomon, you know that the reaction of the bride in Song of
Solomon, you know, she tried to describe the love of her life
and she finally concluded it with saying that he is
altogether lovely. Everything about him caused her
to praise Him. So what it is with our God, He
is altogether lovely. He is God, he is holy, he's
righteous. You know, he is the truth, He's
the life, He's the way. Everything about him should
drive us to praise him. Verse 25 to 27, you know the,
you know these people in the early church, you know in
Jerusalem here they were praising God for his provision.
The these verses recount the hatred that of the world towards
Jesus and the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross for their sins, for
the sins of the world. They praise God for his gift.
If there was ever a valid reason there praise God.
If there ever was a valid reason, it is the death of
Christ on the cross for our sins.
That's a valid reason. The fact that he took our place,
the fact that you know he took your place, He died for you,
paid for your sins, He was buried and he rose again, that
should give you ample reason. If you can't think of anything
else, anything, any other reason to praise Him, you should praise
God for what He did for you, for sending his Son to die in the
cross to pay for your sins and arise from the grave.
And we serve a holy, righteous and a living God.
This this evening, when I think that my sins are gone, when I
think that I have been forgiven, when I think that I have a home
in heaven, when I think that God is my Father, Jesus is my elder
brother, and the Holy Spirit is my indwelling comforter.
When I think of the price that he had paid and the love that he
had showed to you, to me and to you, when I think of that, of
the gift that he gave, I cannot help or praise the his holy
name. I cannot help it there.
There is still a valid place for praise in the House of God.
Church service does not have to be dead and silent.
We can praise God. Yeah, we can praise and we can
shout. Amen.
We can shout Hallelujah. Praise the Lord.
If you don't want to shout, ladies, you can wave our hands
as long as it's clean, you know, But we can praise the Lord in
church. I've been in churches that have
been better than a doornail. I've been in church where, you
know, where the, you know, the congregational singing.
It's like, does anyone actually believe the words that they're
singing? Yeah, there's, you know, there's
no, you know, you know, there's no, it doesn't seem like that
they believe it, that they're, that they're actually know that
they're saved and on their way to heaven.
It doesn't seem like that at all.
But thankfully, it's not this place.
Many people don't like it. But our God is still worthy of
all of our praise, all of our honor and glory that he can
that, yeah, that we can offer to him.
Praise is not an option in the Bible.
When we look it up and we study praise and praise in the Bible,
it's not an option. God doesn't say if you want to
praise me, you can. It's actually command and we
don't have time to look at the verses, but Hebrews 1315, Psalm
47, verse one, Psalm 5, verse 11, Isaiah chapter 12 and verse
6 are some verses where where it tells us young that praise is a
command. God saves us from a dead spirit
in the House of God. When we have such a glorious,
glorious God in the midst of his church, there's praise for God's
power. We find out in verse 28.
They mentioned in verse 28 for to do whatsoever thy hand, thy
hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.
And so they're praising God for his power.
They mentioned God's hand. This is a reference to his great
power here, to His ability to exert supernatural power to
accomplish His will. May I say that God has not
changed at all this evening. He is still the He is still the
same today as he ever has been, and he's, he still has all power
that is in heaven and in earth. He is still the God who is able
to do that which is exceedingly, abundantly above all that we can
ask or think. He is still the great I am.
He is still God and he is worthy of our praise.
He's worthy of it. How many mountains has God moved
for you and I? How many mountains, how many
times has God, you know, moved and helped in your life?
When you're down and depressed and you're, you got worries, you
got cares, you got, you know, trials going on.
How many times has God showed up and moved those mountains for
you and helped you carry you through those through those
tough times? How many times have you seen God
do the impossible? How many times you know, has He
moved and answered prayer for you and for me?
Don't you? And I think that He's worthy of
our praise. He's worthy of it.
I do that. That praising crowd is my crowd.
If we don't praise Him, be careful about criticizing those
that do. You know, when every church has
some people that are like this, that they don't praise God when
they're in church. They like, I mean, they won't
sing, you know, they won't sing in the congregations.
They're there, their body is there, but their mind and spirit
may be somewhere else. Every church has.
Yeah. And, and if you don't have
somebody like that, you will find somebody one day because
they, they they find churches like this.
Yeah, Yeah. And and they and they're there,
but don't be that person. You know, if you're not praising
him, be careful of criticizing those who do.
Yeah. After all, they have more Bible
for their actions than you do than you do for yours.
When you're praising, when you're praising God and you're
worshiping him, you have more Bible for your action than
people that are not praising God.
They praise God for their for God's Providence in verse 28 as
well. They took time to praise God for
his Providence. That is, they praised him that
in the death of Jesus things worked out just as he had
planned them to do. Jesus didn't just say, hey, I'm
going to die in the cross, pay for your sins was buried and I'm
going to be buried. I'm going to be, you know, for
three days and then I will rise again.
He didn't just speak it with his mouth.
He proved it with his action. He proved it.
And you know, and so, you know, you know, this early church,
they realized that, you know, what he said he was going to do
actually happened. And they thank God that he is in
control of all of their lives. And what a lesson it is for you
and I. If we really believe that God's
in control, then why not praise him?
If we really believe, why not praise Him?
Why not praise him for, for all of life, even the parts that we
don't like in life, even the parts that are hard to
understand in life. We under, you know, if we really
believe that he, you know, that he is who he says he is, then we
can thank Him that even in the middle of our difficulty, things
are going according to the plan of God.
Let me remind you that regardless of what comes your
way in life, if you're saved, God's behind it.
Romans 828, you know, talks about, you know, for all things
work together for good to them that believe God.
And I'm paraphrasing that. Yeah.
And so if we're saved, we're child of God.
It doesn't matter what comes in our life.
You know, God's there. You know, he's it's going to
work out and he's going to you know, he's going before you and
I to make victory possible. He deserves praise for his great
control, for his control of our life.
You know, and so they're praising crowd.
They worshipped with their prayers in verse 29 and 30.
You know this the early church here after they praised him, you
know from verse 24 through 28, they, you know, they prayed and
you know they worshipped when prayer, they began asking God
for some specific things related to their situation.
They prayed for God's investigation.
In verse 29, they, they say, Lord, behold their threatenings
and grant unto us the unto thy servants, that with all boldness
they may speak thy word. And so they did not condemn.
They did not condemn those that you know, you know, that were
against the church, against them.
They didn't condemn them. They merely asked God to take
notice. After all, they knew that God
already knew their situation, but they reminded him
nonetheless. This is what the Lord wants to
wants to do with our perplexing situations in life.
He does not want us to worry. I know it's easier said than
done, but He wants us to bring our madness to Him in prayer.
That's what He wants us to do. We have all these things that
are going on in life and I know their struggles in life and all
of our struggles are different. But instead of worrying, instead
of, and again, I know it's easier and said and said than
done for some people, But instead of us worrying and
fretting over it, we have a God in heaven who can hear and
answer our prayers. We have a God in heaven who can
help us and guide us and give us wisdom and take care of us.
If we go to Him in prayer, He knows our needs already.
Our prayers are merely demonstrating the fact that we
know that He knows and that we believe that He'll take care of
us. They prayed for God's in
feeling, you know, they prayed for the feeling of the, of the
Holy Spirit so that they might boldly proclaim his message.
They wanted the power of God in their lives.
Notice that they took the, they took the place of servants, you
know, literally slaves before God.
They bowed humbly and asked God to take them and to use them for
His glory. This is the kind of praying that
we need in church today. We need to be actively seeking
and asking God to visit upon our church with His supernatural
power. We need His power to witness.
We need His power to worship. We need His power to preach.
We need His power to carry out the gospel to the ends of this
world. We need Him to get the job done.
You know, because we cannot do it by ourselves.
The Lord builds the church, not you and I.
We need His power. We need His power, and we need
to pray for God's power to be upon His church and to be upon
His people church. How often are we praying,
actively praying for God to have his, for God's power to be upon
Liberty Baptist Church and upon Pastor Rivero.
How often are we praying? That should be a daily thing for
every member of this church. It should be something that we
that we're all doing on a daily basis, praying that God will
have his power upon this place and that God will use Pastor
Rivero and use the people of this church to spread the
gospel, you know, to people in the neighbor here in Easton, in
the neighboring towns. They prayed for God's
intervention in verse 30. They ended their prayer by
asking God to get personally involved in their situation.
Look at verse 30. By stretching forth thine hand
to heal and that the signs and wonders may be done by the name
of thy holy child Jesus. They're asking God to get
involved, to get involved, you know, personally get involved in
their situation. They wanted him to demonstrate
his approval of the church by manifesting his power through
the church. They merely prayed that God will
show up and show out in the midst in the in the midst of the
people. It's a valid object of prayer in
in our times as well. This is a valid object we need
to pray for that God will do the miraculous and the midst of his
church. Once again, we need that when I
was younger and you may have heard me a few times and you
know, when I pray when I was younger, I, I, one of my
teachers and I just got in the habit of doing it.
He, he made a habit, he said of he would always pray, whether
it's silently or out loud that God will change him, that he
would leave different than the way that he came in.
He said, God, I don't want to go to church today and not learn
anything. I don't want to go.
I don't want to leave the same way that I came in.
And so he made a habit to pray that you know, and, and beg God,
God help me to leave different than the way that I came in.
And so you may have heard me pray that from time, you know,
you know when I pray and you know, and that stuck with me as
a young person. And I want and I still to this
day, I want that desire to always to be changed to be
closer to God, to leave different whether whether I'm at
my home church at Lifeline Baptist Church or if you know,
or even if I'm preaching at other places.
I want to leave different than the way I came in.
I want to be closer to God. That's you know, so this early
church here, you know, they they asked God for God to get
involved to, you know, to have his hand to stretch forth thy
hand to heal. We need to pray that God would
do again the miraculous in the midst of his church once again,
I'm not referring to some people.
I'm not referring to some people who are or who are blame, maybe
blaming God for things. I'm referring to an old
fashioned movement of God amongst people in which their
hearts are stirred and to love Him more, their lives are
changed and made holy and the strings of their tongues are
loosed to praising God and praying to Him and telling the
lost all about Him. We should be, you know, we, we
have, you know, we teach the younger kids, let's talk about
Jesus, that song, right? How often are we talking about
Jesus? How often adults are we telling
other people and praising him? You know, you know, to, to our
coworkers, you know, to our lost family members.
We need God to we need his intervention in our day.
We not, we, let's not be afraid to ask him to help us.
He will answer Nothing honors God as much as he.
Nothing honors God as much you know as does the prayer of
faith. They worshipped with power.
It wasn't an ordinary church service here.
They worshipped with power. As soon as they finished their
praying to God, they experienced an immediate answer to their to
their prayers. As verse 31 says is you know
when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were
assembled together. The place was shaken when the
Lord shows up. It cannot be hidden.
It cannot be hidden when God shows up.
He turned their prayer meeting upside down.
In other words, things got different really fast.
And you know when God is in a service and when he's not in the
service. When God's in the service,
things cannot remain calm and collected.
When God shows up, the Spirit begins to move through a place
and now in the plate, that place will be shaken for the glory of
God. We need God to shake us these
days. We need Him to move in our
church services so that things are not run-of-the-mill and our
world needs to know that God is alive and that He's in the midst
of His people. Many, many would not like a real
move of God, and that's evident by the number of dead churches
that are around, even in the New England area.
However, I say God, pour on all of us Your glory, your power.
Give us your power. Give us your presence.
Move in such a way to shake this place that people would worship
you once again, that people would worship you.
This worshiping crowd, you know, that's my type of crowd here.
It's my This place was shaken. Yeah.
The place was saturated when the Lord moved in.
Those who were looking for something got and they got it.
Verse 30, verse 31, you know, says and when they had prayed,
the place was shaken, they were assembled together and they were
all filled with the Holy Ghost and they spake the word of God
with boldness. So everybody who everybody that
was there. Everybody got something.
Could you imagine, you know, what would happen in our homes
and our communities if every member, if every member of the
church was filled with the Holy Ghost?
Not, not only, you know, would we be shaken, but the world
around us would be shaken too. We would see people come to, you
know, come to the saving, you know, faith of Christ.
We would see differences being made in people's lives.
You know, the churches would be filled.
And you know, if, you know, if everyone was filled with the
Holy Ghost, it's a worshipping crowd.
They worshipped with power, but they were also a working crowd.
They were a working crowd. Verse 32.
And I got a hasten point #1 was my biggest point #2 There were
working crowd. Verse 32 says, in the multitude
of them that believed were of 1 heart and of one soul, neither
said any of them that ought of the things which He possessed of
His own, but they had all things common.
Drop down to verse 34. Neither was there any among them
that lacked. For as many as were possessors
of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the
things that were sold, and they laid them down at the apostles
feet, and distribution was made unto every man according as he
that had need. So these verses make it clear
that the early church, they were a busy bunch of people.
They were busy, they were active in the Lord's work, and they
were active in the lives of the Lord's people.
And doing what they did, they set out, they set a good example
for the Church of our day, you know, the reason for their work,
you know, in verse 32, you know says in the multitude of them
that believed were of 1 heart and of one soul, you know.
And so the reason this verse gives us 2 reasons for their
doing of what they did. They shared a common love.
The Bible says that they were of 1 heart.
They had a common love here. This is that is that they had a
love for one another that could not be explained in human terms.
And as a result, they worked on behalf of their brothers in
Christ. This kind of love when it's
present and when it's real is a supernatural work of God in our
hearts. When he saves us, he gives us
the ability, gives you an eye, the ability to allow him to love
through US for us to allow him to love through US the love of
the Saints that you know, the love the Saints have for one
another. It's is impossible to understand
or to explain. However, when we say when we,
when Jesus is the, you know, you know, when we're saved and Jesus
is the presence, you know, you know, and, and in our lives,
it's a powerful witness to the world.
And it's because of Jesus that you and I could love one
another. It's because I know it's hard.
People are difficult. People may be weird from time to
time. And I know it's difficult.
People get on our nerves. Church members get on our
nerves, Right. Yeah, you know, like if they sit
in your seat at church and it's like, you know, people, like,
you know, it happens, you know, and, you know, and, and yeah, I
know some people make it really hard to love them, right.
Some people do. God's help.
Nothing shall be impossible. And, you know, and so we can
love one another. We can love people.
And they shared a common life. Yeah.
What made this possible is that within each of their heart,
within each of them, they bet, you know, they had the same
heartbeat. That is the, you know, the Bible
says that they were of one soul. This means that one life filled
each of them. You know, you know, you know
that one life filled each if them, each of them.
And they were not. They were not in this thing
alone and they knew it. So when one person hurt, they
hurt. If one person had a need, they
did what they could to fill that need.
If one person was sad, they helped that person.
When we are, when we who are saved, the life of Christ comes
into us. That same life that lives in me
and lives in you. We are.
We are of 1 Lord, we have one soul.
That is why when again, if you have a need, if there's a member
in your church that has a need and you're able to meet that
need as a brother in Christ or sister in Christ, you should
meet that need. And if somebody's hurt, we
should hurt with them. We should, you know, And if
somebody. And when we're happy, we should
be happy. Other people should be happy.
And when, when God blesses you, we should all rejoice that God
is blessing you. God, you know, you may not have
the blessings of God right now in your life, but you have said,
God bless somebody else. We should praise the Lord for
that. Yeah.
So this church, they were a working crowd.
They, they were servants. Verse 34 through 35 talks about
their work. They were unselfish in an
expression of their love for one another.
They demonstrated by working, by selling all that they had.
You know, they were servants. And you and I need to be of a,
of a servant's heart as well as we serve in the church #3 Not
only was it a working crowd, but they were a witnessing crowd.
They were a witnessing crowd. Look back at verse 33.
The Bible says, and with great power gave the apostles witness
of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon
them all. They were a witnessing crowd.
This verse tells us that these people were not quiet about
their faith. They were bold in their witness
and they were not ashamed of that of what they had or who
they were in Christ. You and I, we should be a
witness in crowd. We shouldn't be ashamed that
we're on our way to heaven, that we know that Jesus as our
Savior. Let me give you 2 quick thoughts
about the witness of these believers.
They witnessed in the power of God.
When the when these apostles went forth bearing the message
of Jesus, He went with them bearing witness to their
message. He placed His power on them and
enabled them to witness for His glory.
We as individuals in the church as a whole, as a whole, it is as
it should be. Then we will be able to count on
God's power and our witness as well.
The reason thousands were being saved in the early church wasn't
because of their ability. It wasn't because they were
special people. Reason why thousands were being
saved wasn't because they had the they had the largest worship
choir. It wasn't because of that, you
know, it wasn't the quality of the preaching or the glory
again, of their servants. Thousands were being saved
because they were operating under the power of God.
We need that power today. We need God's power in our
churches today and all that the powers, the powers available to
us if we claim it by faith and Acts chapter one, verse 8 and
may we pay the price to get the church where the church ought to
be. May we pray until we until he
fills and fills us and pours us out for his glory.
May we get to the place as a church and as individuals that
the power, power of Christ may rest upon us.
We need that more than we need anything else in our day.
They witnessed the the provision of His grace.
The Bible tells us that great grace was upon them all.
The word grace means favor. It may mean you know favor.
You know, you know, with people. This was the case in Acts 247.
Or it may mean that they found favor with God and he blessed
them accordingly. I'm inclined to lean towards the
latter explanation of this passage.
If that is true, then they went forth under the grace of God and
were aided of Him, and they as they witnessed His plan of
salvation. In other words, God helped them
to get the job done for His glory.
God help them for His glory. He gave them the grace to preach
the gospel and tell the lost of the lost and dying world about a
Savior. May we seek Him for that same
grace to go out and tell this world about a Savior who loves
them. May we not fear about rejection
or ridicule, but may we have the grace to tell them about the
bloody bloody cross and the empty tomb so that we might
fulfill the Great Commission of our Lord Jesus.
May we have the courage to stand up and and be counted amongst
those who are washed in the blood and different because of
the saving almighty power of God.
May we not be ashamed of Him, and may we declare the true
Gospel and trust Him to save sinners, not for our sake, but
for His sake. The witnessing crowd is my
crowd. Are you a part of that crowd
today? If you're saved, if you're part
of this church, then you are. If not, you need to come to
Jesus to be saved, and he will save you, you and you know, and
then you can be a part of this church and you can be part of a
worshipping crowd, a working crowd, and a witnessing crowd,
all for God's glory. Thank you for listening to the
sermon from the pulpit of Liberty Baptist Church.
If this message was a blessing to you, or if there's any way we
can serve you, please let us know by contacting us at
info@mylibertybaptist.org. Or you can visit us this Sunday
at 800 Washington St. in Easton, MA.
May the Lord bless you as you grow in His Word.