Welcome to the Lansdale Life Church podcast.
If you're seeking a closer relationship with Jesus Christ, this podcast is for you.
Thank you for joining us today.
So if you could turn to Acts chapter four, and it's a short message today with all that's happening.
Some of you are saying, good, I came on on the right day. But Acts chapter four and
God's great grace is upon us. Amen. There's something about grace, God's unmerited favor.
His blessings, his benevolence. I once heard that a great acronym for grace is God's riches
at Christ's expense. You've probably heard that before. And it really is, God just pours on his
blessings. And the response really is for us to also be generous to others. And we're going to see
that in today's verses. We're only looking at a few verses and we see the culture of the early church,
how it's just exploding with generosity because great grace was upon them. They said, you know,
like these things I hold on to, they're just temporary. They're so insignificant compared
to eternity. You ever just been so blessed that you just have to give away? It reminds me,
remember when King David was, you know, the kingdom was going phenomenal. He had peace on
every side and he's just blessed. And he's like, I just don't deserve this. Like who am I? A
little shepherd kid, the eighth son of Jesse. You know, I mean, this is like, and yet, you know,
and then he asks, isn't there anyone of the household of Saul I can bless? Because I just
need to give back somehow. And even though Saul tried to kill him for years, okay,
he still realized Saul was a part of his stepping stone to becoming king and the Lord used him
for this. And so they said, well, yeah, he has a, you know, Jonathan's son lives in Lodabar. And so,
you know, the story that, you know, King David brought Mephibosheth to his house. He restored
all of the land that belonged to King Saul to Mephibosheth. And here Mephibosheth was a disabled
man at that point. And yet he was restored all of his land. And he also was restored his servants
that King Saul had. And not only that, but he ate to eat at the king's table from that day on.
He was considered like family. That's the whole picture of like, just saying, man, I don't
deserve this. Just like David, look around and say, how did I get here? I have to give something
back. You know, we're going to see a little bit more of that deeper into this. So let's pray.
Father God, as we turn to Acts chapter four, Lord, we ask you to reveal to us this, this
perspective and this generosity of the early church and Lord God, that we can replicate that
in our own hearts and be generous to others because you've given so much to us. And we thank
you for that in Jesus' name. Amen. So let's just dive right in to verse 32. And we're going to be
finishing in verse 37 of Acts chapter four, sharing in all things. Now, in the, now the
multitude of those who believed were of one heart and one soul, neither did anyone say that any of
the things he possessed was his own, but they had all things in common. And with great power,
the apostles gave witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus and great grace was upon them all.
Nor was there anyone among them who lacked for all who were possessors of lands or houses,
sold them and brought the proceeds of the things that were sold and laid them at the apostles' feet.
And they distributed to each as anyone had need. And verse 36, and Joseph, who was also named
Barnabas by the apostles, which is translated son of encouragement, a Levite of the country of
Cyprus, having land sold it and brought the money and laid it at the apostles' feet.
And so we see this great burst of generosity and sharing. And I'll just mention,
this is the first time we hear the mention of Barnabas and he's going to be instrumental
in the book of Acts. And he's also going to be instrumental in Paul, the apostle Paul's
journey as an apostle. And so as we're reading this, this idea of generosity,
I've heard socialism seems to be on a gaining momentum again. I mean, it ebbs and flows
through every generation, it seems. But I've actually heard a politician once say,
well, the early church, they were socialists. And just look at what we just read, they gave
everything. Well, I won't get too deep into it, but obviously there's a difference between a
government taking from you and them deciding where it goes with no accountability, by the way,
and a difference between the Holy Spirit urging people to give out of their heart,
to give out of their free will, because of the surplus. They're overwhelmed with gratefulness
to God and they give out of their heart. So comparing this to socialism and government
interference and ruling over people and taking their property away, it doesn't work. So we
can just end that with there. I had all kinds of examples of this, but for time's sake,
I think we should dive right into what we just read. And the first is we see this idea of the
early church laying things at the apostles' feet. And what does that mean? What does that represent,
people laying things, their possessions before the apostles' feet? And I think there's a lot
of symbolism in this. And first of all, I want to mention, it really shows a picture of submission
to authority, because these apostles, they had authority. We read that a few weeks ago,
how they said we have to choose people who had been with Jesus and who have the same testimony
as us and so forth. And so the new saints deliver these things to the apostles because
they had authority and they were submitting to this authority. And I have some examples of this,
but first, the Lord, he does raise people up to have authority in the body of Christ,
because Jesus Christ is the head of the church. There is no person who's the head of the church,
but it's his body of Christ that he raises some up to fill certain offices, to inspire,
to encourage, to lead others in the body of Christ. We read this in Ephesians chapter 4 verses 11
to 13. And it says, and he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists,
some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the
edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge
of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature and the fullness of Jesus Christ,
that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine
by the trickery of men in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but speaking the truth and
love may grow up in all things into him who is the head Christ. So the Lord has chosen people
in the body of Christ and many people carry several different offices. You know, in fact,
I don't know how you could be an apostle without being an evangelist, right? Because what are you
going to do when you get there? Okay. If you're not an evangelist, there's preachers, teachers,
prophets, but we see this picture of this fivefold ministry in the body of Christ,
but the Lord chooses these and we just read why to lead the church, because new believers
and even believers who have not really been growing the way they should in their faith,
they can follow others that they submit to who have that authority. And that's the picture really
in this culture, in the Jewish culture, laying things at the feet is really a sign of submission.
We see it in Revelation chapter four, when the 24 elders are, when it's really neat,
if you ever get a chance, read in Revelation chapter four, you'll see the cherubim and they
start worshiping God, worthy, worthy are you. And as soon as the 24 elders hear it,
they fall on their faces and cast their crowns before the throne, okay? Because of that submission
to Jesus Christ who is on the throne, that submission. We don't have time to get into who
those 24 elders are, but the picture is people who are in authority realize that they're not
really in charge, Jesus Christ is in charge and they cast their golden crowns before the throne,
because like this isn't mine, this really belongs to you. In fact, sometimes having responsibility
isn't necessarily an easy thing, it's a lot of weight to it. And so we see this submission
to the apostles and it's really a beautiful thing when you think about it.
I picture when the woman, when Jesus Christ was in the house and the Pharisees were watching him,
and suddenly the woman, the woman who was a sinner came with the alabaster jar of oil
and fragrance worth like a whole year of wages. And she breaks it open, which that means it can
never be used again, and she pours it over his feet, submitting to him this picture of like,
Jesus is worth all of it, you know, that fragrance. And of course,
Judas is saying, what a waste! This could have been used for the poor or for your own pockets,
Judas, because he was stealing from the treasury, as we know. And so it's a picture of submission,
but what also is it a picture of? It's really a picture of trust, isn't it? Because they're
bringing their stuff, they sold their land, okay, and they're saying, well, here we go,
and they're bringing it in and they're laying it at the feet of the apostles saying,
do with it as you will. I trust you with it. What used to be mine is now the churches,
and we trust that you will be good stewards with what we are surrendering to you. So it's trust,
it's a big picture, really, of trust, isn't it? I remember when Jill and I were engaged and
and we were planning the wedding and she was working, but I was six years older than her,
and I made more than her, so I was paying for everything most of the time, right? And she
was working and it was interesting, at one point, when we were getting closer to the wedding,
she suddenly, back then, they didn't have auto deposit of your checks, by the way. So
she had her check and she goes, why don't we just deposit it in your bank account?
And you know what's interesting? I'm like, wow, we really are going to be one. She trusts me,
and I know that sounds silly, but I guess I was a little untrusting with money,
and when she said, let me just give it to you because you'll know how to spend it properly,
and I'm like, wow, I really appreciated the trust and I felt honored,
and she knew that I'm going to be the provider of our family and so forth,
and she trusted me with that money, and that was like, wow, and it drew us even closer. It made
me really appreciate her even more that she trusts me that much, and that's the picture here. It's
like saying, here, apostles, we trust you with how you're going to spend this money,
okay? And of course, we just read how it went out to people who had need.
Another picture is really surrender. It's surrendering what we have, because
they didn't have to surrender the proceeds. In fact, next week, we won't get into Ananias and
Sapphira today, but they sold land and they lied to God, and that's the big sin that we're going
to read about next week that is severe, really, when you read that, like, whoa, you know? Because
they could have done anything with that proceeds, okay? They pretended they gave it all to the
apostles, but they didn't have to, but this is that surrendering only, giving it over, saying,
I trust you with this, and I'm giving it completely. No strings attached.
And back to King David, you know, we mentioned Mephibosheth, but when Jonathan was alive,
and we read how David conquered Goliath, what a great picture that is,
and Jonathan was so like, who is this kid? Like, how did he just do this? Like, there was
no one in our whole nation who was willing to go out into that battlefield against an at least
nine foot nine inch giant who was just, he grew up in battle, okay? He knew how to fight,
and there he was. He was tougher than Leo. I'm just going to say that right now,
and so there he was, and he's like, and David, you know, didn't just like cower in front. He ran
into the battle. He ran. Can you imagine that? He ran into it, right? And Jonathan was probably
saying, like, where is his courage coming from? And we read how Jonathan, when he realized this
this is someone who is not normal. He's anointed. He surrendered his armor and his weapons,
and his armor was, not many people had armor in those days. In fact, almost none. You know what
they fought with? Like, rakes and sickles. They hammered them into weapons because they
didn't have weapons. Jonathan gave his armor and his weapons to David and said,
these are yours. Like, that's how much you realize David's the man, you know? I have a role here,
but he's the man. He's the one. I'm giving this stuff to him. That's the idea, really, of just
surrendering it, and that's what Jonathan did. He surrendered it to him. I think that's so
beautiful when you realize they can use this better than I can. I remember when
Jesse used to, my Jesse, we've been talking about a couple of Jessies, but
Jesse Bonner, he used to lead worship at our old church, okay? And at one point, there was this
woman that went to our church, and she was very wealthy, so we kind of gathered. And
she played, but she wasn't great or anything, but she had a lot of guitars, and she was very wealthy,
and so she said to Jesse, I want to give you something. And because of his worship ability,
she gave him this extremely expensive classical guitar. I mean, I don't think you ever found out
how much it was worth. You kind of searched around and so forth, but unless you want to
do it, but it was worth a ton of money. But this woman, he went into her studio and saw all these
guitars like, oh my goodness, and she gave him one of the best she had because she saw he's going to
use it for the Lord, and she just gave it to him. I mean, pretty amazing, just surrendered it.
That's the picture. This used to be mine, but the Lord knows how to use it better. They're all
metaphors, really, for just giving to the Lord, saying, the Lord knows how to use this better
than I do, and I want to just surrender it to the Lord. And that's the picture. The early
saints just said, you know, these apostles, we trust them, we're submitting to their authority,
and we're surrendering our things to them. And then finally, one other thing I believe this
represents really is unity. Unity. Because, you know, all these believers were coming together,
and they were going up to the apostles in front of everyone and surrendering these things.
And it was unity. It was building more and more
benevolence. It was building more and more generosity. Now, there can be some downsides to
that, doing things in public, which we'll read next week, okay? Because suddenly, a lot of times,
people say, wow, look at the accolades they got. How do we get the accolades without really
surrendering, you know? Without really surrendering, but pretending we are. And that's where anything
in church becomes fleshy. When people look at the accolades of people upon someone,
and then they say, I want that, you know? Like Simon the Sorcerer saying, you know,
you know, how do I lay hands and bring the Spirit upon people so that I can get all these accolades?
Because you guys are rock stars here in Samaria. Anyone know what I'm talking about? A little bit.
But, you know, so how do I have that? Well, so that's the negative to it. But at this point,
it was just like here, and it was in public, and it was unified. Because they said,
I just want to deliver all of it to the Lord, you know? When you see this picture of unity,
I was thinking about how when Moses led Israel out of Egypt, and they're at the base of Mount Sinai,
and he goes up, and he's up there for 40 days and 40 nights. But during that time, okay, around Exodus
25, the Lord is giving him a lot of instructions, okay? And one of them is, I want you to collect
for the tabernacle that you guys are going to build, okay? In fact, I don't know if we have
that verse up there. Exodus 25, one, there we go. And then the Lord spoke to Moses saying,
speak to the children of Israel that they bring me an offering from everyone who gives it willingly.
Back to that socialism thing. You know what I'm saying? Who gives it willingly with his heart.
You shall take my offering and let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them. And they
will gather together, you know, the gold, the silver, the bronze, the blue, the scarlet,
and all the different garments, and also the skins of the animals and the wood, all that stuff.
He's telling them, make sure you collect these things, okay? But something happens while he's up
on the mountain, okay? They didn't get the collection yet, and the people at the base
are coming up with their own ideas on how to use that gold. Do you know what I'm talking about?
The golden calf, right? Like, I can use the gold the way I want to use the gold. I think I want
to use the gold to build this idol. You know how many people fall into that? Really? It's like,
I can use my money better than God can use my money. I can use my stuff better. I know better
than God does. And we start doing very foolish things with our possessions. And we see while
Moses is up on the mountain getting instructions for the tabernacle, how to build it, what to collect,
they're down there building their own idol, a golden calf. And then finally, after that all
gets dealt with, Moses comes down, takes the collection, and they gathered so much. This is
how much the hearts of the people change during that little bit of time. So much that they said,
you got to stop. It's too much, okay? And we see that whole picture again when they were building
the temple in the Promised Land. Same thing. They took the collections and everyone came just
with a willing heart saying, here have it. You know how to use it. Build the Lord's house.
Back to David. I know he's coming into this a lot, but David, when this is after his failure and so
forth, but he still is just looking and he's seeing a tent that the Ark of the Covenant is in.
And he's like, this isn't right. I'm living in a palace. And God's holy Ark
where the amazing things are stored there, the manna, the butted almond branch, and the manna,
and the Ten Commandments. And they're in there and I'm in my house looking down on this tent.
This is not right. I have to build God a house. And he goes to Nathan. He says, listen,
I have to build something spectacular for the Lord because I don't belong
up here and he belonged down there. It should be the opposite, right? And so Nathan finally tells
him it's a great idea, you know, but it's not for you to build, but he started taking the
collections. And finally Solomon, his son would build this magnificent temple for the Lord.
And really that's what it's about. It's about building. And I just want to show you
second Psalms 7.16. What did I just say? Psalm, Samuel, sorry.
So, oh, put the verse slide before that. And now came to pass when the king was dwelling in the
house. And we just shared that, you know, at peace. He said, I got to build this house.
And so the Lord told Nathan, like David's going to build me a house. Like I need someone to build
me a house. Okay. Of cedar. But you know what? I respect that, that desire to build a house for me.
And you know what? I'll take you up on that someday. But let me tell you about your house
that I'm going to build for you. And then we have second Samuel 7.8, I believe that next slide.
16. And your house and your kingdom shall be established forever before you. Your throne
shall be established forever. And of course, he's talking about the lineage of David,
which is Jesus Christ. But you think about this, like David just wanted to build a structure
for God. And God respected that desire so much that he said, you know what? I'm good,
but watch what I do for your house. Watch what I do for your lineage. Watch what I do for you.
And that's what the Lord wants to do. He wants to build a house for all of us that he can thrive.
And of course we are the house now, you know, we are the temple, the Holy Spirit.
And you know, this message comes at an interesting time, okay? Because I was planning this week to
go right into Ananias and Sapphira and blend these things together. But on Tuesday night,
we had an elders meeting. And as we were discussing the budget and so forth,
Dan, who oversees the budget, he says, you know, our tithing is down over 30% for the first
quarter this year. I'm like, well, okay. Well, and now none of us elders have any clue what anyone
gives, including me. Like, I don't know what anybody gives. So, you know, if you're suddenly
you see me, you don't feel like, you know, I don't know. Okay. So, you know, the good thing is,
you know, everyone gets treated, I hope, with love and respect and honor. And it doesn't,
I don't know anything. And I want to keep it that way, you know. So, but it's just a matter of why,
you know, like why is this happening? And I know as a church, we neglect preaching about tithing.
And because for one thing, it's not our distinctive at a Calvary Chapel. We don't
ask for money. We don't beg for money. We don't pressure you or, you know, try to,
you know, burden you and give a 10 minute
sermonette on giving and all this stuff or promise you this, the world, if you just give
money now, you will have everything you want in life. And, you know, we don't do any of that.
You know, there's no manipulation. There's nothing. Okay. And I don't know about you,
but I resent that. And yet, unfortunately, it works. It works. It's weird. It works.
I've been at messages saying, Oh, here we go. Here we go. And by the end of it,
I'm like, all right, here's my credit card. Just stop already. Just stop. Yeah. Well,
you know, I, I, I cave to it, you know, but we don't do that here. And we're still not going
to do it. We're not taking another collection at the end of this service. Now that I've
marinated you with some guilt, it's just, no, no, no, no, no. You give because you
willingly in your heart want to give. But at the same time, you know, we do want to at
least make it known that, you know, the church has to operate on something in this world. Yeah.
The Holy Spirit's awesome. But he also uses some filthy mammon, you know what I mean? It
talks about that, you know, use filthy mammon to win friends and influence enemies for eternity.
Right. So, but I just share it because just so that you know, to keep it in your mind,
because there is naivety. Like when I got saved as a Baptist, the first thing is I got,
here's your envelope. All right. And make sure you give because it's part of worship. It's part
of being a believer. And I know Christians don't hear that anymore. And I don't want to preach it.
The only reason I'm talking about it's so interesting. We're in the elders meeting. I'm
like, oh my goodness. The next section is about giving. Wow. The timing of this. Next week,
you're not going to hear another message about tithing. Okay. Because we don't do this. Okay.
But I just want you to know that. Think about this. Look at your budget. You're saying,
if this is out of whack, I promise you, I will promise you from personal experience
when you can't outgive God. Remember what the disciples said, you know, we have given you
everything to follow you. And he goes, you know what, you will be replenished a hundred fold.
And he's not necessarily talking buck for buck, you know, not a hundred dollars for a dollar.
What he's talking about is the joy and the experience in life. What you give to the Lord
gets paid back in dividends. And he said, both in this world and beyond. So the dividends pay down
here and they continue to pay up there. And so I just want to encourage you. If you look at your
budget, you see what's out of whack here. I don't have any extra money. Start giving.
Suddenly you'll have extra money. I promise you. You know, I know someone who said years of their
faith has always been kind of like a yo-yo and they suddenly were, I guess, on a downward spin.
And they're like, you know what, I'm sick of giving. This is ridiculous. You know,
why am I given? And he stopped giving. And I just saw what happened. He's always in debt.
He spends money on the dumbest things. And whatever he buys, it ends up cluttered
somewhere in the garage, never used again. It's just junk. It's junk. We spend a lot of money
on junk, don't we? On golden calves. You know, that's what we do, right? And so I'm using this
time really just to encourage you not to guilt trip you at all. And we're not, again, we're not
going to suddenly, all right, we're going to bring the baskets around again. You know,
reconsider. You know, no, we don't do any of that. But I also want to say,
you know, all the people that serve in this church, okay, all of them, there's not one full-time
person being paid in this church. Not one. In fact, most people get paid a smittance or nothing,
volunteer. And I love it that way. That's the way church should be. People should be just serving
because they can. Remember, we don't got to, we get to, right? We get to serve God. And that's
what I really want to just encourage you. And as a worship team comes up,
I hope this word was received okay. And if you've been here a while, you know, we don't do this.
We don't ask for money. We don't talk about money. We just, but at the same time, you know,
you need to know. You need to know. And I think it's a blessing because, you know,
because if we're not trained in something, in a discipline, even of giving,
then we really miss out, don't we? We really miss out. So let's pray and
thank the Lord for what he's done. Father God, I thank you so much for
this opportunity, Lord, to talk about a Godly principle of tithing, Lord.
And everything we have you've given us. Nothing we have really belongs to us. Yeah,
we're stewards over it. But it's on loan from you, Lord. It all belongs to you.
And I pray, Lord, that you would really bring
just an abundance to this church so that we can do more things with it. And actually to everyone's
finances, Lord, as we obey and trust you, Lord, that you will really bring prosperity to each
one of us, Lord, that you will give us raises in our jobs, that you will give us advancements in our
careers, Lord, that you will give us more clients, more customers, Lord, that you will give us raises
in an area that we never even knew about. And even random finances would just come pouring in
through the mail, Lord. I mean, you could do so many amazing things, Lord. And we just trust you,
Lord, that you're going to do these things. And, Lord, we're not worried as a church, Lord,
God, we don't worry about anything because, Lord, you always provide, Lord.
You know, he who began a good work, Lord, God, according to your riches and glory, you will
provide everything that we need as a church body. And Lord, we'll sacrifice and surrender
what we need to, Lord, to bring your glory. And, Lord, we just ask you for a great,
great abundance, Lord, God, not to keep or squander on ourselves, as James says.
We ask amiss, not for that, but, Lord, so that we can be overflowing with generosity to others
who truly are in need. So, Lord, God, we ask you to just bless us and give us a generous heart,
Lord, God, that we can give to others, Lord, God, not even waiting for something to be repaid,
but giving as we're giving to you as the least of these. When we give it to them, Lord, God,
we're actually giving it to you. And we thank you and we love you in Jesus' name. Amen.
Let's give the Lord a round of applause. Let's stand on up and work.
Thanks for joining us at Lansdale Life Church as we praise God and discuss His word.
Don't forget to join us for worship live Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. Eastern on YouTube.
Be blessed and have a great day!