MacDonald, William: The Life And Spirit Of The Church ~ Acts 4v23-37

Could we turn in our Bibles tonight to the fourth chapter of the book of Acts? Acts chapter four, and I'd like to begin reading verse twenty three down to the end of the chapter. Acts chapter four, verse twenty three, down to the end of the chapter. And being let go, they went to their own company and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said unto them. And when they heard that, they lifted up their voice to God with one accord and said, Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven and earth and the sea and all that in them is, who by the mouth of thy servant David has 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 of a truth against 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 threatenings, 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 servant, Jesus. 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 the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul. Neither said any of them that aught 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' feet, and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need. And Joseph, who by the apostles was surnamed Barnabas, which is being interpreted the son of consolation, a Levite and of the country of Cyprus, having land, sold it and brought the money and laid it at the apostles' feet. Now my purpose in reading this from the book of Acts tonight was to go back in our minds and in the word of God to try to capture something of what it was like in the early days of the church. I'd like to think with you tonight, what characterized individual believers and what characterized the local assemblies at the time recorded in this book? Now, Acts is a wonderful book, as are all the books of the Bible, and it doesn't pretend to be an exhaustive history of this period. The Spirit of God gives isolated incidents from this time and weaves them together in a wonderful way. And if you read them carefully and prayerfully, you can breathe again the pure air of the primitive church, and you can capture something of the spirit that animated the Christians at that time. And I think as we do this, uh, we'll realize that we've come a long way from conditions as they were in the early days of the church. Sometimes we pride ourselves with the feeling that we are exactly where they were, but it really isn't true, I think we'll find as we look at it tonight. As I study the book of Acts, the, the most important consideration that comes to my mind as to what the early Christians were like is this: they were full of the Holy Ghost. It says that here, verse thirty one, when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together, and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost. They spake the word of God with boldness. They were filled with the Holy Ghost. And to me, this explains so much of what happened in the book of Acts. In the early church, church, you have Christians who were radioactive with the Holy Spirit. This wasn't some crisis experience that had come to them. This wasn't some emotional experience that they had passed through, but it was a, a life of day by day dependence upon the Lord, and a life of day by day yielding to the Lord. And, um, the result was that everywhere these people went, things happened. And the result was that the community knew they were there, and the civil authorities knew they were there. And in a very real sense, these early Christians were disturbers of the peace, in a good way. They disturbed the peace of the world as it then was, and stirred people up, and made people angry, if you will, and saw people saved. And the filling of the Holy Spirit did for them what money couldn't do. I sometimes think that in our generation we depend on the dollar rather than the Spirit. And our test of success, even in the things of the Lord, is measured by the dollar sign. While that isn't exactly prominent in the book of Acts, seems to me that their lives were open for the Holy Spirit to come in and take control, and we see them going forth and making an impact for God in the world in which we live. The Word of God tells us to be filled with the Spirit. Be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess, but be filled with the Spirit. It's very interesting to me to notice the results of the filling of the Spirit in the lives of these people. The first thing is that they spoke the Word of God with boldness. And if you make a study of the filling of the Spirit of God in the Book of Acts, you'll find that almost always it's connected with speaking, with witnessing, with boldness. That's an interesting thing, isn't it? It's a funny thing when a man drinks to excess, one of the first ways it affects him is in his speech. It's one of the first ways you can tell, and it's true with the filling with the Spirit too. One of the ways you can tell a man who's filled with the Spirit is by the way he talks, and in this particular case, by the boldness with which they witnessed for Christ in a hostile society. But notice the second result of the filling of the Spirit in verse thirty two. They had a completely new attitude toward material things. The filling of the Spirit made them hold lightly onto things, and they said, well, whatever we have belongs to the Lord, and let's use it for the Lord. Many Christians suffer from paralysis of the nerve that leads from the brain to the pocketbook, and the filling of the spirit snaps that paralysis. It breaks it, and it's an interesting thing to me to trace in the book of Acts and see these Christians, when they were filled with the Spirit of God, money no longer seemed to be important to them. One of the real results was that they held things in common, neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own, but they had all things common. Now, I know that we are in the habit of explaining this away and of putting these verses in dispensational pigeonholes so that they no longer have any bite for us, but it's the word of God, and it still stands, and we have every reason to believe that wherever there is the filling of the Spirit, there's this same Spirit with regard to material things. The next thing it says in verse thirty three is, with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. They had great boldness, great generosity, great power, great grace. It was wonderful, wasn't it? Do you think that could happen today? I believe it would happen if we were really filled with the Spirit of God, if our lives were open to him, and he could have his way ungrieved in these lives of ours. And I love to notice in the book of Acts that it was as a result of this filling of the Holy Spirit that these men preached with power. The gifts in the book of Acts were not professional gifts. They were what we might call charismatic gifts. What do I mean by that? Well, men in the book of Acts did not have power because of professional training that they had. They had power because the Holy Spirit came upon them. Maybe this man was a carpenter or a plumber or an electrician. There was no reason, humanly speaking, why he should ever preach the gospel or minister the word with power. But the Spirit of God came upon these men, and when other people heard them, they said, these are just homespun fellows. These are just fellows from our own neighborhood, and here they are preaching, and men tremble at their words. They could only conclude it wasn't the men themselves, it was the gift of God. This is very prominent in the book of Acts. We have swung in the other direction, or are swinging. The gifts in the book of Acts were not professional gifts, they were charismatic gifts, and God will never stop doing that in the history of the world. God loves to take little nobodies and use them mightily for his glory. He's doing it all the time, and he takes great delight in doing it. I'm sure you've read the story about little Bilney, who lived in Eng- England many years ago, and he used to go to one of the great cathedrals and hear one of the great bishops preach. And as Bilney listened to this bishop, he thought, oh, there's something missing in his preaching. One thing thou lackest. And the Lord laid it on little Bilney's heart to speak to the bishop. And so one day he went to the man's study, and he, he said to him, sir, he said, I'd like to make my confession. And of course, the bishop thought he had come to confess some particular sins, and he's very well proceed. And little Billney confessed his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and told the bishop how he too could have that faith. And as the result of his testimony, this great bishop bowed his knee to the Lord Jesus Christ and was soundly saved. Little Billny. Very few people have ever heard of him, but God had been using little Billnys down through the years, and he's still using them. We see it here in the book of Acts. The second thing I see, and it's very important, is that the Christians lived first and foremost for the Lord Jesus Christ. All the Christians lived first and foremost for the Lord Jesus Christ, for his interests here on earth. They never thought of their profession as being the reason for their existence. This is interesting to me. When they thought in terms of vocation, their calling never was to be a doctor, or a nurse, or a teacher, or a plumber, or a carpenter. Their calling was to be a witness for the Lord Jesus Christ, and these other things were subordinate. You know, that is true. For instance, the Apostle Paul, Paul never said, Paul called to be a tent maker, did he? Paul was a tent maker. Paul made tents to the glory of God. I dare say he made good tents. That wasn't his purpose in life. He said Paul called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus. I think of my Savior. He came into the world, and during those first thirty three years of his life in Nazareth, he spent a great deal of time in the carpenter's shop. And I dare say he was the best carpenter. Somewhere recently I read that if the Lord Jesus had had a sign over his carpenter's store, it probably would have said, my yokes fit well. We were in Nazareth just a few months ago. There's a Christian hospital there in Nazareth, and they have a chapel on the grounds. And three years ago I was asked to speak at that chapel, and when I got up, instead of, um, instead of a pulpit like this, you look down and you're standing behind a carpenter's bench. It spoke to me very loudly that in this very city, my Savior worked behind a carpenter's bench, and that was his pulpit. But he never spoke of himself as called to be a carpenter, did he? He didn't come into the world to be a carpenter. He came into the world to seek and to save that which is lost. And God never intended that we should think of our calling in life in connection with our secular employment, but we do it. That's incidental, if I may use the word. The purpose of that is only to provide for bread and butter. But our main purpose in life is to represent the Lord Jesus down here. You know, most of us, um, live in a society, and even in a Christian society, where we're encouraged to think, our young people are encouraged to think, that they should make a name for themselves and get on in the business world. Of course, you know what happens in order to get on in the business world, you've got to give more and more of your life to business. And I don't know how it is in Australia, but I know, I know in America today, the corporations, if they can get likely young men, they'll pay them anything. Money is no consideration. But I know too that they'll extract the very last ounce of the life too. And you've got to be willing to drop everything and travel for that corporation, spend long hours climbing to the top. I had a friend named Ray Johnson. He worked for Ford Motor Company in Des Moines, Iowa. Ray has a very nice singing voice, and uh... whenever some of the saints in the assembly would die, their relatives often would ask Ray to sing at the funeral. So one time, one of the dear believers died, and they asked Ray, the relatives said, would you sing? And he said, I'll ask my foreman. So we went to the foreman. He said he'd like to get off on Tuesday afternoon to sing at a funeral, and the boss said, sure, he said, we've got to marry them and bury them. And, uh, embarrassingly enough, a week later, one of the other saints died, and once again, Ray was asked to sing. So he went to his foreman, and he asked him if he could sing, if he could get time off to sing. And the foreman said to him, look, Johnson, when you work for Ford Motor Company, Ford Motor Company must come first in your life. And Ray said, well, I'm sorry, sir. Ford Motor Company doesn't come first in my life. He said, the Lord comes first in my life. And the boss said to him, of course, he said, we've all got to go to church on Sunday. That was his idea of putting the Lord first in your life. And Ray said to him, my family comes second in my life. And he said, Ford Motor Company comes third. Well, Ray was able to get employment elsewhere, and the Lord has actually honored him. The Lord has honored him, he always does. But you know, there are very few people today in America who've ever learned how far to go in business without robbing the Lord. Very few. In fact, I think it's one of the most sensitive areas in life today with regard to secular employment to say, to know when to say, thus far shall thy proud waves come and no further. And more than we know, we have been brainwashed to such an extent in this whole matter of the dignity of having a high-paying job, it is very hard for most of us to think clearly about it. I said the other night somewhere that I was brought up in a, in a fellowship just like this, and I praise God for the background that I was given in the Word of God, but I don't remember anyone ever suggesting to me the work of the Lord as a worthy way in which to spend my life. Does that shock you? Well, it's true. I don't remember anybody ever suggesting to me the work of the Lord as a worthy way in which to spend my life. But I do remember being encouraged, and I really didn't need the encouragement because my mind was already set on the matter. I was encouraged to go into business and to strive for the top. This was status, and it's important, I was told. This is all the encouragement I got. And to go in for the honors of this world, really. And I did it too. Makes me think of Henry Martin. Some of you have read about Henry Martin, going through university, striving for all the honors that the university could offer. He got them all. He said when he got them, he realized he had grasped a shadow. And it makes me think of what Charles Haddon Spurgeon said to his son. He said, my son, I should not like it if God were to call you to his service, that you should dribble down into a king. And I think that says it very well. Well, I see that in the lives of these early Christians. They knew what was first, and they were able to maintain that balance in life. And I think that accounted for a lot of their power. The honors of the world didn't seem to mean anything to them. And incidentally, do you ever think about honors? Do you ever think about the ribbons that are given by the world? You know, a ribbon really isn't much when you stop to think of it, is it? You ever think of what men will do to get a piece of ribbon? They could go down to the store and buy a whole yard of it. But honestly, they'll knock themselves out. Napoleon held some up. He said, I could build an empire with these. It's true too. With just some pieces of ribbon, you could build an empire. It's really kind of sad to see us Christians going after them, isn't it? And neglecting what's really important. The trick is to remember what is primary and to keep all the rest in its proper place. And I can see these Christians, and their vocation in life was to serve the Lord Jesus and to re- represent him down here, and that's what counted to them. As I read the book of Acts, it seems to me that their thinking was this. After what the Lord Jesus has done for us, it's an insult to his love for us to give him less than all. It's good, isn't it? After all that the Lord Jesus has done for us, it's an insult to his love for us to give him less than all. It really is. You stop to think that the one who died on Calvary's cross was not a mere man, it was the Lord of life and glory. That God became man and died for me. Why did he die for me? So that I could go on living my own little petty life the way I want to live it? He didn't die for me for that reason. He died for me so that those who live might no longer live unto themselves, but unto him who died for them and rose again. I think it was Stud, I'm not sure, Stud or Borden of Yale, or one of those men, who spoke of that day in his experience when by faith he saw the Lord Jesus dying on the cross and realized that when Christ died, he bought us. And if we take our lives and use them the way we want to use them, then we're thieves because we're taking something that doesn't belong to us. That's shattering, isn't it? If I'm to take my life and live it the way I want to live it, I'm taking something that really was purchased at tremendous cost at the cross of Calvary, and I'm using it as a thief would use it. It doesn't belong to me. And of course, that's the vision that has motivated men and women down through the centuries, men and women who have made history for God. We don't belong to ourselves, and our lives are his. And he wants us to work hard down here for the supply of our current needs and the needs of our families, and to put all the rest in the work of the Lord, to trust him for the future. That's what they did. They weren't lazy, these saints in the book of Acts. They weren't lazy. They were, they were hard-working people, but... they didn't major on minors. They kept that which was central before their eyes all the time. And they had a message. And the message was the resurrection and glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. That was the message. That's the message that's prominent in the book of Acts. I'm sure you've noticed that. We, we speak a great deal of Christ crucified, and I don't say that they didn't include that in their message, but it's not really what's prominent. What's prominent in the book of Acts is God raised him from the dead and took him back to heaven and glorified him at his own right hand. And they had a tremendous appreciation of the supreme worthiness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And when you really believe something, you want to share it with others, don't you? They really believed it, and everywhere they went, it seems they gossiped the gospel, because I understand that's the thought in the passage that's used here. This is good. You know, sometimes I think that the Christ we preach today is rather a... an ordinary Christ, if I may use the expression. I think sometime that modern preaching reduces Christ to another person, just like ourselves. And men don't have a vision of who he is. That he's the creator and sustainer of the universe and the eternal lover of men's souls, and he's the one who's coming back. And my, didn't they emphasize that in the book of Acts? That he's coming back to judge the world in righteousness. And you better bow to him now. And the word went forth with such power and such conviction that people trembled, and they said, men and brethren, what shall we do? The Lord Jesus was alive to these disciples and glorified. My, how we need to present him in that way. I wonder if you ask most Christians in the world today, in what form is Jesus now? I really think m- many Christians picture Jesus as a spirit being floating around in heaven. But actually, the Bible presents the Lord Jesus as a glorified man in heaven with a body of flesh and bones, a real, live, tangible, literal body of flesh and bones, and he's coming back in power and great glory. And this was the message they carried forth. Everywhere they went, they ran into persecution. Everywhere they went, they ran into persecution. But the shocking thing is not that they ran into persecution, but that they repaid it with love. And this made a tremendous impact on the society in which they lived, because the world wasn't used to this type of thing. If they had only repaid it with hatred and bitterness, the world would have been very, very happy, because that's playing its own game, and it can always win its own game. The disciples didn't do that. Whenever they were re- uh, whenever they were persecuted, they repaid with kindness, and even in the act of death, they prayed for their guilty murderers, and the world scratched its head and never forgot. It's tremendous, isn't it? I like the story of a servant of the Lord working in Melanesia, and there was a, a native from the bush there who came to the school, to the boys' school, and he was very hard to handle. And this dear servant of the Lord was so patient with him and so kind to him, but it didn't seem to make any difference. One day, the native just slapped him right across the face, and the other workers on the station were horrified. The servant of the Lord said absolutely nothing, but the other workers insisted that this lad be sent back to the bush, which he was. Years later, they got a call at the mission that a native was dying out in the bush and wanted them to come. And they went out there, and this man told them that he wanted to die in faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. He was trusting Christ as his only hope for heaven, and they practiced, uh, christening then. This particular group of people practiced christening, and they wanted to give him a Christian name. And they said to him, what would you like to be named now that you're a Christian? And he said, just name me John Selwyn, for it was he who showed me Christ many years ago when I slapped him across the face. He had never forgotten, and in the closing moments of his life, it all came back to him, and as a result, he trusted Christ as his savior. I see that in the lives of the early Christians. It's interesting that, that when they were in a tight spot, they didn't pray to be delivered, but prayed for boldness. Did you notice verse twenty nine of chapter four? It says, and now, Lord, behold their threatenings and grant unto thy servants that with all boldness they may speak thy word. My, I would have got the mimeograph machine going and sent out prayer requests all over the world to have me snapped out of jail. They didn't do that. They just sent the, this message to heaven that they might have boldness to declare the word the way it ought to be declared. And they have a marvelous sense of God's overruling power in their lives. You know, there's a thrill here in verses twenty seven and twenty eight. I don't know if you've ever noticed this. It says in verse twenty seven, for the truth against thy holy child, better servant Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate and the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together. If you and I were writing the Bible, verse twenty eight would probably say they were gathered together to do what they wanted to do, to do all that was in their wicked heart. But you know, the Bible doesn't say that. It says they were gathered together to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done. People say to me, how do you know the Bible's the word of God? I only have to read two verses like that to tell me the Bible's the word of God. No man would have ever written those verses like that. That's God writing it. Just think of the faith that these believers had, even in the dark and cloudy days of life, and, and, and the wrath of men being heaped upon them. They said, yes, they gathered together to do what you wanted to be done anyway. Which is another way of saying God makes the wrath of man to praise him, and the remainder of wrath he restrains. What won't praise him, he restrains it. They lived sacrificially for the spread of the gospel. You got that here. Verse thirty four: neither was 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' feet, and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need. The lives of the early Christians was a perpetual crisis of dependence upon the living God. Let me say that again. The lives of the early Christians was a perpetual crisis of dependence upon the living God. We don't like that. The flesh hates that. And yet there's a power connected with it that nobody can deny. And I really believe in our day we've been clever. We've been clever with reserves, securities, pension schemes, government pension schemes, and all the rest. And sometimes in the quietness of my soul, I feel, look, we've been robbed of a blessing. Some of us have been afraid of a blessing, the blessing of being cast upon the Lord. And I'm, I'm the last one in the world that should say that because all my training was in banking, and a good banker is a man who knows how to make reserves in the long run and plan for the future. But I know that in the spiritual realm it isn't that way. And I know that the gre- as Darby said, the greatest glory of the creature is subjection and dependence upon the Lord. And I know, I know from experience, as well as from the Word of God, that when we're really cast upon the Lord, that we see the Lord in miraculous ways that we don't see when we're well cushioned. Have you ever heard Christians talking about the depression days when they had so little, and it was really so hard in many ways, and yet they knew God day by day in such a wonderful way, and they say, look, I wouldn't want to go through it again, but I wouldn't give up the experience for anything. Have you ever, have you ever said that or ever heard anyone say that? Well, it's true, really. It really is true. And I see this in the lives of the, of the early Christians. They didn't pad themselves, they didn't cushion themselves, they didn't depend on, on false crutches, and that it was just all for the Lord and trust God for the future. And of course, he never failed them. And just think of the power that emanated from their lives. It seems hard for us to link those things together, and yet they're all linked together in this passage of the word of God. They lived lives of faith. Faith means dependence upon the Lord, and you can't trust when you can see. And God calls us to a life of faith. And then I noticed too that the weapons of their warfare were not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. I noticed that they depended, they lived lives of faith, they depended upon the Lord, and their prayer really had power. And you know, I feel that if we were to be honest with ourselves today, we'd have to acknowledge that, although we're comfortable and living in prosperity and all the rest, our prayers don't have power. And most of our prayer meetings, what they really need more than anything else is closing down. I know it's a shocking thing to say, but it's the truth. I believe of our prayer meetings were what they should be, you wouldn't be able to keep people away. Now you can't get them. Not interested. And the trouble is that we've been so clever that our lives don't rise above flesh and blood. Just too clever for our own good. Well, these people didn't, these people were just a little group of nobodies, and they had nothing and no one but the Lord, and they had a vision before their soul. And incidentally, it was marvelous. It was a worldwide vision, and this thrills me to think, to think of a little band of nobodies living in a very petty country, if I may say so. I mean, you read about Jerusalem in the, in the Bible, you think, my, it must be a magnificent metropolis, something like Sydney. Well, it isn't. The Jerusalem of the Bible is one mile square, no more, no less, one mile square. The Lord Jesus appears to twelve disciples, calls twelve disciples, and it's wonderful, he gives them a world vision. Twelve homespun fellows in a petty little country, and he set before them the world, and here they go forth in dependence upon the living God with a cosmic view. Marvelous, really. And they were so effective that the Apostle Paul could say, before he laid down his pen, that the then known world had heard the gospel. A young man said to me in the United States not so long ago, he said, Mr. McDowell, it's very hard to live a life of faith in the United States. He said, you have to put yourself in a position where you have to trust God, where if God fails you, you're sunk. And he said, if you do that, there'll be a power in your life, and when you touch other lives, something will happen for God. And I see that, I see that as I read the book of Acts. These people were nobodies in themselves. They didn't have any strength in themselves, but the power of God was flowing through them, and when they touched other lives, something happened for God. And isn't it wonderful in life? Wouldn't you like day by day to see the gears mesh in life, to see that marvelous converging of circumstances in life that tells you you're in the way, God is leading step by step. They saw prayer and the word of God. And I see that these people lived in separation from the world. They lived in separation from the world. They were very much in the world, and they had a lot to say to the world, but they didn't become a part of the world system. They were able to make this distinction. What do we mean by the world? Do we mean the planet on which we live? Obviously, we don't mean that, and we don't mean the world of beauty and nature about us. The world is, is really the system that man has built up to make himself happy without Christ. It's a society where the name of the Lord Jesus is not welcome. That's what we mean by the world. Could be the world of culture, could be the world of art, could be the world of opera, could be the world of religion. But it's a world in which the, the name of the Lord Jesus is banned, and where man is trying to bring the millennium in by his own efforts. And it's that system that crucified the Lord of life and glory. The world. The, the, the hands of the world are stained with the blood of Jesus, and these Christians never lost sight of that fact, and they felt it would be simple treason for them to walk arm in arm with the world. And of course, they were dead right. They were dead right. Everywhere today I hear that you should become a part of the world in order to influence the world for Jesus. That was a wrong basis altogether. I think it was Archimedes that said, as long as I'm on the world, he was speaking of the planet then, he says, as long as I'm on the world, I can't move the world. But he said, if you would give me a fulcrum outside the world, I could move the world. If he could just get a lever and a fulcrum outside the world, he could move the world. Well, there's a spiritual principle involved there. As long as we are a part of the world system, we'll never move the world. We have to take our places in separation from the world, and then we'll have an impact on it. But of course, there's reproach involved in that, and nobody likes reproach. The animals of the Old Testament were sacrificed outside the camp. Jesus suffered outside the camp, and we're called to go outside the camp unto him, bearing his reproach. Well, in the book of Acts, you see Christians living that life. The issues were clear then, the lines were drawn. There was no mistaking, especially in believer's baptism. They took their stand publicly and said, I'm no longer a part of the world that crucified the Savior. I'm dead to the world by the body of the Lord Jesus. And they witnessed to the world, and they witnessed against the world, and they told the world, God is against your sin, and you can't succeed as long as he is against it. And there was power in their word, and just think of the thousands who came to the Lord Jesus. Did they engage in the politics of the world? Well, you only have to ask the question to answer it. I like this. They they had the answer to the world's problems, and they knew it. And the answer, of course, is Christ. You know, man has his solution to the problems of the world. Some say, well, it's philosophy. Some say, well, it's education. Some say, well, it's science. Some say, well, it's politics. If you could just change your political structure and and move over into socialism or communism or some other ism, that would solve the problem. But it wouldn't. All of man's solutions fail in that they fail to get at the cause of the trouble. The cause of the trouble is sin in human nature, and I only know one thing that attacks the cause, and that's the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And it is wonderful to me to read the book of Acts and see people who had the answer and who, who knew that they had the answer, who would not be deflected. I tell kind of a homely story about a man who had a fiddle. He only had one string on the fiddle, and he only played one note of that one string, and he drove his friends to utter distraction. Just one note all the time. They said to him, look, if you only knew how many notes there are in the scale, how many notes you could play with a violin, you just play one note. He said, I know it. He said, I found the right note. Well, these early Christians were like that. They had found the right note, and the right note was Christ. And their attitude was, if it does, if it isn't true, it doesn't matter. But if it is true, nothing else matters. Their attitude was summed up in a statement I read recently. It said, God may have other words for other worlds, but his word for this world is Christ. God may have other words for other worlds, but his word for this world is Christ. And they went forth and shouted from the housetops, Christ is the answer. You need Christ, and you'll never be happy till you find him. So they didn't try to put a poultice on the social evils of their day, but they went and told men about the Lord Jesus. And you know, that's the greatest kindness that we can do for the world. People are all the time, especially with young people today, you hear a lot about, um, the necessity for social involvement by the Christian and all the rest. And I've seen too often how this becomes a detour to the Christian life. I feel the greatest kindness we can do for men and women in the world today is to introduce them to the Lord Jesus Christ. The greatest weapon we have is the Bible, the Word of God. If we just go forth in the power of the Holy Spirit, God can use that testimony in a mighty way. As I say, their goal was world evangelization. Just think of that. Just think of their goal was to get the gospel out into all the world. I wonder, do we share that goal today, or have we more or less given up? I understand that a third of all the people who have ever lived in the history of the world are living at the present time. Do you believe that? A third of all the people, if you took the population of the world from the beginning till now and added it up, a third of all who have ever lived are living now. That's because of the population explosion. What a challenge. We just came from Indonesia. Indonesia is the fifth largest nation in the world as far as population is concerned. And there isn't a single missionary in Indonesia from an assembly like this one in any place in the world, not a single one. It's really amazing, isn't it, when you stop to think of it. Go to Beirut, Lebanon, you can find two hundred and fifty missionaries in one city. But all you can say for Beirut is that the, the nationals still outnumber the missionaries. But you get the fifth largest nation in the world, and not one from an assembly, at least like this one. But you know, uh, just in closing, I might say this, evangelism to them was not an end in itself. Their evangelism led to the establishment of New Testament churches everywhere they went, and that's a thrill to see it in the book of Acts. To see. And they realized that the local church is the unit on earth that God has chosen to spread the Christian faith. And it's the establishment of local assemblies that gives permanence to the work. And this was all part of their strategy. And in many, in many ways, the reason we're here tonight is because of the foundation that they laid. Wonderful to see them establishing these indigenous churches. I think the most thrilling perhaps was Thessalonica. Paul goes there two or three weeks, preaches the gospel, leaves behind a functioning group of believers, well instructed in the fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith, including other doctrines like election. And And. a local church from which the gospel was sounding out to the surrounding neighborhood. What a thrill. But really, in the final analysis, it all goes back to what we said at the beginning. The great essential thing that they had was the filling of the Holy Spirit. They were really turned over to the Lord. He came first in their lives, and he was able to use them, and he did use them. There's a lot else we could say, but maybe this will start the wheels going in your own mind, and you'll go back to the book of Acts and take a fresh look at it, and maybe, as I have, develop a thirst that we might know something of that in this generation before the Lord comes back again.