Why Acts all the time?

Acts Chapter 15: 1 – 10

One or two people have been asking why we are continuing to plough through the Book of Acts. Well, the answer, quite simply, is that if we take seriously what we learn from it, then it will help us considerably in our calling, our calling by Jesus Himself to become not just faithful but fruitful disciples. The whole point of being a Christian according to Jesus is ‘to bear fruit; fruit that will last.’

Of course there are many different understandings and interpretations of what Christianity is and how it should be practised: but if such different ideas do not help or, as is all too often the case, actually undermine a person’s or a church’s ability to bear fruit, then we would better do without them altogether. ‘To go and bear fruit’ is our calling, according to Jesus; and in the life of the early Church presented to us in the Book of Acts, we see what amazing things people and whole Churches can do when they choose and determine to set aside their religious preferences and cultural prejudices, when they banish their fears about their own inabilities or of what other people might think of them, when they swallow their pride and self-sufficiency, and, instead, open up their lives to God in order to allow Him to use them. To do what especially? Well, to bear fruit; fruit that will last. And it is quite clear, from the teaching of Jesus Himself, that what he means by ‘fruit’ is people, new people for His kingdom. This is why it shocks and saddens me when I hear people using the word ‘evangelical’ in any kind of derisory or derogatory way: it is a mark of shame, no less, that people within the Church in England years ago had to begin to describe themselves as such precisely because so many others had either forgotten or chosen to avoid their first calling and priority as Christians, which is to ‘bear fruit’ - to bring in the ‘harvest’ - is how Jesus referred to it, to help others to come to know for themselves the love and the truth of Jesus.    

A short while after I arrived here, one lady in the congregation, who is no longer with us now but who had very certain ideas about services, music, and even theology, took me to task. How dare I tell her what she ought to believe about God and what He calls us to do. I have to admit, I was a little taken aback, and gently tried to explain that whilst she was free to believe whatever she wished about God and the Christian religion, I nevertheless had a job description - in my ordination vows and from Jesus and his Apostles to teach faithfully; and that whilst some of my clerical colleagues have and do still do come up with some ideas that, to put it mildly, simply cannot be deduced from the teaching of Jesus, I was determined, as best I could, to teach faithfully. And I have invited people on a number of occasions to check what I teach with the teaching of Jesus and his Apostles. And if they can prove me wrong, then I will apologise, publicly, and correct my teaching accordingly. Because the truth matters; and the truth, for Christians, has to start with the revelation of God in Jesus Christ and the application of that truth in a Christian’s life – the most important application of which is ‘to bear fruit’. Well, according to Jesus it is. Those who wish to make of the Christian faith ONLY what appeals to them philosophically, culturally, or in any other way, will find the teaching from Joe and Kevin and myself at times not only challenging but even probably a grave affront to some of their most cherished ideas. But the truth matters; and Jesus’ truth – whatever some might say to the contrary – matters a very great deal; because without it one tends to get only more religion and less fruit.

 In our passage from the Book of Acts this morning, we are presented with something of a crisis in the local church at Antioch – the arrival of the ‘We’ve always done it this way brigade’. Now I don’t know if you have met any members of the ‘We’ve always done it this way brigade’? They come in various shapes and sizes and with a great deal of religious and social ammunition. They are usually very sincere, forthright, and determined to make a fuss. The problem is that because they have not signed up to or did not read or understand the joining instructions, they tend to emphasise the importance of the unimportant, of secondary rather than primary issues of faith and practice, and of their ‘churchmanship’ rather than their ‘calling’. Much of what they advocate is good and healthy - in the right proportion and in the right place: but it has, always in my experience, a sad tendency to operate by law rather than by grace. And because grace is the defining term of Christianity, and because grace is what law finds unsettling and disturbing because it often seems rather messy and open-ended and inclusive rather than exclusive, and risk-taking rather than safe, and downright unreasonable and seemingly unrealistic - in purely worldly terms, and takes us out of our personal comfort zones and challenges our most cherished ideas, so it tends to cause v2 ‘considerable uproar and dispute’.

Now we ought to be both impressed and inspired by the Church at Antioch: they send a group to the Apostles and Elders at Jerusalem v2 to ‘sort it out’. Unlike the General Synod of the Church of England when warned last week of its impending demise through lack of perceived relevance to the un-churched of this country and especially the young, it does not immediately vote to form a committee. And even this disagreement within the Church did not prevent the group v3 from bearing fruit, I’m sure. They did not waste their time on the journey talking about the Church’s wranglings and disagreements, they told the people along the way of the good news that the Gentiles were coming to know the God, bringing v3 ‘great joy to the Christian communities.’ And what is the second in Paul’s list of the fruit of the Spirit of God? 

The fruit that begins to show in a person’s life when they are sharing the good news of Jesus with others or hearing about it? Joy! (Which, incidentally, is a very different and far, far more rewarding and uplifting thing – joy, that is – than the ‘happiness’ that people talk of and look for today. But that’s for another occasion.)

So they arrive in Jerusalem, still telling everyone v4 of the wonderful things that God, through them, had been doing amongst unbelievers. But immediately they run into the ‘We’ve always done it this way’ brigade again, or their sister regiment, the ‘Religion of our Fathers’ brigade’, another well known constrainer of grace. What do this lot insist on? That they become just like us; that they are not welcome unless they accept our cultural and religious practices.  A fellow clergyperson only last week was telling me that this was why her congregation was not growing; because of this very selfish and excluding attitude amongst her congregation.

At Antioch and Jerusalem the presenting issue was the practice of circumcision. It takes Peter to stand up and explain to them the true meaning or spirit of circumcision and how a faithful or circumcised heart is what is important, not a whole load of religious and cultural practices that are only v10 ‘a yoke on the neck that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear’. Circumcision, which had been a reminder and outward physical sign of the Covenant made between God and the people of Israel, a Covenant in which God graciously takes the initiative, promising freedom and new life, had become for the party of the Pharisees an end in itself, a mark of their culture and nation that served as a barrier rather than an invitation. They had forgotten the teaching in Deuteronomy and in the Prophets that without obedience to God’s calling to live in a certain way and to be a ‘light to the Gentiles’, the sign was worthless.

So what is it in Christianity that saves a person, that is, reconciles them to God?  It is God’s grace; God’s grace as a gift accepted by grateful and faithful hearts that then demonstrates its integrity in fruitfulness. This is what purifies the person, not the keeping of a long list of religious laws and practices.   

Someone once remarked that as far as Christianity is concerned, the difference between religion and faith is that you can do the first on your own but you can only do the second with Jesus; and only the second can produce fruit that will last. On my recent pilgrimage walk in northern Spain, I was astonished and saddened by the number of people who had been put off Christianity by the officers of the Church and their practices, their rules and regulations, that were utterly graceless. Law had been allowed to triumph over grace and not only had no new fruit been grown but good fruit had been lost!

It really is all about GRACE because graceless religion is Christianity without Christ: graceless religion puts things first that ought to be either secondary or not there at all. Indeed, Peter speaks in hardly disguised harsh terms to the Pharisee group. V10 ‘Why are you putting God to the test?’ And then, adding insult to injury in the next verse rebukes them by seeming to imply that the Gentiles who have given their hearts to God by faith – and by faith alone - in the Lord Jesus are already in a place where the Pharisees need still to get to.

That may be inferring too much from the simple text but the point that Peter makes, the point that we must understand about the nature of the Christian faith, the point that must inform our relationships with all and our intentions and acceptance of all, is that our reconciliation with God, our membership of the Covenant, is through faith alone. 

It is grace that must motivate us if we are to be both faithful and fruitful. As one great Father of the Church once said in speaking of grace, ‘If you cannot yet as a Christian find the love for your neighbour to practise it, do nothing to prevent others from so doing so, and make the learning of grace your greatest ambition.’

Let us pray that the learning of grace may be our greatest ambition as individuals and as Jesus’ church here in Brenchley.