The Church Enlarged – 5/24/09
Sermon Series: The Church: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow
Title: The Church Enlarged – The spread of the church to the Gentiles.
Text: Acts 11:19-26
Theme: This message will examine the need of the Church to grow and proclaim with power the message of Christ. This saving message is a powerful force in a community as people live out the truth and freeing nature of the gospel.
These were the first people to experience a relationship with Christ outside of the context of Old Covenant bounds. Their new Christian lives are identified not by adherence to OT regulations and customs but by the movement of the Holy Spirit in their lives.
Introduction: Being reminded of who is in charge. As we look back over the history of the Church it is impressive to clearly see the handprint of God’s movement as He stretches and torques the Church into what He desires it to be.
Transition: As we continue our study of God’s Church through the ages, I am convinced by today’s passage that God is in control of His Church. And if we are going to be a people of God we have to be reminded of that. The passage that we read today deals with the time that God is moving His church out of the comfort zone of their Jewish background and experience and into the greater landscape of communicating redemptive grace to the whole world.
1) Be Open to God’s Movement
a) IN the opening phrase of this passage we see that some people who had experienced a relationship with God through Jesus wanted to share their faith. They were open to something new and different that God was planning on doing for them.
i) The preaching of the men of Cyrene and Cyprus
ii) The reaction of Barnabas as he came and saw the “grace of God” apparent in the new non-Jewish converts.
b) Be open to the idea that God does not always do things the same old way. He delights in presenting Himself to people in new and diverse ways.
i) He is diverse
(1) He has pictured an immense and diverse creation.
(2) He has revealed Himself in a huge assortment of ways.
(a) Through Hid word which is diverse – History, poetry, prophecy, narrative, letters.
(b) He has used dreams and visions, people and angels to proclaim Himself and in a few instances even showed up Himself and even these manifestations were unique and diverse.
(i) He showed up to Moses in a burning bush
(ii) To the Israelites in a pillar of fire and a pillar of clouds.
(iii) To Job as a whirlwind.
(iv) To Elijah as a gentle whisper.
ii) He is big
(1) God is big enough to be looked at from several different angles. There are none of us big enough to get a full and complete understanding of God and his nature. Why would we limit Him to our own small understanding when He does not limit Himself in the same manner?
2) Be sensitive to His Movement
a) We do not know the exact occasion that precipitated the Cyrene and Cyprian converts to preach to a group of people who were not Jews. But we do know that this was intended by God to be a part of the plan that He had in mind as He enlarged the Church to include more than just the Jewish people as Christ followers.
b) He had been working in the background to expand the minds of the Church leadership to include non-Jewish people into the landscape of His redemptive plan.
i) In a different part of the country God has been moving Peter toward an understanding that non-Jews are to be a part of the Church by a vision and by introducing him to a man named Cornelius. This is only the first step that God has in mind in His expansion of the Church.
c) In our story today we see that now that the scattered Jewish believers have let the cat out of the bag, the Church in Jerusalem gets wind of what’s going on way up there and decides that they had better check it out. So they send Barnabas up to investigate.
i) Let’s take a moment and reread what this passage says about the character of Barnabas – “for he was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and of faith.”
ii) As soon as Barnabas is certain that it is God’s hand which is moving forward he was excited – He celebrates and encourages them to keep doing what they are doing.
d) The thing that we have to notice here is that everyone is operating at a level that makes them sensitive to what the Holy Spirit intends for them to do. The real question for us is how do we put ourselves in a position where we are sensitive to what God wants to accomplish through us.
i) We have to desire a spiritual understanding
(1) “And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.” (1 Corinthians 2:13-14, ESV)
ii) We have to be doing God’s bidding.
(1) Luke 12-11-12″And when they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not be anxious about how you should defend yourself or what you should say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say.”” (Luke 12:11-12, ESV)
3) Be Available for His Movement
a) God called on those who preached
i) One of the things that I want to take note of here is the fact that the reason that these men were in Antioch was because they were being persecuted in Jerusalem and they had to find someplace else for them and their families to live.
ii) It is important for us to be reminded that sometimes when we are in the middle of something really hard, something which we would rather not be going through, that might be a time when we should pay even closer attention to the opportunities which God puts in front of us.
(1) These guys preached in a city which they probably would have been more comfortable not going to in the first place.
(2) Paul was able to bring the good news to Caesars own household because he got hauled to Rome in chains.
(3) Teresa and I are able to be a part of God’s work here because God dragged us to Missouri.
(4) I wonder were or to whom God might be dragging you.
b) The Church called on Barnabas and Barnabas called on Paul.
i) The other thing that I notice about this story is that the people involved picked up the phone and said yes I will do that.
ii) Barnabas said yes when the Church in Jerusalem asked him to go all the way up to Antioch.
iii) Paul said yes when Barnabas found him in his home town in Tarsus and was available to go to Antioch, which wound up being the sponsoring Church for all of his mission trips to the Gentiles.
