Acts 4:32-34 “All the believers were one in heart and mind. No-one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify for the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was on them all. There were no needy persons among them.”
Having translated the book of Acts in 1955, J.B.Phillips wrote:
“It is impossible to spend several months in close study of this remarkable short book… without being profoundly stirred and, to be honest, disturbed. The reader is stirred because he is seeing Christianity, the real thing, in action for the first time in human history. The new-born Church, as vulnerable as any human child, having neither money, influence, nor power in the ordinary sense, is setting forth joyfully and courageously to win the pagan world for God through Christ…
We cannot help feeling disturbed as well as moved, for this surely is the Church as it was meant to be. It is vigorous and flexible, for these are the days before it ever became fat and short of breath through prosperity, or muscle-bound by over-organisation. These men did not make ‘acts of faith,’ they believed; they did not ‘say their prayers,’ they really prayed. They did not hold conferences on psychosomatic medicine, they simply healed the sick. But if they were uncomplicated and naïve by modern standards, we have ruefully to admit that they were open on the God-ward side in a way that is almost unknown today.”
Maybe the above can act as an encouragement to take a fresh examination of the book of Acts. Even in the short verses above we read of the early Church’s radical unity, sacrificial generosity, boldness, grace and power. Where are we now?
Let’s cry out in prayer with Habakkuk the prophet:
Lord, I have heard of your fame. I stand in awe of your deeds, O Lord. Renew them in our day, in our time make them known; in wrath remember mercy. Amen! (3:2)
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