BY RAVI MUSUKU, PRESIDENT, BAPTIST CHURCHES OF NEW ZEALAND
ACTS 2:42-47
42 They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. 43 Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. 44 All the believers were together and had everything in common. 45 They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. 46 Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, 47 praising God and enjoying the favour of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
- Teaching of the Word
- Fellowship ( koinonia)
- The Breaking of Bread
- Prayer
1. Teaching of God’s Word ( Devoted to Apostles’ Teaching)
2 Tim 3:16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,
2 Tim 4: 2 Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke, and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. 3 For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 4 They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths
2. Fellowship (koinonia)
It’s a favourite word of Paul, its basic idea is sharing, but it is used to denote intimacy and fellowship in general.
It is used for “the fellowship of the Holy Spirit” and for participating in the blood and body of Christ when we partake of the cup and the bread at the Lord’s supper.
Open Homes, house churches. People are comfortable in a small group setting and a small house church rather than a large one. Monthly prayer group. Aquila and Priscilla
3. The Breaking of Bread
“The breaking of bread” has a definite article before bread, causing some to render it breaking of the loaf and to distinguish it from “the breaking of bread” (without the definite article) in verse 46.
They claim that verse 42 refers to the Lord’s supper while verse 46 refers to ordinary meals. Teaching, fellowship, and prayer are spiritual activities, therefore breaking of bread is also a spiritual activity which is the Lord’s supper
4. Prayer
The final feature in verse 42 literally reads, “and to the prayers” in NRSV. The phrase could refer to prayer during the set times of the Jerusalem temple, which the disciples attended, but there were also times when they prayed on their own.
The great contribution of Jesus to the Christian understanding of prayer was his intimacy with God, whom he called Father. The Aramaic word he used was Abba.
5. Community Life
- v 43- Filled with awe, signs and wonders, other outsiders were encouraged
- Sharing of possessions, sharing food, hospitality, Alpha course
- God gives gifts, and we need to operate in those gifts, non-Christians are attracted by signs and wonders. Signs and wonders happen with the proclamation of the Word and expecting God to perform miracles.
- Jesus performed signs and wonders along with the proclamation of the Word. Expect great things from God and attempt great things for God.
- Radio show.
- Mark 16:17 – “And these signs will accompany those who believe, in my name, they will cast out demons; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
