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The Way Things Should Be?
"Nowhere else in Acts does the Spirit come before baptism. Later Peter explained to the Christians in Jerusalem that the way the Holy Spirit came on these people was “as he had come on us at the beginning” (11:15). It was accompanied by “speaking in tongues and praising God” (10:46). In spite of all the leading that God had given up to this point, Jewish believers are astonished that these Gentiles have received the Holy Spirit (10:45). With such unmistakable evidence that these Gentiles have indeed been converted, Peter does not hesitate to baptize them immediately (10:47–48). The specific reason he gives is clear: “They have received the Holy Spirit just as we have” (10:47)." [1] (emphasis mine)
I highlighted that first line because I want to talk briefly about an important question we need to think about when reading the book of Acts. Obviously Acts tells us A LOT about the early Church, the Holy Spirit, missions, etc. The question we need to answer is this:
Are the things that are recorded in Acts -
a) Prescriptive: Telling us how we should also do Church, see the Spirit working, etc.
-or-
b) Descriptive: Telling us simply how things happened and leaving us to do Church and theology our own way, as long as it is Biblical
You can probably tell by my phrasing that I think the nearly always the answer is b). There are a lot of books and people these days that are hearkening us to go back to the "New Testament Church", the good 'ole days, as it were. My response to that is "Which part do you want to go back to? Do you want people having sex with their mothers-in-law like 1 Corinthians, or do you want them totally forsaking the Gospel, like in Galatians?" The temptation in reading Acts is to see everything as perfect and to think that God wants us to "do Church" just like they did then. But the fact is, if you read Acts closely, its REALLY hard to work out "the way that we should do things". In this passage, people receive the Spirit before being baptized. That doesn't happen anywhere else. We ourselves receive the indwelling of the Holy Spirit at the moment of conversion. They early Church shared everything in common. GREAT! But we don't have any of the details, other than that Ananias and Sapphira were struck dead.
I think it's a good thing to seek to be Biblical, but I think that desperately trying to be the Church that is in the book of Acts is not only misguided, but impossible. Acts isn't meant to be a handbook on how to be the Church, it is the earliest history of that Church.
So what do we do? How do we know how to do Church? Love Jesus, tell others about Jesus, know the Bible, teach the Bible, reach our culture and community in the best way we know how, and stop comparing ourselves to everyone else. We really need to get over ourselves in most cases. Don't worry about the right way to "do Church" worry about BEING the Church. Love Jesus unashamedly and unrestrainedly, know the Bible and follow it, and beware of the mistakes that others have made throughout the history of the Church so that we don't make the same mistakes. Then just do it. I'm pretty sure that's what they did in Acts.
The Way Things Should Be?
"Nowhere else in Acts does the Spirit come before baptism. Later Peter explained to the Christians in Jerusalem that the way the Holy Spirit came on these people was “as he had come on us at the beginning” (11:15). It was accompanied by “speaking in tongues and praising God” (10:46). In spite of all the leading that God had given up to this point, Jewish believers are astonished that these Gentiles have received the Holy Spirit (10:45). With such unmistakable evidence that these Gentiles have indeed been converted, Peter does not hesitate to baptize them immediately (10:47–48). The specific reason he gives is clear: “They have received the Holy Spirit just as we have” (10:47)." [1] (emphasis mine)
I highlighted that first line because I want to talk briefly about an important question we need to think about when reading the book of Acts. Obviously Acts tells us A LOT about the early Church, the Holy Spirit, missions, etc. The question we need to answer is this:
Are the things that are recorded in Acts -
a) Prescriptive: Telling us how we should also do Church, see the Spirit working, etc.
-or-
b) Descriptive: Telling us simply how things happened and leaving us to do Church and theology our own way, as long as it is Biblical
You can probably tell by my phrasing that I think the nearly always the answer is b). There are a lot of books and people these days that are hearkening us to go back to the "New Testament Church", the good 'ole days, as it were. My response to that is "Which part do you want to go back to? Do you want people having sex with their mothers-in-law like 1 Corinthians, or do you want them totally forsaking the Gospel, like in Galatians?" The temptation in reading Acts is to see everything as perfect and to think that God wants us to "do Church" just like they did then. But the fact is, if you read Acts closely, its REALLY hard to work out "the way that we should do things". In this passage, people receive the Spirit before being baptized. That doesn't happen anywhere else. We ourselves receive the indwelling of the Holy Spirit at the moment of conversion. They early Church shared everything in common. GREAT! But we don't have any of the details, other than that Ananias and Sapphira were struck dead.
I think it's a good thing to seek to be Biblical, but I think that desperately trying to be the Church that is in the book of Acts is not only misguided, but impossible. Acts isn't meant to be a handbook on how to be the Church, it is the earliest history of that Church.
So what do we do? How do we know how to do Church? Love Jesus, tell others about Jesus, know the Bible, teach the Bible, reach our culture and community in the best way we know how, and stop comparing ourselves to everyone else. We really need to get over ourselves in most cases. Don't worry about the right way to "do Church" worry about BEING the Church. Love Jesus unashamedly and unrestrainedly, know the Bible and follow it, and beware of the mistakes that others have made throughout the history of the Church so that we don't make the same mistakes. Then just do it. I'm pretty sure that's what they did in Acts.
[1] Ajith Fernando, Acts, The NIV Application Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1998), 337.
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