It's incredible. Okay, open your
Bibles, if you would, to Acts, Chapter 2. The name of the message
is One Accord. One Accord. Lord willing, we'll
finish this chapter today. Lord willing, we'll finish this
chapter today. Oh, my. It's been wonderful, though,
hasn't it? The first two chapters have just
been absolutely wonderful to go through. It's just been amazing.
And last week we looked at Peter preaching the Lordship of Christ,
and then who is the long awaited Messiah sent by God to save his
people from their sins. And then we looked at the effect
wrought in the hearers, a group of hearers. Remember, there was
two hearers there, folks who actually heard something and
folks who didn't hear nothing at all. Right? And folks who
heard something, they heard it affectionately. By the power
of God, the Holy Spirit, they actually heard something. They
heard the preacher say something. And that's because the Holy Spirit
gave them, they were born again and they were given faith to
believe, right? And ears to hear and eyes to
see, just like we've been given, right? Oh, it's absolutely incredible. So let's look at verses 42 to
47. today, but let's start in verses 36 for our reading, or
verse 36, and we'll go all the way down to verse 47. But again,
our text will be verses 42 to 47. Verse 36 of Acts chapter
2, Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that
God hath made that same Jesus whom you have crucified, both
Lord and Christ. God did that. Now, when they
heard this, they were pricked in their hearts, they were convicted,
and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, men and
brethren, what shall we do? Then Peter said unto them, repent
and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ
for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of
the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you and
to your children and to all that are far off, even as many as
the Lord our God shall. Look at that, again, call. He
calls his people, doesn't he? He does. He shall call them.
He calls them. And with many other words did he testify and
exhort, saying, save yourself from this untold generation?
Then they that gladly received his word were baptized in the
same day. They were added unto them about
3,000 souls. And then here's our text today,
verse 42 to 47. And they continued steadfastly
in the apostles' doctrine, in fellowship, and in breaking of
bread, and in prayers. And fear came upon every soul,
and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles. And there,
that fear, that's Jerusalem. And all that believed were together,
and had all things common, and sold their possessions and goods,
and parted them all to all men, as every man had need. And they,
continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, did eat
their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, praising
God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added
to the church daily, such as should be saved. In his sermon, Peter had declared
to the unbelieving Jews that were gathered together that God
had made his darling son, the son of his love, the Lord Jesus
Christ, both Lord and Christ. And God, the Holy Spirit, pricked
the hearts of about 3,000 of the hearers that day. There was
more, we know there was more, because there was some scoffing
at him. But 3,000 of them, the Holy Spirit pricked their hearts,
gave them ears to hear. They heard something. They heard
the shepherd's voice, didn't they? Through the preaching of the
gospel. They heard about Christ. And he pricked the hearts of
about 3,000 of his chosen people, moving them to cry out, men and
brethren, what shall we do? Now God, the Holy Spirit, had
made them aware that the very one they sinned against was God
himself. And that's who we've sinned against,
right? Our sins were against God. We violated his holy law. And his justice, being wholly
unjust, must extract the penalty that it demands. And the scripture
says, right, the soul that sinneth, it must die. So again, Christ,
the great substitute of sinners, comes and dies in our place. Now we're still going to die
physically, but because Christ died for our sins, we're going
to be ushered into glory. The instant we breathe our last
breath, we're in glory, just like that. My oh my. What a time that'll be. What
a time that'll be. But the only reason that's going
to happen is because Christ paid that which the law of God demanded
for our sins. And he did that for all his people,
all the elect of all the ages. And what we see here, there's
about 3,000 of the elect right there. Just like that. Notice that too? Did Peter say,
bow your head and repeat a prayer? Say, come on up here. We're making
an altar down here. Didn't say none of that, did
he? Who did the work? God did the work, amen. The Holy
Spirit did the work, didn't he? He pricked their hearts. He pricked
their hearts, beloved. And as a result of that, they
praised God. They praised God for his goodness
and his mercy. God had given them a new heart.
And here we see a sincere cry for mercy came from them. Men
and brethren, what shall we do? Well, there's nothing they can
do, is there? Now, that's the reply of man.
We always think there's something we can do. But the gospel preacher
always says, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt
be saved. And look at what Peter says here.
Peter said unto them, repent and be baptized, every one of
you, in the name of Jesus. Have a change of mind. How do
we have a change of mind about God? Is it something we can muster
up? No, we saw that last week, right? That repentance is a change
of mind, but God's got to do that for us, doesn't he? In Revelation,
I think it's chapter one, John says, and turning and being turned. That's how we are. We turn, but
we're being turned, beloved. Isn't that amazing? God turns us to Christ and then
he changes our mind about him, about his son, about the Bible,
about God's people. It's absolutely incredible. So
he says, repent and be baptized every one of you in the name
of Jesus Christ for or because of the remission of sins and
you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost for the promises
unto you and to your children and to all that are far off even
as many as the name of the Lord, as many as the Lord our God shall
call. My oh my. Jesus Christ, the very one those
unbelieving Jews had crucified, was God's promised Messiah. He
was the promised Messiah sent to Israel. They'd been waiting.
Vicki and I were talking this week, and Vicki goes, isn't it
amazing that they're still waiting for the Messiah, but he's already
come? They're unbelievers. They have
a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof. Now, do we hope that there's
a revival over? Absolutely. I'll tell you what,
I hope there's a huge revival over there, don't you? I hope
there's a huge revival all over the place. Wouldn't that be wonderful? But that's God's doing, isn't
it? We can't make it happen. See, people, and I used to be
in this, they think that if they can get that temple rebuilt,
then they're hastening the coming of Christ. I'll tell you what,
it don't matter if they rebuild that temple, because the final
sacrifice has already been here. His name is the Lord Jesus Christ.
There's no need for any more sacrifices, is there? None. It's done. It's done. Oh my. Now, do we pray for the peace
of Israel? Absolutely. We pray for the peace of all
around the world, don't we? Do we hate any kind of hate towards
other people? Absolutely we do. That's wrong. But what we're seeing manifest
is the evil of man, naturally. Sin. Wars come about because
of greed and power. And people who just want to kill
and destroy. And that's natural for all of
us, beloved. But God saved us. We're born
again now. were not the people we used to
be. And there was 3,000 of them that came to Jerusalem just to
worship as they would with their Jewish religion. And what happened?
They went home believers on the Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that
amazing? Were they expecting to have an
encounter with Christ when they went to Jerusalem? Nope. Amen. Not one of them. They weren't
even expecting. They were going there to do their
yearly worship. That's what they had to do. Not even having any idea that
the Lord God Almighty was going to reveal himself and their whole
lives would never be the same again. Isn't that what happened to us?
It did, didn't it? Oh my. I'll tell you. Christ is the promised Messiah.
But he came here and he obtained eternal redemption. Those 3,000
saints there that were saved, they were ones who Christ obtained
eternal salvation for. They were ones who God the Father
gave him in eternity. And there's a whole other, there's
a number of them. We don't even know the number of them, do we?
But there's a huge number of them. But those folks we see
right here, 3,000 of the elect just turned right like that. And they didn't do anything,
they just said, what should we do to be saved? They knew they
couldn't do anything. What are we going to do? We're
guilty. Oh, and then Peter sets Christ before them. Peter sets
Christ before them. And the Lord God, the Holy Spirit,
he'd already been working on them. Oh my, he'd already been
working on them. They wouldn't have cried that
out if God the Holy Spirit wasn't working on them. My, oh my. And Christ obtained eternal redemption
for those he laid down his life for. And we're redeemed by the
precious blood of Christ. That's what's purchased our souls. And that blood was shed to redeem
us, but that blood was shed to appease God's wrath, beloved.
That blood was shed first and foremost to appease the God we
sinned against, first and foremost. Christ offered himself up to
God without spot, you see, as our mediator. We get the benefits
of it. And that blood is so precious.
That blood of the God man is so precious that it redeemed
a number that no man can number. We know not everyone's saved,
because there's people in hell today. If God saved everyone, like some
universalists say, then everybody would be in heaven, but everybody's
not in heaven, are they? No. My, oh, my. And the preacher's cry is, believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. And remember,
Luke's writing under divine inspiration here too. He's not just penning
words that he's thinking of himself. When we read the scriptures,
remember that these words are divinely inspired by God. He's
the true author of these words. He's letting us in to what happened
that day. And then now, this book is wonderful
because we're gonna see the church at work. Going forth for Christ. And all they desire is to glorify
God, just like we desire to glorify God. Isn't that amazing? In this portion we're going to
look at, we're going to see some good examples, right? We're going
to see some good examples for us even today. And it's set forth
there for our learning, beloved. Look at verse 42, and they continued
steadfastly in the Apostles doctrine. Now, what's the Apostles doctrine? Well, it's the doctrine of Christ.
It centers around Christ. It's preaching Christ. It's preaching
that man is unable to save himself. That if we're to be saved, God
must save us. Otherwise, we're lost. We cannot
save ourselves. In other words, it's called the
total depravity of man. People get all bent out of shape.
It just means we can't save ourselves. That's what it means. Is it true
or not? You know, you say, oh, I believe
in total depravity. Somebody goes, oh, I don't believe
in that. Oh, my goodness. Well, you don't. And then you
ask them, well, do you believe you can save yourself? Or do
you believe God has to save you? Well, I believe God has to save
you. Well, that's because you're totally depraved. You see, people get, they get
all worked up about the acramen of the tulip. It's just based
on scripture. And the apostles taught this.
Paul said there's no man, no man can seek God. No man understands
God, you see? There's no way in our natural
state for us to understand who God is. Romans actually 3.19
says, now we know that whatsoever things the law saith, it saith
to them who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped
and all the world may become guilty before God. That's total
depravity. Man is guilty before God. Why?
Because of our sin. Because of our sin. And then
do you know that the apostles, they preached the unconditional
election of God. Right? Another, the you, oh,
this one really bends people out of shape when you start talking
to them about unconditional election. I had a friend of mine the other
day, I asked him. I said, you're so against unconditional election.
I said, can I ask you something? And he goes, yeah. And I say,
you claim that you're saved by God. And he says, yeah. And I
said, well, when God saved you, did he save you on purpose or
was it by accident? It was on purpose. I said, that's
election. See, but man's so against that,
naturally, until you bring it right down to our level, right?
I needed it brought down to my level. First time someone told
me about election, I blew a gasket when I believed my free will
had saved me, which it hadn't. Oh, my gosh. My, oh, my. Listen to this. Paul's writing
to a young church in Thessalonica. Turn there if you would. 1 Thessalonians
chapter 1. He's writing to a real young
church. And people say, well, you shouldn't
teach these deep things to young believers. Well, Paul did it,
didn't he? Paul did it. Look at this. Look
at this in 1 Thessalonians chapter 1 verses Verses four and five. Paul taught, he taught the unconditional
election of God. Look at this, it's so clear.
Knowing, brethren and beloved, your election. That means to
choose in the Greek. Your election, what? Of God. Well, who chose me then? God
chose me. And then he says in verse 5,
for our gospel, look at this, look at this, it didn't come
to you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost,
and in much assurance, as you know what manner of man we were
among you for your sake. Look at that, it came with power,
beloved, the power of God the Holy Spirit. Just like we saw
with Peter preaching. Peter's just a mouthpiece, isn't
he? That gospel came with power and 3,000 souls were saved. And
then, I absolutely love, I absolutely love Where is it here? Look at verse 6. And you became
followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much
affliction with joy of the Holy Ghost, so that you were examples
to all that believe in Macedonia and Achaia. Oh, verse 9. I love verse 9,
because I used to be a Catholic. I was worshiping idols, right?
Look at this. For they themselves show of us
what manner of entering in we head unto you, and how ye turn
to God from idols. We turn from God! We turn from
idols to God, beloved. And every one of us, we either
turn from the God of self, to serve the living, true God.
That's what God's done for us. Why? Why did we do that? And
look, it says, to serve the living and true God. Why did we do that? Right back to verse four. Knowing,
brethren, beloved, your election of God. God chose us on purpose, beloved.
We're not saved by accident. We're saved on purpose, isn't
that wonderful? And that's what they taught.
Peter even wrote to the elect scattered. That means the elect
of God, the chosen of God. Call us a peculiar people. My
oh my. My oh my. And then, our Lord's
apostles preached limited atonement. Even Christ himself, turn if
you would to John chapter 10, and then put your finger in Titus
chapter 2 verses 14 and 15. Our Lord, do you know our Lord
himself? taught limited atonement? Look at this. This is in John chapter 10 here.
John chapter 10. My oh my. John chapter 10, verse 11. Our Lord said this, I'm the good
shepherd, the good shepherd giving his life for the sheep. If you
go down a little further in that chapter, you go down a little
further in that chapter, where is it? Okay, here. Look in verse 25,
John chapter 10. Look at this. So he's told us
in John 10, 11, I'm the good shepherd, the good shepherd giving
his life for the sheep. I talked to a universalist a couple weeks
ago and this is where I took him. He believes Christ died
for everybody. This is where I took him. I took
him right here. And I said, who are the sheep? Because Christ
is identified in verse 11 that he died for the sheep. He said,
I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd giveth his
life for the sheep, right? OK. Now look at, and I took him
down here. Look at verse 25. I told you, and you believe not,
the works that I do in my Father's name, they bear witness of me.
So they bear witness that he's the Messiah. But ye believe not,
because ye are what? Not of my sheep. As I said unto you, my sheep
hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. Our Lord
taught that. And I give, look at verse 28,
who gives eternal life? Man can't get it, because we're
sinners. He says, and I give unto them,
who? Unto the sheep. He just told these Pharisees.
Now that's the finger of election, the only finger of election I
heard one preacher say one time, pointing right at them and saying,
you're not Christ. Now we can't say that to other
people because we don't know. If you had met me in my natural
state, you wouldn't have ever thought I'd be saved. And I wouldn't
have thought that either. Here I am preaching the gospel.
And I know you all have similar stories. Here we are. We talked about
it. Here we are, sister. Worshipping
and praising our great God. My oh my. But he's revealed here
to us and to these men. He says, I give unto them eternal
life and they shall never perish. Neither shall any man pluck them
out of my hand. My father which gave them me is greater than
all, and no man is able to pluck them out of my father's hands."
Look at that. That's eternal security right there. That's
eternal security. So even our Lord taught this.
And then if you would turn to Titus, chapter 2, Paul writes
about this too. He calls us a peculiar people. Peter calls us a chosen generation,
meaning we're chosen out of our generation. Out of all our generation,
the Lord said, Brian, you're mine, out of your generation.
He said, Karen, you're mine. Out of your whole generation,
Marsha, you're mine. Isn't that wonderful? Out of the whole generation
that we live in, he said, you're mine, to his people. I know all
kinds of people I grew up with and the Lord in eternity said,
you're mine Wayne. My oh my. Isn't that amazing? That's just incredible. But it's
true, look at this. And who did Christ give himself
for? Look at this. Titus chapter 214, now remember Paul's writing
to a younger preacher. He says, who gave himself for
us. He doesn't say he gave himself
for the world, does he? He says he gave himself for us. Gave
himself for his sheep. That he might redeem us from
all iniquity, all our sins, buried with Christ, all of them, and
purify. We're purified, even though we're
sinners still, we're purified in God's eyes. He doesn't see
no sin in us. And I'm sitting from the top
of my head to the bottom of my feet still. Man, yesterday I got myself so
down. I'll tell you, I'm just going
to be real with you. I got myself so down, I was just spinning
in a pit. I was down in the mouth, feeling
so sorry for myself. And you know what I thought about? There's Brother Kevin. having to go talk to his dad,
who, praise God, is a saved man. Right? And he might not see him
again this side of eternity. Man, I was so ashamed of myself,
beloved. I was so ashamed of myself. You know, but it's normal, isn't
it? It's normal for us to get down. But isn't it amazing how
the Lord, and I'm just being honest, I get down, I'll tell
you what, sometimes I get so down, I just want to crawl into
bed and sleep. You ever get like that? You ever get like that?
It's like, let me just sleep for an hour or two or three hours
so I can just get some, and my wife has so much patience with
me. I'm over, I'm so sore, I'm just laying all this down, man. Right? Oh my, isn't God good
to us? Isn't he so good to us? My, he
died for us. It says here, who gave himself
for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify
unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. These
things speak and exhort and rebuke with all authority, let no man
despise thee. And then, you know what else
our Lord preached on? the irresistible grace of God.
These are all parts of the Apostles' Doctrine. Turn, if you would,
to John chapter 6. John chapter 6. And then I'll read to you. Actually,
first I'm going to read to you Hebrews chapter 13. It says this,
Now the God of peace that bought again from the dead, our Lord
Jesus Christ, that great shepherd of the sheep through the blood
of the everlasting covenant, Make you perfect in every good
work, to do His will, working in you." See that? It's God working
in us, eh? Working in you. That which is
well-pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory
forever and ever. Amen. Now, I'm going to read
that 1321 again. Look at this. And this is God
working in us. Make you perfect in every good
work. See, we're sinners to the core,
aren't we? Everything we do is tainted with sin. But listen,
make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is
well-pleasing in the sight through Jesus Christ. Through Christ,
to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. But it said there
that he gave his life for the sheep. And it's him working his
will in us, beloved. It's him making us willing. It's
him drawing us with irresistible grace. And look what it says
here. In John chapter 6 verse 37. All that the Father giveth me,
what? There it is. Thanks sister. Shall. Shall. Not might, not maybe, not well,
if they want to. Shall. Shall come to me. And him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out. There's no way I'm going to cast
him away. There's no way. This is even before He's went
to the cross. He's saying this. And then look
down at verses 43 to 45. So this shows you the irresistible
grace of God. We cannot resist His will. If we're one of His
sheep, He's going to get us. Now we may wander for years.
We may run around losing our mind for years. And when I say
losing our mind, I'm thinking of my little puppy dog just going
crazy in the house, right? We call it losing his mind. He
just goes crazy. Well, that's how we are in sin. But look at this. Despite all
that, Jesus therefore answered, in verse 43, and said unto them,
murmur not among yourselves. Don't murmur. Now look at this. Now think of the implications
of these words. No man can come unto me. That means none of us, none of
us in this building, no one in the world has a natural ability
to come to Christ. That's what he's saying. No man
means no one. That's man and woman, right?
We have no ability, he says, no one, no one. That's universal. No one, no man can come to me
except, now there's like those little buts, right? Except, except,
The father which has sent me, draw him. That's what happened
to us, brother Dave. That's what happened to us, brother
Jim. The father drew us. We couldn't come naturally. We didn't want to come naturally.
And he made us willing in the day of his power. Now I'll tell
you why. You ever think of this? Someone
do you wrong? Do you ever, do you ever, I mean
if they really do you wrong, like we sinned against God so
many times, right? Think of it. No human would go
up and say to a person who treated them like that and say, well,
come on, you can come and eat my tent. We'd be like, get out of here,
I don't want to see you. In our natural state, wouldn't
we? I'm going to get you back. That's our natural state. See,
but now we have the freedom of the spirit in us, don't we? We
don't desire to be like that anymore. Why? Well, because of this. Except
the Father which sent me draw him, and I'll raise him up the
last day. Look at that guarantee. I will. That's God in the flesh
saying, you can't come to me. No one can come to me. But the
Father's going to draw some. And I'm going to raise them up.
Now, I don't have a clue who they are. I preach to everyone. I don't know who God's elect
are. So I preach the gospel to all. That's called the general
call. That goes out. This message after here is going
to go out on the internet. Out it goes, right? The general call.
Flee to Christ. He's the only Savior. He's the
sinner's only hope, is Christ. But God has to make that effectual,
doesn't he? I can't save myself and I can't
save anyone else. But God can save all who come
to him through Christ. Right? Oh yeah, he can. Oh, he can. Look at this. It
is written in the prophets, Moses. Remember that all they had was
the Old Testament. So he's talking, he's talking now the prophets,
right? He's talking to minor and major prophets. and they
shall all be taught of God. Every man that has heard and
has learned of the Father, look at this, cometh unto me. Have we not, I ask you beloved,
have we not learned wondrous things? God chose us in eternity. Christ
is the lamb slain from before the foundation of the world.
Before there was ever stars in place, before the universe was
ever made, before anything was ever made, we were in Christ. Before we were in Adam, we were
in Christ. My, oh my. And our great God
who sees the end from the beginning, remember what I said last week?
It's like a parade. When a parade goes by, all you
see is what's in front of you, right? But imagine having a drone 600,
700 feet up, and it sees the end of the parade and the beginning,
right? That's how God sees time and everything in this world.
We just see it from the little part of the parade that's going
by us. but he sees the whole thing.
He already knows the end, and he knows the beginning, and we're
in his hands, and he'll never cast us out. Oh, it's wonderful. So even Christ here is preaching
the irresistible grace of God, because no man can come to him,
except the Father draw him. And I'll tell you what, a team
of wild horses couldn't stop someone coming to Christ when
the Holy Spirit's drawing them. You hook a train to him, it still
won't stop him. Because it's God's power that's drawing them.
It's not His power. It's not my power that's coming
to Christ. It's God drawing me to Christ, right? Isn't it wonderful? And then lastly, our Lord, His
apostles preach the preservation of the saints. Turn, if you would,
to Hebrews chapter 13. Hebrews chapter 13. I actually
read this verse early. Chapter 20 and 21. Oh my. And Jude, remember in
the Jude it says that he's able to present us faultless before
his throne? That's preserving grace. That's Christ preserving
us and presenting us. And remember, even in the text
we just read, he says the Father draws, and then I'm able to raise
him up. He preserves us. That whole time,
in between two, he preserves us. Isn't that amazing? It's
all of God. Salvation is all of God. It's
all of Him. From beginning to end. From planning to execution
to glorification. It's all God. It's all God. Oh
my. Look at this in Hebrews chapter
13 verses 20 to 21. And our God is able to preserve
us. Now the God of peace that bought Again, from the dead,
our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood
of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good
work, to do his will, working in you, that which is well-pleasing
in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and
ever, amen. See, all through our life, he's working in us.
And he will preserve us to the very end. What's it say? He's
the author in what? The finisher, amen, of our salvation. Right? He does it all. And also everything
in between, right? I remember, I think I've told
you, I'm going to repeat this story though, but I knew an author,
a well-written author in Oregon. I had met him at one of the jobs
I was at, and he became one of my customers, a regular repeater,
and he was just a great fellow. And I asked him, he professed
Christ too, and I asked him, I said, when you sit down to
write a book, do you just sit down and start typing? And he
goes, no, no. I planned the theme of the book. I planned the characters
of the book. I planned how I want things to
come out. And I looked at him and I said,
oh, my goodness. God does all that, doesn't he?
He goes, oh, absolutely. And he was the one who told me
that's what that verse means, that he's the author and the
finisher. And I said, so you start the book, you plan it,
you purpose it, and then you finish it, right? And he goes, absolutely.
And I do all the work in between, too. That's what God does with
our salvation, beloved. There's not a wick of nothing
we do to be saved. It's all Him. And there's nothing
we do to keep being saved. You ever think of that? He keeps
us. I remember here in Spurgeon say,
there's not a stitch. No, Henry said, there's not a
stitch of our righteousness in the righteousness of Christ that
we're robed in. There's not one stitch, not one
little stitch that's ours. It's all Christ. It's all what
he's done. Oh my. It's absolutely wonderful. So let's keep going here. We
see in verse 42 again, Acts chapter two, verse 42. that these, the
apostles continued in these God-honoring truths, the apostles' doctrine. And then we see, and they continued
steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine, in fellowship, and
in breaking of bread, and in prayers. They enjoyed each other's
company, beloved. One of the greatest things for
me as a preacher is to see you all after service, staying around
and talking, and fellowshipping together. It's so sweet. Brother
Jim said, look, no one wants to leave last week, right? Everyone's
standing around talking. It was wonderful. That's a sign
of a healthy church, beloved. There's unity. There's fellowship
amongst the brethren. It brings me great joy when I
see that. And we see here that they continued
steadfastly in that sweet fellowship that we have, that communion
that we have with one another. Now they may have had nothing
in common in their lives, but they had everything in common
spiritually. And then I find that when you meet the Lord's
people, you want to get to know them. I always like to ask, how'd
you meet? How did you meet? How'd you meet
your husband? I always like to ask that. Because it's neat. It's neat learning people's history.
It's neat learning. And I look at it all from the
lens of God's providence to see how God brought you together.
It's absolutely amazing. It's absolutely amazing. My oh
my. And they'd been taught that the
Lord's Supper was an ordinance that was instituted by the Lord
Jesus Christ, and they were taught by Christ, being passed down
to believers now through all the generations. Our Lord said,
this do in remembrance of me, and so they met together and
had communion together. And like us, they've been taught
that every time they ate the bread and drank the wine of communion,
they were proclaiming the Lord's death till His coming. So we
see that early New Testament saints continued steadfastly
in coming to the Lord's table, and they continued steadfastly
in prayers. And they knew. They knew because they were cleansed
by the blood of Christ, and because they were clothed in His righteousness,
and because Christ was their mediator, that they could come
wholly and freely to the throne of grace. just like we can. Are you needy? Let us go to the throne of grace.
I'm needy too. Let us go to the throne of grace.
Take anything. Take everything to the Lord.
We have that free access to go to the Lord. And then look at
verse 43. It says, and fear came upon every
soul, and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles. I'm
going to read what John Gill said about this, and this being
the inhabitants of Jerusalem. It says, upon every inhabitant
of Jerusalem, at least upon a great many of them, and upon all the
greater part of them that saw and heard these things, and heard
the apostles speak with different tongues, diverse tongues, and
Peter preached in the manner that he did, and saw so many
thousands at once embrace the gospel of Christ and profess
his name, now by reason of his crucifixion but a few weeks ago,
lay under great reproach and scandal. And such a number of
them baptized in water and because of the miracles done by the apostles
after mention, so great fear fell upon them. They didn't know
what was happening. And then let's read verses 44
and 45 of Acts chapter 2. And all that believed were together
and had things common and sold their possessions and goods and
parted them to all men as every man had need. Now think upon
this. Our great God who knows the end from the beginning had
these believing Jews do this. Because you know what was coming
down the road? You know what was coming down
the road in 70 AD? The destruction of Jerusalem.
Isn't that amazing? That God had them do all this
before that came? It's absolutely amazing. And
they sold their property and their possessions so they could
distribute it to other believers who were in need. The Spirit
of God was working in them and moved them to be of one mind,
we see. They're of one mind. Verses 44 and 45 are not to be
used as an example for believers in all generations to follow.
We're not to go and sell everything. It's not talking about that.
This is what occurred at that time. Now the things that we
can pattern after them is the fellowship, the communion, the
grace they showed one another. Great examples. My oh my. There's nothing written
in the epistles of the New Testament that even suggests that such
a thing It should be done. Well, we should be concerned
of the needs of others. Of course we should be, especially
of the household of faith, right? But people can twist the scriptures,
can't they? Try to make them say whatever
they want. That's not what it's saying for us to go and do that
now. It's not saying that. If someone wants to do something
and give something to the church, that's totally up to them, right?
But this is something we see that occurred at the beginning
here of the acts of the apostles. And I don't know any grace preacher
that would preach that you have to do that. Then look at verse
46 and it says, and they continuing daily with one accord in the
temple and breaking bread from house to house did eat their
meat with gladness and singleness of heart. Now there's a good
example for us. There's a good example for believers of every
generation right there. right there. During these early
days, following the day of Pentecost, the Jews were going to the temple
for public worship still. It was a daily practice for even
the followers of Christ. They could be found in the temple.
But notice the Lord's changed something now. Paul, whenever
he went into the city, first went to the temple, to the synagogue.
But notice the Lord's changed something here. Now they're meeting
house to house. I always said that if something
ever happened where we couldn't meet in this building, we can
meet in the house. Right? That's how it is. They met house to house, beloved.
It says that right there. And they, continuing daily with
one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to
house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart.
There you go. Notice they continued with one
accord In other words, they were all like-minded, similar to what
we have here. It's been wonderful. The unity
is incredible in the body here. We're like-minded. We desire
the gospel, as Brother Neal said, the gospel to go out and be preached
and proclaimed here, and the gospel to go out. My, oh, my. And going to the temple didn't
last very long because now we see they're meeting in house
to house. And some believers have, some believe that this
is referring to eating when it says they're breaking bread.
That's exactly what it means. It refers to them eating together. They're eating together, beloved.
They're meeting in each other's houses and they're eating together. Here's the first potluck. Not
potluck, but you know what I mean. There's a first Baptist meeting
right there. Right? Got to have some food. Man oh man. We're going to do
that next week. But isn't that amazing? They're
sharing their meals. They're breaking bread with each
other. We have sweet fellowship when
we have our fellowship meals, don't we, downstairs? It's wonderful.
Time for us to sit and talk and get to know each other even more. My oh my. They were eating their
meat with singleness of heart. The Lord had filled their heart
with gladness. See, they're born again by the Holy Spirit of God.
They have the fruit of the Spirit now, don't they? They got true
love, true joy, true peace. And they're showing each other
true grace now. Not the hypocrisy of religion. And how did all this come about?
All their needs are being provided for by the sovereign hand of
God. Isn't that amazing? Just like he does for us. Everything we have, all comes
from our great God. It's His, actually. He's just
letting us use it. Right? Think of this. He gives us money. Well, we work
hard for the money, don't we? You say, well, I work hard for
that. Well, He gives us strength to work hard, doesn't He? He
gives us the muscles to keep doing that. You've got to give Him all the
glory. I'll tell you what. My, oh, my. So they weren't hypocrites. They're
showing kindness and gladness to be with one another. This
is real unity before us here. Their hearts are filled with
true adoration of our great king. And what happened as a result
of that adoration? Well, now they're thanking God
for everything they have. Do we not thank God for our salvation,
for everything we have? For our Savior, our Redeemer,
the Lord Jesus Christ? Now let's read verses 46 and
47 together because they're connected with a comma. It says, And they,
continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread
from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and
singleness of heart, praising God and having favor with all
the people. And the Lord added to the church
daily, such as should be saved. When it says there the Lord added
to the church, that's the church universal, beloved. Isn't that amazing? You see, our little work here,
the Lord's used it pretty mightily in the last three years on the
internet. And he may be adding to the church
and we don't even know, beloved. Isn't that wonderful? We just
faithfully meet here together, worship our God and King, and
God does whatever he's pleased to do with the messages. Our
hearts get edified, my heart gets edified studying, your hearts
get edified when the Holy Spirit applies it to you. And then out
it goes and who knows what it's going to do. We know it won't
return unto God void, right? Leave it in his hands. And he
adds daily, such as should be saved. Do you know he's saving
people all around the world right now? Every day. People say, oh,
it's so bad. Well, yeah, it is. in man's eyes,
in our eyes. Everything's working out according
to God's will and purpose. And He's drawn in His elect as
He's pleased to do it. Oh, my. Verse 47, we see the
text brings forth again that these early New Testament saints
were praising God and having favor with the people. They were
sincere with their professions. They were sincere. They were
dedicated to what they believed. They conducted themselves with
such kind deeds and honest behavior, not only to one another, but
also towards those who were not the followers of Christ, which
is what we're supposed to do, right? We're to love our neighbor
as ourselves. And then marvel at the latter
part of verse 47 again. The Lord added to the church
daily, such as should be saved. Such as should be saved. Such
as it pleased Him to save. So these wonderful examples we've
seen here are good things for us to follow as believers even
here in 2023. And God, God did this. God added
about 3,000 souls that day, the day of Pentecost. And you know
what? That's the same God who rules and reigns right now. That's
the same God who put this church right here in Elmont, Michigan.
That's the same God who put you and I in this church. That's
the same God who saved us from all our sins. That's the same
God. Same God saved 3,000 saints.
Same God right now who we serve and worship and adore. My oh
my. And God worked in these early
New Testament saints the same way as he works in the New Testament
saints today. Now two quick points before we
go. We finished the chapter. Praise
God. We're gonna go to number three,
chapter three next week, Lord willing. But two points I want
us to consider that came out of this chapter. The first point
is salvation is a work of God alone. When Peter had finished
preaching, the hearts were pricked and said, what must we do? Well,
he just pointed them right to Christ, didn't he? He pointed
them right to Christ. Just like Paul said, believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. So like
all men, once awakened to their sense of sin and the fact that
we sinned against God, we cry out, Lord, have mercy on me.
Have mercy on me, Lord. And these men wanted to know
how they could appease the wrath of God that they knew now that
they kindled. Christ. Christ. It all hinges
on Christ. Salvation does not come by something
that man does. Salvation is a result of what
God has done and what God does. In this chapter, in verses 37
to 41, the Holy Spirit gives us a beautiful clear picture
of the method of grace. When God intends to save a sinner,
He causes that sinner to hear the gospel. Do you know He caused?
Think of this. We don't know where these men
were from, but we know they came from different countries, don't
they? Who caused them to all be gathered that morning right
there? God. Amen. He did it! Just like He
caused us to be at a church and we heard the gospel preached
somewhere. were born again by the Holy Spirit. He caused those
men to come from all different places and they heard the gospel
preached in their own tongue. And God caused that to happen,
beloved. And they heard the proclamation of the gospel. They heard life's
in Christ. Christ, Christ, Christ and Him
crucified. And they were pricked in the
heart. They heard about the redemptive work of Christ. And God gives
sinners through the preaching of the gospel and his wise and
sovereign providence, he brings that sinner under the sound of
the gospel. He brings his sheep, don't he?
Dave, you told me you moved up here just because you lacked
the area. But little did you know God was gonna send you right
here so you could hear the gospel. Isn't that amazing? And every
one of you can say that. Everyone who's saved can say
that. God bought me, sister, you and Travis, amazing how you
guys met, but Travis was bought to where you were worshiping.
And God saved his soul under the preaching by Scott. And it
was all by his sovereign divine hand. And you probably didn't,
you saw, Travis, you saw a pretty girl and you wanted to be with
her. Right? Just like, oh my, you
hear that so much, it's incredible. Richard and Irene. Richard and
Irene. I was talking to Richard, I said,
Richard, how did you meet Irene? He said, well, I was riding my
bike one day, and here's Irene, she's carrying a Bible, and she's
walking down to go to church. And he said to his brother, man,
she's pretty. And he said, off he went. He
went over, biked over to her and started talking to her, right?
And said, well, where are you going? I'm going to church. He
says, well, I want to go to church real bad after that. And he heard the gospel, beloved!
My! Isn't that amazing? I'll tell
you. It's absolutely incredible. All
organized and directed by God. Think of Philip with the eunuch.
Right? And we're going to see that in
the Book of Acts. Think of Peter being brought to Cornelius. We're
going to see that too. Think of Paul being brought to
Lydia. Right? Think of the Philippian jailer.
They get thrown in the prison. Think, what's going on here?
They're singing hymns while they're sitting there in prison. There's
a great earthquake. And then the Lord saves the Philippian
jailer. My, oh my. Think of the people
of Malta. They were a bunch of barbarians,
right? God sends Paul over there, preaches
the gospel, a bunch of them, the Lord saves a whole bunch
of them. My, oh my. And think of Onesimus. Remember
Onesimus? He was Philemon's slave, remember?
He stole something and he fled to Rome. Well, why did he go
to Rome? Well, because that's where God wanted him to go. And who's in Rome under house
arrest? Paul. And Paul says, now he's a brother
beloved. The Lord in his providence brought
him to Paul and saved his soul, beloved. Salvations of the Lord. My, oh, my. The second point,
the last point, is the building of the church. And I don't mean
the building. I mean the people, the ecclesia in the Greek. The
building of the church is the work of God and God alone. It's
his work. It's his work. And we see that
clearly in our text today. I had told Dan one time about
how much the Lord was using the work here on the internet. And
he goes, you know, it just shows you God don't need many people, does
it? For him to get his message out. No, he don't even need me.
Do you know that? Something happened to me, beloved,
he'd just raise up another preacher for you. That's what he'd do. Really.
Somebody asked me a long time ago, well, what would happen
if, and this was when we were in Oregon, well, what would happen
if you died? I said, God, just raise up another
preacher if he wanted to. No, no, it's not, the work is
not dependent upon me. You guys have seen that. Different
preachers come in. The work's dependent upon God, isn't it?
And God alone. And he adds to the church. The
church cannot be built by human ingenuity and power. It must
be built by the power of God and the power of God alone. I told you the story when I first
came here. And folks said, well, we used
to have like 150 people and all this. And I said, well, yeah,
that's a lot of folks. And well, there's not as many
folks now. And they were getting all caught up on the amount of
people, right? And I think I told you guys. I said, well, I preached
to seven people for seven years. So there's a lot of folks here
every Sunday, right? There are a lot of folks here
right now. And it doesn't matter about numbers, does it? Am I
lying to you, or am I telling you the truth, preaching the
gospel? I'm telling you the truth, aren't I? And that's what you
want to hear. And I'll tell you what, God is using this little
church here. He's using it. It's incredible. Anyone, you want to talk to me
afterwards and ask me? It's incredible what he's doing. I'll tell you,
it's absolutely magnificent. But it's all his work. It's all
him. It's nothing we do. We just put it out. My oh my. So every effort of
man to build the church, other than the preaching of the gospel.
Now there's huge churches, right? I'll tell you, there's giant
churches. There's no gospel there. You know why they're giant churches?
because it appeals to the flesh. They're tickling people's eyes.
They're lying on God. Now I hope and pray. I know there's
several grace churches that are really large. Praise be to God. I love that. That's wonderful. And I pray all the time if the
Lord would add to the church here, if it be his will. I know you're praying along with
me too. But he has to do that, doesn't
he? It's not something we can manipulate. You know, I do know
how to fill the building, but I wouldn't be preaching the gospel.
And I cannot do that. I cannot do that. I will not
compromise by the grace of God on the gospel. I just will not
do it. My oh my. So fellowship, true
fellowship, true unity that we see here is created and maintained
by God the Holy Spirit. It's a doctrinal fellowship is
what it is. People say, I don't want to do
nothing with doctrine. Well, doctrine just talks about Christ, that's
all. I can talk to you about doctrine
and not even mention the word doctrine. We get talking about
Christ dying for us, That's doctrinal, isn't it? We get talking about Christ choosing
us before the foundation of the world. That's doctrinal. I think sometimes we muddy the
waters too much. I think we really do. I'm going to just be preaching
Christ and Him crucified to y'all. I'm not going to get caught up
in different arguments that people have. I refuse to do that. You
don't see me go to a whole lot of places, because this is where
I'm called. And I take that extremely serious.
I've been telling all my preacher friends, I'm a homebody. I'm quite content. I love you guys. I'm sent here
to preach the gospel to you, and by the grace of God I won't
compromise. I'm gonna... All the strength the Lord gives
me, I'm going to preach the Apostle's Doctrine to you. And what are we going to say?
Amen! Amen! Right? Isn't God so good
to us? Isn't it amazing that the Redeemer
saved us? And here we are, taken from all
different lifestyles and all standings of life, and here we
are. worshiping and praising and adoring our great God and
Savior. And when we leave this earth, we're going to do it in
an even greater way with no sin. Our love will be even stronger
in glory. Wouldn't that be amazing? My, oh my. Brother Travis, can
you close us in prayer?