How to Make a Difference - Part 2

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Date: August 12, 2001

Text: Acts 2:41-42

Topic: Spiritual Growth

Title: How to Make a Difference - Part 2 "Decide to Grow”[i]

Theme: The early church shows us how to grow and to make a difference.

“Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.” Acts 2:41-42

I attended “Open House” here at Forsyth Central last Thursday. School starts in Forsyth County tomorrow, you know. I went around with the girls and met several of their teachers and really enjoyed it. Most teachers simply stood in their rooms and handed out supply lists and answered questions as the students and their parents drifted in and out. Others took the whole Open House concept a little more seriously though.

We walked into one of Leigh’s classes and noticed everyone sitting down in desks, with the teacher giving a lecture. Leigh and I just stood a the door for a moment, but then the teacher looked over at us and asked, “Are you in my class?” Leigh answered, “Yes sir.” “Well then,” the teacher said, “take a seat.” I got out of Leigh’s way so she could make her way to a desk, but then the teacher looked right at me and said (in what I thought was a rather mean tone of voice), “You too, sir.”

My shoulders immediately slumped forward like a scolded child as I shuffled over to a desk and sat down while the teacher jumped right back into his “spiel.” As I sat there in my desk pretending to listen to what the guy was saying I was flooded with thoughts and emotions. One thing I was feeling was rebelliousness – “Who was this guy bossing me around? After all, it is “Open House,” not a prison. And furthermore, why did he have to call me “sir” like I was so much older than him, the young whippersnapper!”

I also started recalling some of the things I did back in my own school days. Do you remember those days? Do you remember how much fun it used to be to pass notes in class behind the teacher's back? Or -- even more daring and delinquent -- remember when you kept your eyes ahead and your face towards the teacher all the while deftly sneaking a note right under the teacher’s nose?

Do you remember the content of any of those earth-shaking, principle's office-risking epistles you and your classmates used to sneak back and forth? What did they contain that was so important, so "hot," that they couldn't possibly wait for recess or lunch time?

For some reason, I kept a shoebox of notes I’d written and received from high school. They’re at my parent’s house now, but I don’t need to get them out to remember what they are about. Mine usually had to do with sports, important stuff like, "Do you think football practice is going to get rained out this afternoon? Other notes were about current events, "Did you hear that Scott Heefner threw up in homeroom this morning?" Of course, many were about boyfriend/girlfriend stuff, “You look really mad, did you and Donna have a fight?”

Regardless of how important these messages seemed at the time, they all had one thing in common. They all instantly sounded stupid and lame once they were confiscated by the teacher and read in front of the whole class. Did you ever have one of your notes read in front of the whole class like that?

Having my notes read aloud in class was certainly not the highlight of my learning career in school, like you, I had better moments than that. But today, in honor of school starting, I want to ask you to go “back to school” with me for a few moments so we can study these verses and learn “How to Make a Difference in life.”

We’re in the second week of a series about living a life of significance. We agreed last week that most people want to live a life of significance but many are confused by exactly what that means. Despite tremendous opposition the early church in Jerusalem made an impact on their world; they knew how to make a difference. The premise of this series of messages is that in following their lead, we can make a difference in our world too.

In the two verses of Scripture we read today the early church teaches us that one important way to make an impact and to live lives of significance is to DECIDE TO GROW in our Christian faith.

These two brief verses contain four fundamentals of Christian growth. They answer the question, “How do we grow as a Christian?” Before we delve into that too deeply though, I want to review how a person actually becomes a Christian.

First: “Accept the Message” (How to Become a Christian)

According to the Bible, the way you become a Christian, the way you “accept the message,” (v. 41) is you CHANGE your mind about who Jesus is. This sounds so simple it often trips people up.

You know, I love the Indiana Jones movie trilogy – I guess you know that because I talk about them all the time in my sermons. There’s a great fight scene in an open-air market in the second movie, Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark, where “Indy” comes face to face with a giant sword-wielding villain. The villain, dressed all in black has this huge sword, which he does all kinds of conniptions with as he prepares to charge and engage Jones. Jones watches the guy looking more bored than scared, then calmly pulls out his pistol and shoots his attacker to the cheers of the mob.

Sometimes in the church I’m afraid all the slight of hand stuff -all the motion – distracts us and we lose sight of how simple it really is to become a Christian. To become a Christian is nothing more than changing your mind about who Jesus is.

The “church” word for this change is to REPENT. Unfortunately, the word repent is terribly misunderstood. Most people think repentance means that you feel sorry, and you begin to cry and weep. That has nothing to do with repentance. You may feel sorry, and you may begin to weep and cry, but that is not necessary, and it does not mean that you have repented. To repent simply means "to change your mind" - to change your thinking. We get our English word for repent from the Latin -- pentir means "to think," and the prefix re means "again" -- "think again." to “think again” Latin: Re - means “again” Pentir - means, “to think”

It is changing your mind about Jesus Christ that enables God to “clean the slate:” and causes him to send the Holy Spirit to come and live in you. This is what happens when you repent, and that’s how you become a Christian.

The Four Fundamentals of Christian Growth (After you Become a Christian)

But what do you do after you become a Christian? What’s next? Is that all there is to it? Absolutely not! Now is time to move on, to move out and begin to grow and to experience the vital and exciting new life in Christ. Now is the time to begin to make an impact – to make a difference in our world. Four things are necessary to do that:

First, as these new Christians did in Jerusalem, you need to be BAPTIZED. Acts 2:41 says, “So those who accepted his message were baptized...” Water baptism is a clear identification of your life with Jesus Christ.

There’s a legend about a farmer who was walking through the woods one day that found a young eagle who had fallen out of his nest. He took it home and put it in his barnyard with his chickens and soon the eagle learned to eat and behave like a chickens. One day a man passed by the farm and asked why it was that the king of all birds was living in the barnyard with the chickens. The farmer replied that since the bird grew up in the barnyard with the chickens eating chicken feed, it had come to believe it was a chicken and had never learned to fly. "Still it has the heart of an eagle," replied the stranger, "and can surely be taught to fly."

He lifted the eagle toward the sky and said, "You belong to the sky and not to the earth. Stretch forth your wings and fly." The eagle, however, was confused. He did not know who he was, and seeing the chickens still pecking at their food in the barnyard the eagle jumped down to be with them again. The man took the bird to the roof of the house and urged him again, saying, "You are an eagle. Stretch forth your wings and fly." But the eagle was afraid of his unknown self and world and jumped down once more for the chicken food. Finally the man took the eagle out of the barnyard to a high mountain. There he held the king of the birds high above him and encouraged him again, saying, "You are an eagle. You belong to the sky. Stretch forth your wings and fly." The eagle looked around, back towards the barnyard and up to the sky. Then the man lifted him straight towards the sun the eagle began to tremble. Slowly he stretched his wings, and with a triumphant cry, soared away into the sky. It may be that the eagle still remembers the chickens with nostalgia. It may even be that he occasionally revisits the barnyard. But as far as anyone knows, he has never returned to lead the life of a chicken.

Our baptism as Christians helps us grow because when we start living like the “chickens” again we have it to draw on to remind us “we are eagles, we belong to the sky, let’s stretch forth our wings and fly.”

The second way the early church shows us how to grow as Christians, and therefore to make more of an impact in the world is to study the SCRIPTURES. That’s what it means where it says that the early church “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching...” Acts 2:42.

Jesus commissioned the apostles by the power of the Holy Spirit, to tell us the truth about life. And we will never learn to understand ourselves, or the world around us, or the society in which we live, or what is happening in the world and why it is happening, unless we begin to understand the apostles' teaching.

People are searching for spiritual truth these days. Listen to these upcoming events listed in the “Faith and Values” section of the Atlanta paper yesterday.

The Unity House is offering a short course in miracles teaching how to live in joy, forgiveness and love Sundays from 10 to 10:30AM.
Swami Durga Das, the world’s only openly gay swami, will speak on how to live fully and transcend pain, grief, trauma and burnout on from 7:30 to 9PM on Aug. 25. The evening will also include chanting and yogic breathing.
A lecture series on “The Ultimate Mind of Enlightenment” is offered from 7:30 to 9PM on Tuesday nights (Tibetan Buddhism).
A Full Moon Transmission Meditation will be held on Sept. 3^rd at 7:30PM. This is a 90-minute silent meditation to create a pool of higher energies for humanity.

I have no reason to doubt that all these events are all “standing room only” affairs. People are hungry for answers, and for truth. But, the reality is, the answers lie in God’s word to the world, the Holy Scriptures. It is there as we read we will be stretched and we will discover answers to life’s deepest questions like, “Who am I and why am I here?” and “What is the meaning of life?”

Phillips Brooks once likened the Bible to a telescope. He said that if you look through a telescope you can see worlds beyond; but if you merely look at your telescope, you don’t see anything but that. The Bible is like that - a thing to be looked through to see that which is beyond; but most people only look at it and so they see only the dead letter.

The third thing the early church did leading to their being able to make an impact according to Acts 2:42 was to develop RELATIONSHIPS with other believers. “They devoted themselves … to the fellowship...”Acts 2:42. In other words, they began to know and to love one another. Here in the church we are to be related and connected to one another.

The giant sequoia trees, known as redwoods, in northern California are amazing. They’re not only the tallest trees in the world; they are also the largest living things on earth. Some of them soar over 300 feet high and over 2,500 years old. To me the most fascinating thing about the trees is their unusual root system. They only grow in groves; you’ll never find a lone sequoia tree. Scientists believe this is because they have a very shallow root system. Even though their roots are shallow, all the roots of the trees in the grove intertwine; they are literally locked to each other. When storms come powering in from the pacific and the strong winds blow, the trees hold each other up.

As a pastor, I’ve seen the same thing happen many, many times in church. To grow in your faith, and thus to make a difference in life, you must grow your relationships with other believers and “live life deeply” with one another.

The fourth thing they did to make a difference according to Acts 2:42 is to WORSHIP God regularly. “They devoted themselves...to the breaking of bread and to prayer” Acts 2:42. The breaking of bread mentioned in this verse is a reference to Holy Communion, not just to a regular meal. Holy Communion and prayer are essential parts of worship.

Personally, I love to worship God, but that’s not always been the case. You see, at one time I believe I really didn’t know how to worship God. Today I suspect there are many others who don’t know how to worship God.

Worship is actually a verb. You can’t be a passive, distant spectator of others worshipping in a service and worship. Worship demands involvement and participation.

Many have the mistaken idea that worship is a sort of “program” conducted by people being paid to put on a good show. If you’re lucky, it holds your attention throughout. You grade the worship leaders and the preacher on how good a job they did. This is not a proper understanding.

My suspicion of this misconception of worship was borne out in a door-to-door survey of several thousand homes in the greater Chicago area conducted by Willow Creek Community Church a few years ago. People were asked, “If you don't regularly attend worship services why not? The five biggest reasons given were: 1) Boring, 2) Irrelevant, 3) Asking for money all the time, 4) I'm too busy already, 5) I feel awkward at church.

Actually, it’s not the preacher and the worship leader and the praise band that are the actors on stage. It’s the people out there who are on stage. Kierkegaard said it is the congregation that are the actors and we worship leaders are merely the prompters standing in the wings, reminding you of your lines.

God is the audience at a worship service, not the people out there. With this understanding it is clear that each of us must physically or mentally participate in everything that is said, sung, and prayed. We must understand that we, together are the ones “putting on the show” in the right sense of that word. God is watching and receiving our worship.

Another misunderstanding about worship is that worship is all about emotions. It’s like, “check the brain at the door” Worship is not the pursuit of a warm, fuzzy feeling. The key to worship is to worship with our minds fully engaged, if you do, I guarantee you our emotions will follow.

Conclusion

Well, our “back to school class” is about over.

I don’t know where you stand in regard to what I’ve said this morning. Maybe you have never made that initial decision and changed your mind - your thinking, about him. If not, you can ask him into your heart right where you are. You can say, "Lord Jesus, come into my heart and be my God, my Lord." If you do that this morning, you need to join us next week to be baptized [Baptism Circle].

Or maybe you have some growing to do. Perhaps you made a commitment to the Lord a long time ago, but your conception of God and your relationship with him hasn’t changed a bit since that day. Are you growing in your faith? Maybe you need to pay more attention to the apostles’ teaching by reading God’s word [Bible Circle]

Or maybe you made the decision to trust Christ and you’ve been growing, but you haven’t really developed any relationships in the church yet. [Relationships Circle]. Or maybe you’ve done or said some things you shouldn’t have. Things that are weighing heavily on your mind this morning. Do you need to develop some relationships? To forgive someone? To be forgiven?

Or maybe you had a revelation this morning about worship [Worship Circle]. Maybe you really didn’t know how to worship God and now you see that worship isn’t about what the preacher does or says, it’s about what each of us does for God that matters. Perhaps you need to simply open your life to God and pour yourself out to him in worship in a way you’ve never done before.

Know what? Whatever your need, God is waiting on you today to do that very thing. He loves you…Let’s Pray.