SermonStudio

This text for the Sunday after Easter really shakes us up, doesn't it? Here we have a picture of the beginning of the life of the Christian church in Jerusalem, with numbers being added to it every day as a result of the bold preaching of the apostles Peter and John. Those two had been told by the Jewish elders and the Sadducees in the city to stop their preaching of the resurrection. But they had replied, "We cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard" (v. 20). And so those who heard them had taken fire with the gospel and had been filled with the Holy Spirit and had begun to tell their neighbors the good news about Christ. But then what do we read in our text? "Those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things which he possessed was his own, but they had everything in common" (v. 32). In fact, if they owned lands or houses, they sold them and brought the proceeds to the apostles, "and distribution was made to each as any had need" (vv. 34--35).

In other words, this early Jerusalem church of our Lord Jesus Christ was some sort of commune, practicing what we would call an early form of communism. To be sure, they didn't all live together in one enclosure, so they were not a commune like the ones of which we hear today. But no one had any private property. Everyone owned everything in common. No one received the profit from his or her own labor or possession. Any profit or earnings were turned over to the apostles, as the leaders of the community, to be distributed equally among all. Communism! That's what they practiced, and that occasions in our minds nothing but dismay.

After all, we live in the United States of America, where regulated capitalism has brought us the highest standard of living in the world. We are motivated to work because we get to keep the reward from our labor, except for what the government takes out in taxes, of course. But if we get the training we need for a job, through education or experience, and if we then work hard and are good at what we do, we usually reap the benefits. And we don't have to share those benefits with those who haven't worked. Oh sure, we provide something for the poor through the welfare system, and most of us give rather generously to the needy and to worthy causes. But after taxes, we're free to spend or save, to give or withhold as we see fit. We like our economic system, and we're not about to exchange it for some sort of all--things--in--common.

Indeed, we have seen the fall of communism around the world. Russia's economic system collapsed because it was simply unworkable, and third world countries are scrambling to switch to our system, even if they still call themselves communists - witness China. We therefore are disturbed when we read in our lesson from Acts that the early church had all things in common. We have always thought that the authoritative pattern for our Christian life as the church is to be found in the New Testament. Christians in the first century A.D. were the ones who knew Jesus, we think, or were followers of Jesus' own disciples, and so they above all others know how we should live our Christian lives. But this pattern from Acts! No, we do not want to emulate it.

Some pious souls would chastise us for that attitude, of course. They would accuse us of being materialistic, of loving our comfort too much, of making money our lord instead of Christ. We should be willing, they self--righteously tell us, to give up everything for the sake of the gospel and to follow Christ. And of course, in one sense they are right. We are too occupied with buying and selling, with comfort and goods, with possessions and property. And far too often it is the stock market or our bank account that dictates our actions rather than the commands of our Lord. There is nothing that makes us quite so uneasy as when the Bible or the preacher starts talking about money. As the old saying goes, in those cases, "the preacher has stopped preaching and gone to meddling." So let us not excuse ourselves too easily from the demands of this text for the morning.

What does Luke, the writer of Acts, say about that early Christian community? "There was not a needy person among them" (v. 14). That cuts right to the heart of the matter, doesn't it? For there are lots of needy persons among us. There are hundreds of children in our public schools who show up without having eaten breakfast. There are elderly, usually hidden from our sight, who have to choose between buying medicine or buying food, because they cannot afford both. There are the poor, the homeless, the mentally ill who wander our streets without healing or helping aid. We could multiply the list indefinitely. And perhaps the worst thing is that not many of such needy are occupying the pews of our churches. "Where are the poor?" asked the diary of one country priest. "Why are they not on the front row of your church?" Yes, our text convicts us, because there are lots of needy persons who have not even been invited among us.

Perhaps the central question we should ask of our text, however, is, what motivated those early Christians in Jerusalem to provide for all who had need? Amazingly enough, it was the resurrection. "With great power," reads our text, "the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus" (v. 33). And that testimony, that proclamation, led to the provision for all in want. Jesus Christ lived in the company of that early church - Jesus Christ, with his new life for all, with his love for every child and adult and elderly soul. And that life and love filled the hearts of the Jerusalem Christians and overflowed in help and love and new life for all who had need.

Last Easter Sunday we celebrated that resurrection. Jesus Christ is risen from the grave and now lives as Lord in our midst. He is here, with his abundant new life and eternal love for all. And our text tells us that that life and love can flow out from our hearts too, to provide for all in their need. No. We do not have to live in a commune or be communists. But we are called to be Christians, and that means that we extend the risen Christ's wondrous new life to all who have want.