Bunbury
Sun am
13/02/11
“A growing church”
Intro: T/m I want to speak on something we are all interested in & if we are not interested we should be!
I want to speak about a growing church & how our church can be a growing church.
It’s the kind of church we read about in the book of Acts, it’s the kind of church our church should be.
And most imptly ……. It’s the kind of church we can be!
I believe the secret of a growing church is plainly laid out for us to see in the book of Acts.
If we follow the pattern we see there then our church too can b/co a growing church.
So t/m if you haven’t already figured it out I’m preaching on ‘A growing church’.
Text: (Acts 2:47 NKJV) [they were] praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.
# 1. The real power.
A. We firstly need to u/s t/m the real power behind a growing church.
a. There are scores of books written about church growth today.
i. It is fast b/co one of the most popular topics in Christian bookstores.
*** George Barna – America’s # 1 church growth expert. His book Evangelism that Works is 176 pages covering everything related to church growth from evangelising / statistics / follow-up programs & not offending new converts! He covers all the possibilities for making your church grow. One church in America even has a McDonalds built into the church foyer!
ii. Everyone wants to know about church growth / pastors / evangelists / para – church groups / congregations etc.
iii. Some churches even hire church growth exerts to come in & tell them what they are doing wrong & how they can make their church grow.
iv. Church growth is something that interests everybody & that is b/c when a church grows everybody stands to win from the church growing.
b. There’s nothing wrong w/ learning what works as long as we don’t ignore the One who makes everything work!
i. This is where most church growth books today are missing the mark!
ii. If we want to experience church growth then we need to have in our church the only One that can make it grow – Jesus!
B. Our text tells us that it was ‘the Lord’ who was adding souls to the church.
Vs 47. …… And the Lord added to the church ……
a. This tells us something very simple yet vitally impt to a growing church – Jesus is the one who adds souls to the church!
i. When we look at the book of Acts we see right from the very first verse the real power behind the building of the church.
(Acts 1:1-2 NKJV) The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, {2} until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen,
ii. The book of Acts is not about what the apostles were doing but it’s about what Jesus was doing!
iii. All throughout the book we see the continuing work of Jesus being carried out.
b. Let’s look at this hero of the book of Acts.
i. Again & again throughout the book of Acts we see not the hand of the apostles so much as the hand of the Lord working & moving.
ii. We see Him sending down the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost.
iii. It is Him who Stephen sees standing at the right hand of the Father as he is being martyred.
iv. It was Him …. who appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus.
v. It was He who sends Paul & those accompanying him to preach in Europe.
vi. He was the One who opened hearts to receive the gospel message.
vii. It is Him – the ascended Jesus Christ, who stands by Paul & encourages him in a time of trial.
viii. It is He who was working in & through his people in the book of Acts.
ix. And now it is He who adds to the church such as should be saved!
C. Here is the truth we need to see – The ascended Christ is the present life of His church!
a. What Jesus did in the church in the book of Acts is what He is still doing in His church today!
i. It is Him who is adding to the church today …not our preaching / eloquence / zeal / wisdom.
ii. Our efforts / contributions are weapons used in His hands but He is the One doing all the adding / building / growing of His church.
b. We have developed the idea that a growing church is b/c of us.
i. And in one sense the church does grow b/c of us …….. but we are not the Life that causes the church to grow!
(1 Cor 3:6 NKJV) I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase.
ii. Jesus H/s has promised that the building / growing of His church would be something that He would do.
(Mat 16:18 NKJV) ...I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.
iii. Jesus can use our talents in the building of His church ….. but He still builds His church.
(Psa 127:1 NKJV) Unless the LORD builds the house, They labor in vain who build it; ……
iv. If we are not seeing a growing church then we need to ask ….. why doesn’t the Lord add daily to us?
# 2. The irresistible attraction.
A. The church of Jesus Christ should be an irresistible attraction to the unsaved.
a. This is the kind of church that Jesus wants His church to be to the unsaved.
i. In the same way that bugs are drawn to the light it is Jesus’ intention that sinners would be drawn to His church.
ii. But instead of this being the case people all over the world are leaving churches like never b/4. …… why is this the case?
b. Our text is the end of a sentence ….the last part of a powerful statement laid out in Acts.
i. To get a clearer pict of what was happening ….. let’s go back & look at the first part of that statement.
(Acts 2:44-47 NKJV) Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, {45} and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need. {46} So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, {47} praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.
ii. What do you think would happen in this church if what we have just read was a description of the Potter’s House Church, Bunbury?
iii. Think about how this church in Acts is described …. Unity / unselfish living / continual devotion / gladness / simplicity of living.
iv. As this church is described there is no mention of perversity / backbiting / cheating / gossip / hypocrisy / laziness / lying / immorality etc.
B. The atmosphere souls were being birthed into explains why the church was growing.
a. The church in the book of Acts was a growing church b/c the atmosphere souls were being birthed into was a healthy one!
i. You can give birth to a baby in rubbish tip but that baby’s chances of survival are not going to be good.
ii. Birth the same child into the sterile clinical environment of a hospital labour room & its chances are going to excellent!
b. Why doesn’t the church grow?
i. Could it have anything to do w/ the lack of health in the church spiritually?
ii. I wonder how many times people have blamed the pastor or the outreach program of the church but at the same time thought nothing of their own immorality / lying / lust / envy?
iii. B/4 we point an accusing finger at the one who might have been caught in the act of adultery we need to stop & think.
iv. Jesus reserved His most fierce attacks on those who were self righteous hypocrites.
v. The simple reality is that much of the time the church is in such poor health spiritually that she is not even able to travail to give birth to new souls.
** Alexander Maclaren who was preaching to his church one Sunday morning says these words to them: “Depend upon it, friends, that, far more than my preaching, your lives will determine the expansion of this church of ours. And if my preaching is pulling one way and your lives the other, and I have half an hour a week for talk and you have seven days for contradictory living, which of the two do you think is going to win in the tug?”
vi. The way you live outside of the church speaks far louder than any sermon I’ll ever preach to the unsaved!
vii. So the question is not what the preacher is preaching inside the church …… but what is the congregation preaching outside the church?
# 3. The direction of this church.
A. We see that this was a growing church b/c there was real conversion.
*** I remember many years ago as a new convert witnessing to a young Roman Catholic man. After listening to me for some time he said to me “Are you trying to convert me?” it wasn’t until I thought about it afterwards that this was exactly what I was trying to do!
a. The Bible tells us that those being added to the church were those – ‘being saved’.
Vs 47. ….And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.
i. Now this tells us a lot more than we think about the quality of the people coming into this growing church.
ii. Firstly we see that it was a growing church b/c the people coming into her ranks were actually saved & not just b/co church members!
iii. What a difference it makes in a church when people are thoroughly converted / washed in the blood of Jesus Christ / delivered of sin!
iv. One of the greatest problems in the church today is there are people w/i her ranks who are not really saved!
v. The membership of many churches are growing but it couldn’t be said that God was … adding to the church those who were being saved!
(1 Cor 3:3 Weymouth) For so long as jealousy and strife continue among you, can it be denied that you are un-spiritual and living and acting like mere men of the world?
vi. The distinguishing mark of this N/T church is that its ranks were being filled w/ people who were being thoroughly converted & turned away from sin!
B. But this wasn’t all – the entire direction of this church was an upward growing direction.
a. When we think about the word salvation – it is represented as being three different things.
i. Firstly – the definite act of conversion – being saved / translated out of the kingdom of darkness & into the kingdom of Light.
ii. Secondly – it is used in the W. of God as referring to something we are still experiencing & growing in.
iii. Thirdly – it is spoken about in the Bible as being something that will be complete when we reach heaven!
b. This was not just a church where people had once been saved – but a church where people were still being saved!
i. In other words salvation for those who were already in the church was not just a thing that once happened – it was still happening!
ii. Yes those that came to Christ each & every day were being saved & so were those that had given their lives to Christ 5 years b/4!
*** In 2002 my wife & I went to Rotorua on my way home from Australia & preached there. Pastor David Abrahams took us to a Redwood forest there & we walked through the forest. There were trees there that had barely begun to grow, seedlings which were very new & tender & we walked amongst Redwoods which were hundreds of feet high! But the one thing every tree in that Forest had was that they were all growing!
iii. In other words this church in Acts was like a forest of trees where there might be trees of all different heights & stages of growth but each was growing!
c. The question t/m is – are you still being saved / growing?
i. Has the process of salvation in your life come to a grinding halt ….. have the tender shoots of growth in your life begun to die?
ii. Has sin begun to poison the growth of the spiritual plant that was once thriving?
d. How can we expect new believers to grow develop if all they see when they look at the older Christians is dead wood?
i. The reason these new believers were growing was b/c they were being saved into a church where all the members were growing through a continual process of salvation.
C. There are really only two directions that growth can take.
a. Everyone in the church of Jesus Christ is involved in some process of growth.
i. It is either positive growth where daily we are b/co more like the Lord Jesus Christ.
ii. Or it is negative growth where each & every day the fire is dying out & the grip that salvation has on your soul is being lost.
iii. The Bible puts these two classes of people side by side ….. the growing & the dying when it says ….
(1 Cor 1:18 NKJV) For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
iv. Here is a process that is happening in two different kinds of people.
v. Some are in the process of perishing ……. Some are in the process of being saved!
vi. The question we must address in our lives is which way is the process taking us?
