What the Church Should Be

One of the things that I’ve pondered a lot in the past 8 months is the status of the church in America. Last fall I had the opportunity to attend a church planting movement conference, and was really challenged in my understanding of church. After the conference I went back and read through the book of Acts, to see how the early Christians- the early church- functioned together. I made a list, and I’m sure I missed quite a few things, but here are some of the points that stuck out to me.

What the Church Looks like in Acts

• They joined together constantly in prayer (1:14)
• There were leadership positions; they prayerfully considered how to fill them (1:15-26)
• They were all together in one place (2:1)
• They were devoted to learning the apostle’s teaching, to fellowship, to prayer, and communion (2:42)
• They were filled with awe at what God was doing (2:43)
• They were unified (2:44)
• They gave generously to each other and to others (2:45)
• They met together in a place of worship and also in each others’ homes (2:46)
• They praised God together, and many people came to Christ because of their witness (2:47)
• They spoke through the power of the Holy Spirit (4:8)
• They raised their voices together in prayer (4:24)
• They were filled with the Holy Spirit, and spoke the Word of God boldly (4:31)
• They were of one heart and mind- unity- and they shared everything they had (4:32)
• They claimed God’s power, and testified to the resurrection of Jesus (4:33)
• They were highly regarded by the people (5:13)
• They were persecuted (5:17 and following)
• They went from house to house teaching and proclaiming Christ (5:42)
• They gave different tasks to different people (6:1-4)
• They lived in the fear of the Lord (9:31)
• They were aware of what was happening with other churches, they were connected (11:22)
• They provided help for the brothers (11:29)
• They prayed on behalf of those who are persecuted (12:5)
• They worshipped and fasted together (13:2)
• They raised up leaders in the churches that they started (14:23)
• They heard reports from the missionaries that they sent out (14:27)
• They focused on God changing the inside of a person, rather than looking at the outside (15:5-11)
• They were not perfect 🙂 (15:39)
• They welcomed missionaries and received them warmly (18:22 and 21:17)

Well, I think we could learn some lessons from the early church. I know that we are currently practicing some of these things, but perhaps we have let ourselves get too caught up in things that don’t really matter. I have definitely gone back to Acts a lot this year, and I hope that you will check it out for yourselves!