Sermon Tone Analysis

1.

In Christ there is no East or West,

in Him no North or South;

but one great fellowship of love

throughout the whole wide earth.

2. In Him shall true hearts everywhere

their high communion find;

His service is the golden cord,

close binding humankind.

Chorus

Join hands, then, members of the faith,

whate'er your race may be;

who serves my Father as His child

is surely kin to me.

3.

In Him those walls shall tumble down,

that bear hostility,

and the whole family of God

shall dwell in unity.

Chorus

4.In Christ now meet both East and West;

in Him meet North and South:

all Christlike souls are one in Him

throughout the whole wide earth.

Chorus

Introduction

I worked

I worked as a systems engineer and project engineering manager with Motorola before my life as a pastor.

I started in 1995 and, at the time, Kim and I had one child.

That summer, my hiring manager took me out to lunch.

And he asked my what my goals were and what was important to me.

I told him that my family was probably the most important thing to me.

As far as my goals, I said that I wanted to eventually become a corporate VP.

He asked me, “Do you think you can be a corporate VP in this company and still have a quality family life?”

I said, “Yes, I do.”

He said, “I don’t.

I look at the director level right above me, and I see how much time they have to spend away from their families.

How much they have to travel and how much is required of them.

I think it’s impossible to have an upper level management job in this company and have the type of family life you’re describing.”

That summer, my hiring manager took me out to lunch.

And he asked my what my goals were and what was important to me.

I told him that my family was probably the most important thing to me.

As far as my goals, I said that I wanted to eventually become a corporate VP (y’all see…).

He asked me, “Do you think you can be a corporate VP in this company and still have a quality family life?”

I said, “Yes, I do.”

He said, “I don’t.

I look at the director level right above me, and I see how much time they have to spend away from their families.

How much they have to travel and how much is required of them.

I think it’s impossible to have an upper level management job in this company and have the type of family life you’re describing.”

Talk about bursting my bubble!

Here I was, fresh out the gates.

Having my ideal job with my ideal company, with my visions of grandeur about how my life and career were going to go.

And my boss sticks a pin it to bring me down to reality.

We can experience that same bubble bursting feeling when we read this text at the end of , and compare it with the reality we see.

Luke describe the first days of this new covenant community.

We hear him describe what can only be viewed as an ideal situation, perfect harmony in the church.

People respond to Peter’s preaching with repentance and faith.

The church grows from 120 disciples in chapter 1 to 3,000 people added in v. 41.

Then everybody’s getting along, supporting one another, loving God and loving their neighbors.

They have a good reputation with people outside of the church community.

And the last word of our passage is that the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

If you were a passerby in Jerusalem in the days after that Pentecost, you would’ve heard these Christians singing,

Everyone can see we’re together, As we walk on by.

And we fly just like birds of a feather, I will tell no lie.

All of the people around us they say, “Can they be that close.”

Just let me state for the record, We’re giving love in a family dose.

We are family.

I got all my sisters and brothers with me.

We are family.

Get up everybody and sing!

We look at the church today and our bubble bursts.

It’s so often that’s not the song that comes to mind when you think of the church, whether you’re on the inside or the outside.

You can even get nostalgic and yearn to have been back there during those days.

Just like my ideal for my new job and new life were dashed when my boss told me it was impossible to have both, our hope for the ideal that we seemingly read in this text can seem impossible when we see that challenges and divisions that exist in the church.

Notice this with me though.

Life for this new community isn’t messy yet.

We only have to go a few chapters into Acts before the harmony is disrupted.

Persecution comes.

Ethnic division comes.

It won’t be long before the bubble bursts in this very book.

So what are we to do with these verses?

Are we to look at this harmonious group of Christians and say, what we see is the prescription for the church today, and if she doesn’t look like this she’s not being faithful?

Or are we to say this is an impossible ideal and we should have no expectation that the church can look like this?

My answer to both of those questions is, no.

As the apostle Paul says in , there is one body and one Spirit, one Lord, one faith and one baptism.

One God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

So those who follow Jesus Christ should be eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.

This text helps us do that, not by giving us a manual for the church, but by unveiling the identity of the church and giving us markers for its life as a new family created by the Spirit under the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

Don’t get scared when I say this...We’re working through this text with six G’s, Guilt, Grace, Gravity, Growth, Generosity, and Gladness.

Growth, Generosity, and Gladness..

Guilt

I want to work through out text with three G’s, Guilt, Grace, and Gratitude.

Peter closes his sermon in v. 36 with the words, “Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.”

In his sermon, Peter was specific right.

He made sure they knew who he was talking about.

“Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with might works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst… this Jesus you crucified and killed by the hand of lawless men.”

Peter closes his sermon with the words, “Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.”

In his sermon, Peter was specific right.

He made sure they knew who he was talking about.

“Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with might works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst… this Jesus you crucified and killed by the hand of lawless men”

Those words were extremely significant.

They were a point of contact between what the Bible said and where the people stood in relation to that.