SERMON GRACIOUS LIVING

Fourth Easter Sermon -Good Shepherd Sunday

ACTS 2:46-47

46And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

GRACIOUS LIVING

In our Tuesday Bible Study we are studying the book of Acts, and we have looked at these verses.  We discovered for example, that the early church, meeting in Jerusalem, often met daily to worship, not just weekly..  We also learned that the first Christians often split their worship service and met in two locations.   The people gathered first in the temple.  There they would read the scriptures, and then hear Peter or another apostle give  a sermon or message based on the scriptures just read. 

Then they would move on to various homes of their Christian  brothers or sisters, and  break bread together.   This “breaking bread” we know was the first name for the special meal we know by other names; Holy Communion, Lord’s Supper, Eucharist.

We should recognize that the things those first Christians did, we still gather and do under one roof.  The first part of our service this very Sunday,  the emphasis on scripture, is what we call the Service of the Word, and had its origins in the temple.  The Lord’s Supper, the breaking of the bread, we also will celebrate shortly.   .

But whether it happens in two places, or combined under one roof, where Christians gather with Word or Sacrament, grace happens Where you see the word favor,  like in Acts 2:47, it means literally “grace”.

  The phrase God’s favor is found often in the Bible.  In Genesis 6:8 we learn that Noah found favor with God.  We see it at the very beginning of  the Gospel, when the angel appears to Mary,  he says, fear not Mary, you have found favor with God,  Luke 1:30 A little later,  in Luke 2:52, we learn that Jesus grew in wisdom and favor with both God and the people.

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This is the concept of sacred space.  From at least the time of Jacob, God’s people have marked the places where they encountered God.  Its not that God can only be found there, but the place is sacred because there the people experienced God’s grace.

As Christians we believe that wherever Word and Sacrament is, that place is sacred, because there we are promised to receive God’s grace.

But our lesson tells us that we don’t only receive God’s grace in such places, but we also are empowered to do God’s grace.  Grace is not just experienced in the hearing of God’s Word, or the receiving of the sacrament.  It was also experienced in what God’s people do!

God’s people are empowered to gracious living.   Acts 2 gives us a picture of this gracious living.  Diligence in prayers and worship, frequent expressions of praise and thanksgiving in all circumstances, and a cheerful and generous disposition; these are marks of gracious living.

That is what Peter meant when he said “When you do good and suffer for it, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God.

Gracious living of an awareness that we are owned by Jesus, that he was our Good Shepherd, and they were his sheep, that made all the this gracious living possible..  That is why Peter called our Lord Jesus the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls

The Lord is the overseer and shepherd of our souls because he has made us his people.  He now takes responsibility for us.  He gathers us into the  sheepfold for our protection and our nurture, care and feeding.

 This he does in the forgiveness of our sins and the promise of eternal life, and in Word and Sacraments. God has shown his generosity of Spirit in these means of grace, and moves our hearts to likewise reveal a generosity of spirit, not in material things alone, but in welcoming of others into the sheepfold.  In this we become a family, having a common Father to whom we may pray confidently.                                                         

In all this Jesus is not just the good shepherd, he is the gate of the sheepfold.  That means that he is the one who lets us into the family, Because of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, we are able to enter into a relationship with God, and with our brothers and sisters in faith and experience gracious living. 

That is why I am so excited that we have chosen to include the  word Community in our name.  It expresses our openness, our love for each other and for others and our gracious living.  .  And we are a part of a greater family, found not just in this house, nor this city.  We are a part of a family that reaches around the world, and beyond.  I say beyond because in our liturgy, we join not just other Christians but also angels and archangels and all the hosts of heaven who sing praises to God.

Amen

The Personality of God

I recently heard prosecutor Vincent Buglliosi  on the radio.  Bugliosi was promoting his new book Divinity of Doubt: The God Question  Bugliosi offers  up the old argument that the existence of evil/ suffering in the  world proves that God does not exist. 

Buliosi argues that God, if He existed, must by definition, be both all-powerful and all-good (all-loving). An all loving God  would not  allow suffering unless he was powerless to prevent it; an all-powerful God would not allow suffering if he were truly all-loving.  Therefore God does not exist.

But God, like people, is more than what He does or fails to do.   I am a person.  I am defined as much by my physical characteristics height, eye and hair color, etc.), interests (writing, collectables etc.), and values(Christian faith, family etc.) as I am by my actions or inactions.  It is these things that distinquish me from a chair,  an animal or other persons. This is my Personhood.

God too is a Person, who is, surprisingly exactly who Bugliosi says He should be.  God is distinquished from the creation around him because God is in fact All-powerful and All-loving, and the world is not these things.  If creation did not have evil/suffering, we would be unable to distinquish it from God.

The Christian faith is correct in that it recogizes the Personhood of God.  By contrast, Bugliosi, who claims intellectual superiority for agnosticism, can only imagine a god found in the most primitive forms of tribal animism.