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Tuesday, October 03, 2006
It All Belongs To God
Acts 2:37-47
The very first Christian church, chartered in Jerusalem on the Day of Pentecost 50 days after Jesus' death, was so popular that new people signed up every day. One thing that made them so attractive was their willingness to let go of their goods to serve the common good. After all, they said, it all belongs to God anyway.
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We had a mystical $50 in those days.
Those days were the 1970s. That place was Berkeley. We were a "house church" called Fellowship Of His People. He was Jesus himself.
Our little church was a more or less noble experiment in recovering the lifestyle of the earliest church in the Book of Acts. That ancient church was chartered by the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost, fifty days after the Passover when Jesus had died.
Passover was a festival of remembrance, looking back to God's miraculous liberation of the Hebrews from Egyptian slavery. Pentecost was a festival of hope, looking ahead to a fruitful new harvest. It featured an offering of the "first fruits" of the spring crop. The main idea: God gives us all good things, including this grain; it all belongs to God; so we thank God by giving back this first and best portion.
It all belongs to God.
So, back to the mystical $50....
Our church was full of babies, children, and young adults. We were idealistic, naive, highly motivated, and poor as a church mouse. We lived within walking distance of each other's homes, some right next-door, some sharing common gardens. A few of us started small businesses together. We rotated among the houses for worship, prayer, special meals, and just plain fun.
Now and then someone would need money for a car repair, new clothes, a doctor bill, whatever. We'd pass the hat and come up with the money. Often in the neighborhood of $50. Next time a need arose, around went the hat and in came -- yep -- $50 more or less. My turn, I'd accept the dough with many thanks. Your turn, I'd chip in what I could. Round and round went that mystical money, always in the nick of time.
None of us got rich. Nobody went without. It all belonged to God. We tried to use it well for God and for each other.
That's the way the story goes in the second chapter of Acts. Those earliest Christians loved the Lord, and they loved each other, too. No matter where they'd come from (and most of them had been Pentecost pilgrims from all over the Roman Empire) they were now one family of faith. God was their Father, Christ their Brother. So they took care of each other the way that families do. It all belonged to God, and so did they.
The story says they "enjoyed the goodwill of all the people," and that their "glad and generous hearts" had an irresistable spiritual power. Every day, it seems, people came knocking on their doors, asking, "What is it with you, sharing and caring the way you do? How can we sign up?"
That's exactly the kind of church this world needs, now more than ever. I'm convinced they really want it, too, and would do anything to get in if and when they ever found it.
I wonder (and pray): Are we that kind of church?
posted by Jack Buckley at
4:47 PM
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