DAD'S RAMBLINGS -- A HOLY CHURCH

DAD'S RAMBLINGS – A HOLY CHURCH

"And through the hands of the apostles many sins and wonders were done among the people." (Acts 5:12a)

This book has traditionally been called "The Acts of the Apostles" and it is known as such in many translations. I don't want to quibble about this, but it is really the Acts of the Holy Spirit through the Apostles. The Apostles had no power in and of themselves to do the works that are recorded, but they had received power when the Holy Spirit came upon them, just as Jesus had promised in Acts 1:8. In the power of the Holy Spirit, they experienced power in their preaching, in their healing ministries, in evangelism, and in deliverance from jail.

But it was not all peaches and cream. Some of the church leaders gave their lives in martyrdom for the sake of the Gospel.

Even though God was mightily at work adding to the church those who should be saved, there were still people who joined the church who still lived in the power of the fallen nature – the flesh. We read the account of two such people in the opening section of Chapter 5. Ananias and his wife Sapphira sold some property, apparently claiming that they were giving all of the proceeds to the church, when in fact they kept some of it back for their own use. They were not only lying to the other believers, but to God, the Holy Spirit. They were both struck dead and immediately carried to the cemetery for burial.

I think this was just as much a demonstration of the work of the Holy Spirit in the church as were the healings and deliverances. At the very inception of the Church that Christ was building, He made it clear that it was to be a holy church, one that ran by different rules than the rest of society. The solution is to walk in the spirit so that we do not fulfill the lusts of the flesh (Galatians 5:16).

Now, I'm glad that God is gracious and does not take our lives when we sin. There would be no church left if He did. But it does make us aware of the view that God has of His Church. He has called us to be a holy people that reflect His holiness. It is a dangerous thing to trifle with His Church. May our goal be to honor Him in all things – even the secular areas of our lives.

Love, Dad