I'd like to do one thing. If you'd open your Bibles to the book of Acts, Acts chapter 2. Acts chapter 2. We'll go through a lot of the chapter, so if you'll just hold that open there, that will be good for now. So in response to the past two sermons on submission, the most common bit of feedback I received, besides, "You're a sexist Nazi," is, I mean, that's a given, is that husbands felt especially challenged to cultivate a vision large enough to need a wife, to need a helpmate. That seems to be a consistent response I hear from— I've heard probably, I was trying to count this morning, 6, 8 men responding saying, okay, that's the piece of this that feels extremely challenging. How do I create a vision? How do I pursue a vision large enough to need a helpmate as we see in the book of Genesis. How do I pursue a vision that is large enough to need a helpmate? And let me add another wrinkle to that: that is specific enough to need your wife. God gave you your wife as your helpmate, and she is a unique toolkit. She has a unique toolkit that you can now begin to think, okay, I need a large vision, but I also need something specific enough that I can look and say, "Okay, this is why God gave me this particular woman." Now thankfully, that vision already exists. Now I want to connect you, I want your mind to kind of have— we've been looking at Jesus in Gethsemane and the submission that He applied to His will, applied to His heart toward the Father when He said in Luke 22:42, "If it's possible, please let this cup pass from Me, but nevertheless, not My will but Thy will be done." It's the high point of submission. It's really kind of the definition of submission. I want you to keep that in your mind because now we're going to ask, well, what was the vision? What was the vision that Jesus was submitting to? What was the vision the Father had? What is the vision that we as husbands are supposed to have? Actually, let's just broaden it out. What's the proactive vision? Why are we here today? Why are we following Jesus? What's the proactive vision? What's the redemptive vision?
Well, I could have pointed you to many different texts that give you a taste of the vision the Father was calling the Son to, but I picked Acts 2, and we'll read 42 here in a moment, partly because I have Thanksgiving on the mind. So Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday by far, and as is a family tradition, we will be moving down to Branson for Thanksgiving for a few days. We do the Branson thing, we go to Silver Dollar City, we go back and forth, it's beautiful, we love it. And I've got Thanksgiving on the mind, so maybe that's why this text came to mind, but it's also because this is a great little piece of this, a great glimpse of the vision that the Father had when He was calling the Son to submit. Acts 2:42, "They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship." to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.
So here it is, man. This is the vision that the Father called the Son to submit to, and this is what He died for. This is what Jesus died for. And men, this is the vision that I'm calling you to, that God's calling you to, and this is the vision you should live and die for. Let me give you a quick overview of what's happening in this text. The very first thing we see is that the Word of God is front and center. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching. And we see that as a result of the Word of God being front and center, there's a feast that takes place. A feast on God, a feast on God's goodness, a feast on each other, a fellowship, a friendship. We see a radical generosity in this vision. We see fruitfulness and growth in this particular vision. Here's how I would say it: the Bride of Christ is here in this text, and she is fat and happy. She is all good.
This isn't, by the way, the ultimate vision. Jesus will continue to work with his bride throughout the century and millennia until she is washed with the water of the word until all the sheep are brought into the one pasture. But this is a glimpse of the vision the Father had. This is the glimpse of the vision that the Father called the Son to activate. This is a glimpse, men, of the vision God has given you.
There's a very interesting kind of fractal nature to God's goodness. We can see that this text applies at very different levels, multiple levels, Big levels, small levels. It can be more intense or more subtle depending on the moment or the season or the place. This vision that we see in Acts 2:42-48, the Word is central. There's a feast on God's goodness. There's expansion and fruitfulness. This vision can be applied to maybe a moment in time, maybe in the future when every church in the world is experiencing this all at the same time. Can you imagine what that would be like? If every church in the world experienced this at the same time? This vision can be applied to a local church. How wonderful would it be if our local church progressively became more and more like what we see in this passage? But then this vision can be applied to your home, of course.
You know what's interesting is that we are so in debt to a Christian tradition that that our civilization, that Western civilization is built upon, that when I read this text, you may say, "Well, that sounds a lot like a good home." Right? You would read that text and say, "Well, that sounds like a great home." Or as I said, this is kind of a Norman Rockwell, ecclesiological Norman Rockwell moment. But you know what's interesting is that that's not what the home looked like apart from Christ. In fact, go through the Old Testament, you're not going to see that. In homes before Christ. Go throughout Europe before Christianity got there, you're not going to see that apart from Jesus. And I think that's an important point because I think oftentimes there's a tension, especially in families that have made a very sizable commitment to their homes, to their families. There's this tension that says that, "No, I want this for my home," and sometimes the church competes against this this. So that I can't fully invest in the church because if I do, then this will be missing from the home. Well, these categories exist because of Jesus. And they actually first showed up in Christ's church. These first believers experienced this in their brothers and sisters in Christ, not in their own actual blood families. The fact that you may experience this in your home your actual relatives, is God's grace through the church. The church is not competing with this vision. The church is actually clarifying this vision. And I saw this in the last church that I planted and pastored for 10 years. Almost everybody there was a brand new believer in Jesus, a first-generation Christian as they called it. And when they walked into our church, they would say, this looks like something I've never seen before. I've never seen people love each other like this before. I've never seen people be for each other like this before. I've never seen people serve each other, affirm one another, help one another, instruct one another, edify one another. Because these people, they didn't have any Jesus in their lives, right? And the first place they saw this shalom, this beautiful picture of proactive peace, was actually in the local church.
6 · Applies the vision specifically to husbands: pursue this in your church, your home, and your marriage
So you can have this vision for your church. In fact, I will talk more about this, but I don't think, men, that it's possible to do what you're called to do for your family without actually being, as they used to say, a churchman. Having a distinct commitment and connection to making these things true in your local church. But I also want you to see that you can have this vision not only for your church, not only for your home, but also for your relationship with your spouse. If you were to work your way through this text again, you might say this: I want my wife to have time to devote herself to the Scriptures. I want to be in fellowship with her over the Word. I want to provide for her. There's the reference to food, is just evidence of God's provision in Acts 2:48. I want to provide for her. I want to pray with her. I want us to experience miracles together. I want every day to be a conscious act of worship. I want our little fellowship of two to grow and bloom and bless many more. You see how this outline of shalom, this outline of peace, can apply at so many different levels? What you have here is sort of a gospel fractal.
7 · Unpacks the four-stage 'gospel fractal': (1) God's revealed Word/will, (2) obedience/devotion/sacrifice, (3) exaltation/resurrection/enjoyment, (4) fruitfulness/expansion
It's this kind of shape that you can apply over and over and over again in different areas of life, and you can make it really big to describe the whole world, or you could make it really small to describe your marriage. You can kind of make it medium-sized to describe your church. The basic elements of this fractal are as follows: there's the Word. There's this moment when God reveals Himself. He discloses His will. It shows up repeatedly throughout Scripture. God approaches in a covenantal announcement and says, "This is what I'm about. This is My will. This is what I want." This is who you are. This is what's happening. And then if we move into peace, if all things go well, which they don't usually, but if we move into peace, we go from word, revelation, will into this moment of obedience or devotion. And often that obedience or devotion feels like a sacrifice. In fact, when you look at the Old Testament sacrificial system, this is what's happening in the Old Testament sacrificial system. God's announcing His will. There's a commitment, an obedience, a devotion. In our text, we see that in Acts 2, Peter stands before the crowd and announces the gospel and God's will for these people to repent and believe in Jesus. That's the announcement. And then we see people say, "What shall we do?" They're cut to the heart and they respond, like, "How do we obey? How do we respond to God?" That's God united giving the gift of faith. In that moment so people could respond to His Word. And what we see in our little section in Acts 2:42-48 is we see they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching. That's that second level there— obedience, devotion, sacrifice. It's a commitment that's made. And sometimes that commitment is costly or painful. Sometimes it really feels like dying. Sometimes it just feels like inconvenience. But after that happens, there's a season of exaltation or resurrection or enjoyment. There's a moment after submission where the thing, the seed that fell to the ground and died, now blooms. And then what does it do when it blooms? It bears much fruit. It expands. It becomes fruitful. So these 4 stages are sort of everywhere in God's Word. They're at the very beginning of God's Word. This is what's happening as Jesus is obeying. He's obeying. He's submitting. Luke 2:42, He's submitting to the Word. There's a cost to that obedience, a sacrifice, which is the cross. He is dead. Then He is raised. There's an exaltation. He's humbled Himself under the hand of the Lord. He's died like a seed. And now He's raised. There's resurrection. And then that seed bears fruit and becomes the Kingdom.
8 · Applies the fractal pattern directly to daily family life: the husband should lead the household through this cycle daily—asking what God has called them to, obeying at cost, trusting for confirmation, and seeing that obedience overflow into children, neighbors, and the church
Alright, so this is happening throughout Scripture. And men, this is what your home should be doing all the time. This could be a daily experience in your home. What has God called us to? What is that going to cost? How do we obey? Let's do that in faith that God will honor His Word. God will be with us. You'll experience some kind of confirmation from the Lord either immediately or in the future. And then that cycle continues to happen and repeats and repeats and repeats. It overflows not only into children who love Jesus, but into neighbors who love Jesus and into people at your church who love Jesus because this thing was happening in your marriage over and over and over again. That's the will of God. It's the will of God for this earth. It's the will of God for your home. It's the will of God for the church. It's the will of God for every relationship you're in. This is it. He discloses His will, we obey. That feels painful, it feels costly. We have faith and respond. And when we have faith and respond, we see exaltation, enjoyment, something coming to life. And that overflows into growth.
9 · Interrupts the main flow to directly address a common heart issue: evaluating marriage by happiness rather than gospel proclamation
Let me say, as it relates to expansion just for a moment, When you evaluate your marriage by the right standard, it really changes things. Here's what I mean. When you evaluate your marriage by whether or not it is making you happy, then there are going to be many times, based on that standard, that your marriage will be a failure. Not so much because your spouse is making you sad. That happens too. I mean, I've never done it, but that happens too. But more of this sort of sense of, you know, this isn't making me happy in the way that I would hope that it would make me happy. So if you evaluate your marriage by that standard, by the way, which is a completely unbiblical standard, can I drop another question in just your head and you can walk away and think about this for a while? If you don't feel loved, by someone, is that most likely that person, or is it possible that your love receptors are broken? I ask that because God loves you perfectly all the time, and if you're anything like me, you rarely feel it the way you should. In fact, I don't think I've ever felt loved by God as much as I am loved by God. So it's interesting, you start to evaluate whether or not you feel loved. Probably not the best way to evaluate. So if you evaluate your marriage by whether it's making you happy, there are going to be moments in time maybe big chunks of time where the answer is, "My marriage is a failure." But if you actually use God's standard and you evaluate your marriage by whether or not it's proclaiming the gospel, then the whole thing becomes valuable. Even the hard times. Even the moments when you don't feel like you're being fulfilled. Maybe especially in those times. The gospel is proclaimed. So suddenly, if you use God's standard and not ask, "Is my marriage making me happy?" but rather ask, "Is my marriage proclaiming the gospel?" Suddenly your marriage is more successful, even when it's not great. By the way, that would be how I would apply— that's how I would evaluate a church. Most things that you are discontent with would be sources of contentment and joy if you stopped evaluating them by whether or not they make you happy and start evaluating them by whether or not they're helping others. If you're discontent in your marriage, I would suggest that you turn it outward and bless the kingdom and see how you feel about it then. If you're discontent with your singleness, I suggest the same. Turn it outward. Bless the kingdom and see how you feel about it then.
10 · Signals return to the main argument from the pastoral aside on evaluating marriage
So that's just a sidetrack based on this expansion. It's a crucial piece of this cycle that God puts us through. But the basic vision of word obedience, exaltation, and expansion shows up everywhere.
11 · Names Acts 2:42-47 as 'Edenic shalom'—a realized echo of Eden and a foretaste of eschatological glory
And hopefully as you're looking at this passage in Luke— or I'm sorry, in Acts— you're seeing that this is a version of Eden. As the theologians would say, I love this phrase, this is Edenic. This is Edenic shalom we see here. Right? This is at least, at the very least, echoes of Eden. And then we would also say echoes of eternity, right? We would say that this is something, this is some bit of glory.
12 · Introduces Hebrews 2:10 to show that Jesus's suffering was purposeful—it brought many sons to the glory glimpsed in Acts 2
Hebrews 2:10. For it was fitting that He, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. The way I'm thinking about this verse right now is that God allowed Jesus to endure suffering to bring many sons to glory. And I think, well, what does that glory look like? And I think this passage in Acts 2 shows you a slice a foretaste, a piece of what that glory looks like. Glory looks like God drawing near, people responding in faith and obedience, experiencing enjoyment of the blessings of that obedience, and seeing that scale up and repeat and repeat and repeat throughout the world.
13 · Pivots from describing the vision to asking how it came into being
So where did this come from? Where did this Edenic moment come from? Where did this beautiful Norman Rockwell moment of the church come from? Because if we can find out where it came from, then we can also begin to plant these seeds in our home and in our church and in our communities. Well, I said something a few weeks ago. I don't know if you heard it or not, if you remember it or not, but what I said is, is that whenever shalom appears, it was made possible by submission. Whenever shalom appears, it was planted by submission. I said that submission is the seed of shalom.
14 · Unpacks the typology of Jesus as the new Adam in Gethsemane
You know, maybe you've picked up on the fact that Jesus is in a garden and that there's something literary and artistically interesting about what's happening with Jesus, whom 1 Corinthians 15 and Romans 5 describe as the new and perfect Adam. Maybe you've begun to pick up on the fact that there's a new and perfect Adam in a garden, maybe you've picked up on the fact that He's having a conversation about what He should drink, the fruit that He should partake of. And that Adam's sin was partaking of what did not belong to him. And Jesus would undo that by partaking of what does not belong to Him. Right? That Adam got us into this mess because he partook of a fruit that did not belong to him in a garden against God's clear revelation, His Word, His disobedience. And Jesus is now in a garden and He is going to take what does not belong to Him, also a fruit, But the thing that doesn't belong to him is the judgment of God on Adam's sin. Jesus is working the Edenic story backward. He's bringing us back into the garden. Adam was in a garden of life that was closed off to him because of his sin. Jesus is in a garden of death. Adam's curse was to work by the sweat of his brow, and we see Jesus sweating blood. It's a sacrificial sweat, and He's working that into the ground. He's working His obedience into the ground, into the ground from which Adam sprung. And He is working this obedience, the sweat of His brow, the blood sweat of His brow, the sacrificial work that He's undertaking, to the point where He will obey to the point of death on a cross. He will fall asleep and have His side opened up, and when He is raised, a new bride emerges, the church. Jesus is walking backward through our curse to bring His people into the kind of shalom we see in Acts 2:42-48.
15 · Extends the typology: the serpent/devil in Eden finds his counterpart in Judas in Gethsemane
He's submitting to the Father and pulling us back into this cycle instead of the word, revelation, will, disobedience, death, and shrinking. He's pulling us back into the Edenic shalom cycle by His obedience in this garden of death. In our text today, Acts 2:42— oh, one more thing. So the serpent deceives and conquers Adam. The serpent is endued with what? The devil, right? The devil's in the snake. Who's the devil in the Jesus story? Judas. And Judas slithers up the hill to trick Jesus. And he tries to strike at Jesus, but Jesus winds up crushing, he allows that strike to land, right? That kiss to land. But it doesn't destroy him. He winds up stepping on the devil's head as a result of this. Jesus is walking us back into this Edenic cycle. God put an angel after Adam sinned. God put an angel to stop sinful Adam from re-entering the Garden of Life. In Luke 22, God sends an angel to keep the righteous Jesus in the Garden of Death, to strengthen Him, to strengthen Him in His submission.
16 · Brings together the entire redemptive-historical argument: Jesus as the new Adam submitted to the curse to restore humanity to the Edenic mandate (rule and subdue by being fruitful and multiplying)
So Jesus is this new Adam And through His submission, He's bringing us back into this cycle and He's allowing the church to experience life. He's bringing a new bride into being. And when we see Acts 2:42-48, we see just a slice of this glory that Jesus is making possible through His submission. Acts 2:42-47 happens, you know, 40 days give or take after The smoke clears from this crucifixion battle, and when the smoke clears, you don't see bodies everywhere, you see living people everywhere. We've been raised to life, we've been raised out of our sin and our death and brought to life with Him. And we're now part of this word, obedience, enjoyment, expansion cycle that you see in Acts 2:42. And that's all because Adam took on the curse of the old— because the new Adam, Jesus, took on the curse of the old Adam. And He created a new people under His headship who could obey God's very first commandment, men, which is to rule and subdue by being fruitful and multiplying. That's what you're created to do. That's why you need help. The task you've been given is literally as big as the earth itself. And Jesus came and worked that garden in obedience and submission by taking a cup that did not belong to Him, so that you and I could be under His new headship. And when we hear the Word, we can obey. And we can die to self. And we can sacrifice. And we can lay down our lives. And out of that laying down our lives, another bride is beautified. Our bride. The one maybe to your right or your left right now. And the church, the bride, by the way, is beautified as well.
17 · Acknowledges the density of the preceding theological exposition ('full Bible nerd') and signals a shift to practical application
So what is the starting point of all this? I've just given you— I decided to just go ahead and strip all the filters away and be full Bible nerd for that section of the sermon. So if your head's spinning, this is what I write on Tuesday and then I usually clean it up. I just decided, no, you know, no. I'm just going to go full Bible nerd. We'll come back to earth a little bit and ask, okay, so what's the first step? How do we start this? How do we start this cycle? How do we start seeing this shalom take place in our homes, in our church, in our country, and so on and so forth?
18 · Identifies the first step into the shalom cycle: devotion to God's Word
Well, look at verse 42, 41 and 42 again. So those who received his word were baptized. And there were added that day about 3,000 souls. And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. What I'm gonna suggest to you today is that the first step of this shalom cycle for us is to devote ourselves to God's Word. That God's Word is the central piece, this building block of this shalom that takes place in our families and in our churches and so on and so forth. Now, I can go the long route or I can go the short route. I'm just going to go the short route. If you have questions afterward, ask me. I just don't have time to show my work here. But when it says they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, the word teaching is actually doctrine there in the Greek. And what we're seeing here is not that they devoted themselves to a pastor. We're seeing that they devoted themselves to Scripture. The apostles are writing the Scripture. They're revealing the connections between the Old Testament and the Gospel of Jesus. So when they're committing themselves, when they're devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching, that's not— they found a pastor they really liked and they listened to him. But I'm going to talk about that in a moment. What they're doing is actually— what's happening right here is they're listening to a whole new way that God's Word is being cleared. Clarified where these witnesses of Jesus, these people who walked with Jesus, have now been given authority and inspiration of the Holy Spirit to write Scripture. So, "They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching," I think is appropriately for our application. They devoted themselves to John Piper, or they devoted themselves to the Scriptures. That would be the appropriate equivalent. It isn't an accident that this comes first.
19 · Uses a cooking analogy to illustrate that the order of elements in Acts 2:42 matters—you cannot skip the Word and still have the rest
You ever make something? You ever cook something? I like to cook. You ever cook something and are pretty sure the order of ingredients doesn't matter at all? And usually that's true. Usually you could dump everything in a bowl and it's going to be fine. But there are some things where you've got to do it the way they say to do it. You've got to start where they say to start and keep moving forward the way that they say so. In this particular passage, There does seem to be at least a little bit of that in this first mention that they first of all, above all else, devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching. Nothing on this list is unimportant, but you wouldn't know what to do or how to do anything else on this list if you didn't have the Word.
20 · Introduces the Babel typology
So, the first few chapters of Acts are rich with biblical imagery. And one part of the story actually alludes to the Tower of Babel. There's a place in the Old Testament, if you don't know that story, where all the human beings on the earth got really proud and decided to create a structure that would insulate themselves from humility, essentially. And they cooperated with each other so that they could insulate themselves from being humble and trusting God. God's merciful judgment on them in that moment is to divide their languages so that they can't communicate in the same way. That's sort of the fallout of human pride. When we get to Acts, what do we see? We see a group of people from all over the world gathering who speak different languages. And then suddenly, through the power of the Holy Spirit, Babel is undone. Like the Garden curse is undone in a way. Babel is undone and suddenly all these people who spoke different languages speak the same language. Language. And it's that language they're devoting themselves to, which is the Word of God. The Word of God is the common language of God's people.
21 · Applies the Babel/Pentecost typology to marriage
Now that's important because, as it relates to marriage, because you have probably been told that a significant problem in your marriage, or a significant reason for the problems in your marriage, are that you don't speak the same language. That's true. But here's the biblical solution to that. The solution is not foremost to learn to speak one another's language. The solution foremost— we've got some guys that are young, just listen, this is important. Because this will save you like 10 years. No, no, no, no. Learning to speak each other's language will come, but if you will commit yourself to learning to speak the Bible together, you will learn a new language together. Now that new language will have seasonings of personality in it, but the goal for us as believers is to make the Word of God our common language. The Babel is undone not by you learning girl and me learning God. You know, that's the love languages thing. That's so, so, so, so secondary to just having— create in your home a culture where God's Word is just in the air. It's just a thing. We talk Bible. I don't think— I think my wife's in the nursery, but we have jokes about the Bible that are totally inside. And I didn't know if she was in the nursery today. I could say a couple phrases and she would involuntarily laugh. Just based on dumb Bible humor that we've had since we were 18. That's the language you need to share. And I want to tell you that anybody's telling you that your problem is that you don't speak each other's language, they're missing the broader issue. You need to develop a new language. Your home— say you're a first-generation Christian, second-generation Christian— your home should have its own biblical language. It should be based on the Bible. And then it should be seasoned with the personality and the context and the culture and so on and so forth.
22 · Restates the core claim: God's Word must come first to overcome division and produce unity
So this idea of God's word coming first is key to this text. In order for God's people to flourish, Babel has to be undone. The division has to be overcome. Unity has to be brought forth. And how do we all begin to speak the same language? We speak God's language. We speak God's word to one another.
23 · Reads Ephesians 5:22-33 to show the role the Word plays in marriage
But let me tell you another reason why this is important. Over the last 2 weeks we've discussed submission. Ephesians 5:22-33, let me just read this to you. And I want you to listen for the role the Bible plays in the dynamic of marriage. Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord, for the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, So also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her, that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that He might present the church to Himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
24 · Argues that the Bible is essential to both submission and love in marriage
There are at least two ways, there's many more, but two ways where the Bible plays a huge role. If you've submitted yourself to the Bible, if the Bible's central, ladies, you'll hear the word submit and you won't run away from it like it's a bear that's walking in your door to kill you. You know, there are people who hear the word submit and they just run the other way. But if there's a relationship with God's Word and a respect for God's Word, you'll say, "Okay, I don't love that word. I'm not sure I understand that word. But it's in the Bible. And I've devoted myself to the Scriptures. So now let me figure out how to understand and obey this text." Men, the whole definition of love The whole definition of what you're about is rooted in the story of Jesus. How well do you really know that story? Not well enough. I heard somebody one time say that he was talking to a pastor who just, every sermon he preached was just, he just nailed every sermon he preached. And he was an older guy and said, well, how do you, there's just never an off day. How do you do that? And he's like, I don't know. And they talked and talked and the conversation changed and eventually the pastor who nails all the sermons said, you know, one thing that I don't know a lot of people do is I read the New Testament every week. He's like, you know, it's really not that long. Man, your ability to be what you're supposed to be depends on being a man of the Word. You've got to be a man of the Word. You know, if you are not a man— it says that he washed her with the water of the Word. I mean, can you imagine driving to like a car wash and like there's a sign that says, "We have no water." Well, how useful is that car wash? Men, I will help you any way I can, like practically help you, but you've got to be men of the Word. Otherwise, you don't have the one thing you have to have.
25 · Tells a story of a pastor who never has an off day in preaching because he reads the entire New Testament every week
I heard somebody one time say that he was talking to a pastor who just, every sermon he preached was just, he just nailed every sermon he preached. And he was an older guy and said, well, how do you, there's just never an off day. How do you do that? And he's like, I don't know. And they talked and talked and the conversation changed and eventually the pastor who nails all the sermons said, you know, one thing that I don't know a lot of people do is I read the New Testament every week. He's like, you know, it's really not that long.
26 · Uses a hypothetical car wash with no water to illustrate the futility of a husband who has no Word
You know, if you are not a man— it says that he washed her with the water of the Word. I mean, can you imagine driving to like a car wash and like there's a sign that says, "We have no water." Well, how useful is that car wash?
27 · Restates the thesis: submission is the seed of shalom, and what we see in Acts 2:42 is submission to God's Word
We've said repeatedly that submission is the seed of shalom. And what we see in Acts 2:42 is submission to God's Word day in and day out. Submission to God's Word is so important. Now, the Word of God isn't our first language. If you've ever been around people speak English as a second language, you'll see them making a heroic, valiant effort that most of us dumb Americans never attempt. But you'll also see this moment, if you're around them enough, where they just relax and speak the language they really, really want to speak. Right? And there's just this kind of moment of, "Ah." Well, I'm sorry to say that none of us speak Word of God as our first language. And that because we are redeemed sinners, our original language is the flesh. And as much as we can say we love to speak God's Word to one another and we are fluent in God's Word, the truth is that every one of us, I feel this every week, all the time, every one of us begins to slip out of speaking God's Word and sleep speaking our natural language.
28 · Transitions from the problem (we slip into speaking our natural language) to the solution: examining the emotional and heart-level conditions that kept the early church devoted to the Word
And so what I want you to see with the rest of our time is that there's a certain level of emotional connection that these people have to the Word of God that I think keeps them interested and devoted and committed to it. There's some stuff happening, not so much in the background, but stuff that we wouldn't necessarily notice that I think will help you have that much more interest and engagement in being people who speak the Bible.
29 · Identifies the first heart attitude: surprise
The first one is this: there's an element of surprise in their relationship to Scripture. When these people are being exposed to Scripture, there's this sense in which they are continually surprised. The context of this story happens on a day called Pentecost. And this was a feast that was celebrated for the first fruits of the harvest. The very first things that would come up in the field, you know, the first tomatoes, etc., they'd come up in the field, they'd take the first fruits, and they would dedicate those to God. Now what's happening in this text is so interesting because if you'll notice, these people are gathered. It says they were gathered all in one place. They're gathered together like a harvest would be gathered. And then in v. 40, it says they were cut to the heart. They were cut to the heart. And what do you see in v. 42? They were devoted. They were offered. They were given up. And how are they given up? How are they devoted? How are they offered? Through prayer. Prayers are being lifted up with a sweet-smelling aroma to God. So what's happening at Pentecost is that there's a new people created And these people are the firstfruits of that new people. And they're being offered up at the Feast of the Firstfruits as a sacrifice pleasing to the Lord. Guys, the Bible's full of this stuff. As Peter is discussing Christ's role in the Old Testament, he goes through this pretty complicated and nuanced Christological unfolding, and he's like, listen, David said this, but David didn't talk about himself. David was talking about Jesus and so on and so forth. And can you just imagine these people who were so well-versed in the Old Testament hearing these new categories created and being almost scandalized or surprised? There's a bit of the Word of God that should surprise you. These people devoted themselves to the Word because the Word was prophetic. Profoundly interesting and nuanced. And I want to tell you something, I would like to pastorally love people who have taught you to read your Bible and say that part doesn't apply to you, or this part doesn't apply to you, or this was for those people, or this was for that time. Oh my goodness, what do you have left? These people didn't have categories like that as they heard the Word. They had one category. Christ is popping up on every page of my Bible suddenly, and my heart is burning within me as I see Jesus in all of the scriptures. They had this commitment to the Word of God because the Word of God kept surprising them, kept kind of scandalizing them even.
30 · Identifies the second heart attitude: skepticism toward self
But more than that, I mean, in addition to that, they had a deep skepticism both of themselves and of the world. Boy, this is so key. Look at verse 36. Peter says, "Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made Him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified." This Jesus whom you crucified. The people devoted themselves to the Scriptures because they were deeply skeptical of themselves. Why? Because they just crucified God. They didn't think, "If I follow my heart, I'll have it figured out." Because when they followed their heart, the Son of God was killed. They were profoundly skeptical of their heart. They were profoundly skeptical of themselves. Verses like, "There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end leads to death," applied to them in a way they never expected. So when 2 Timothy 4, for instance, says the day is coming when people won't endure sound teaching, but they will wander off and acquire new teachers for themselves to suit their passions. No one ever thinks that's talking about them. What we've got, I'm going to talk about this in a moment, is this profound skepticism toward authority and a genuine belief that what you think in your heart is the truth. Your take on that conversation you had, that's the right take. Your understanding of the situation, that's the right understanding of the situation. They didn't feel that because they saw in living color that when they followed their heart, God got crucified.
31 · Identifies the third heart attitude: skepticism toward the world
Not only did they have a deep skepticism toward themselves, but they also had a deep skepticism toward the world. Look at verse 40: And with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, Save yourselves from this crooked generation. These folks had just seen the destructive power of the crowd. Hey, social media folks, are you aware of the destructive power of the crowd? Does that— do you feel that? Are you aware of that? I want to just say this. There's such a bias toward the kind of things I'm saying right now, because the instinct is, how can I integrate into the culture? How can I integrate into the culture? How can I integrate into the culture? And what these people were hearing was, how can I create a new culture? Because my culture is broken and it killed Jesus. My culture is broken and it got carried away in hysteria and committed a terrible sin. There is a profound— there's a reliance, a love for God's Word because there is a profound skepticism towards self and toward the world. And I just want to tell you that however you choose to live your life and what movies you choose to watch and music and so on and so forth, I just want to tell you, like, it will be so tempting for you to listen to the— to hear the middle-aged fat dude telling you to not be worldly. And they come up with reasons why I'm not, why I'm out of, like I'm weird. Guys, the Word of God is life. There isn't life elsewhere. Be profoundly skeptical of your hot take. Be profoundly skeptical of what the world tells you.
32 · Identifies the fourth heart attitude: humility toward teaching
One of the things that shows up is they just kind of had a respect for dudes preaching. You know, we have this skepticism toward authority that is probably rightly placed right now, but there's no skepticism toward self right now. And that's tragic. But there's these moments where they just respond in faith. The way they respond in faith is to say to the guy who's preaching, "Brothers, what shall we do? Tell us what to do. Tell us how to respond." They had a kind of humility toward the Scriptures. They were eager to be taught. You know, this shows up a lot in our interaction with the preached Word. And I don't love being the guy to talk about this, but talking about things like this are acts of love. During the Reformation, a doctrine emerged called the Priest to the Believer. And the Priest to the Believer is about equal value and equal access to God. In equal responsibility before God. And hopefully, the practical implication of this is that every believer has access to God's Word, which is a relatively new concept in the church, by the way. But let me just be clear, your equal access to God's Word does not mean that you've made an equal investment in God's Word. There are men who have spent their lifetime studying God's Word, And your hot take on a few concordance checks should not be equated with the serious amount of actual work that others have put in to understand and teach God's Word. There's a sign that I saw in one of my doctor friend's offices: "Please do not equate your WebMD search with my medical degree." These people thought, you know what? I need help understanding God's Word. I need someone to tell me how I can understand God's Word more clearly. By the way, your ability to read God's Word, that happened because a scholar way more committed than you spoke a language you don't speak and served you as a teacher translating God's Word for you. That concordance you like? That topical Bible you like, that study Bible you like, also people investing their lives to give you access to God's Word. So these people just had this sense of skepticism toward the world, skepticism towards self, appreciation for being taught, appreciation for being told how to apply God's Word.
33 · Identifies the fifth heart attitude: a bias toward action
And that's the final idea, is they had a bias toward action. Their entire approach to the Scriptures is summed up in verse 37: "Brothers, what shall we do?" What shall we do? They immediately followed up on their action. Verse 41: "So those who received his word were baptized." The word went in, godly actions came out. Fellowship, breaking of bread, radical generosity. The word was costly to them because they had a bias toward action. They heard the word and they obeyed. Sometimes someone will say, "I've got this problem," and I'll say, "Well, have you considered doing X, Y, or Z?" And they'll interrupt me in the middle and say, "Hold on one second, preacher. I've tried that. And you know what happened?" "What?" "It hurt. So I know that that's not the right thing." to do because it hurt. Or, I tried that and it cost me something, so I know it's not the right thing because it was costly. I tried that and people were mean to me, therefore it's clearly not God's will because I'm experiencing pain.
34 · Summarizes the four heart attitudes required for a shalom-building relationship with God's Word: skepticism toward self, skepticism toward the world, humility toward teaching, and a bias toward action
These 4 conditions—skepticism toward the world, skepticism toward self, kind of appreciation for being taught, and this bias toward action. These are heart attitudes that if we cultivate them will actually allow us to have a shalom-building relationship with God's Word.
35 · Uses Psalm 1 to reinforce the four heart attitudes
Psalm 1 describes a man, a kind of shalom man. "He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all he does, he prospers." Well, what's this shalom man doing? Well, let's ask what he's not doing. He's not walking in the counsel of the wicked. He's not standing in the way of sinners. He's not sitting in the seat of scoffers. He has a skepticism toward the world. He has a skepticism toward his own hot take. What is he doing? He is delighting in the law of the Lord, and on His law he is meditating day and night. How do we build this shalom? This peace that overflows from God's Word to obedience to exaltation to expansion? It starts by responding rightly to God's Word.
36 · Closes by returning to Jesus in Gethsemane
Jesus is that new Adam who gives us the power to respond to God's Word. In the moment when Jesus is in the garden and He's submitting to God's Word, He's purchasing that particular act of righteousness for us. We have, through Christ, the ability to respond to God's word the way Jesus did. Let's pray.
37 · Closing prayer
Let's pray.