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Stephen's Discourse
By daniel | August 22, 2004
Hey saints!
I?m reading Acts 7-12 this week, just like each and every one of you. Today, as I write, it?s Wednesday. So far I?ve read chapters 7-9 and I hope you have, too.
Stephen?s discourse in chapter 7 is just incredible. He presents a brief synopsis of the history of God?s dealings with Israel, slowly guiding his audience ? mostly religious leaders ? to a conclusion that they simply will not bear. His thoughts are woven around two men and a house, and how Israel responded to each. First, there?s Joseph, whom his brothers disowned and sold into slavery, but whom God had chosen to deliver Israel. And deliverance came, despite his brothers? ignorant, jealous hatred.
This pattern is repeated with Moses. God had chosen Moses to deliver the people from Egypt, but they “did not understand” and so “disowned” him (7:25,35). This attitude toward Moses, it turns out, was rooted in a religious idolatry ? a penchant to worship that which was not God ? which Israel has never seemed to shake.
That idolatry came to its consummate expression in Israel?s attitude toward the Temple. The religious leaders confronting Stephen had a fierce (dare we say idolatrous?) devotion to the Temple, convinced that God Himself was in it and was somehow limited to it. To this devotion Stephen speaks, undermining it with a quotation from Isaiah:
“Heaven is my throne, and earth is the footstool of my feet; what kind of house will you build for me,” says the Lord, “or what place is there for my repose? Was it not my hand which made all these things?”
And to this reality the religious elite responded with a bloody-handed frenzy. Such was their devotion to their religious structure that they could not bear challenge from the voice of God Himself.
We do that too. We don?t kill people, but we do get so used to certain methods, so devoted to certain religious traditions, that we no longer give God room to say what He will. We become convinced that God Himself is in them and is somehow limited to them. We assume our comfort with certain formats reflects God?s comfort. We like it, so God must, right? And we extend it to our theology, our precious propositions. However we see it must be the way God sees it. We fall in love with religion and dogma, and we subtly deny the very God we?re talking (or singing or raving or whatever) about. We cling.
I?ve come, by grace, to a different posture. I have categorically refused to cling. I?m not going to assume that God likes what I like, and I?m certainly not going to adhere to religious traditions or methodologies. Nor will I flee to new methodologies or religious trends. Instead, I will simply agree with God. What He wants to do, I want to do. Now, I don?t know all He?s after with me, with us, with our gatherings, but I agree. I divorce myself from all theologies in favor of actually knowing God. Dogmas and doctrinal statements have become distasteful to me. I love sound doctrine too much to put it in system and statements. I prefer to just teach it.
In this posture I?m free. I?m free to hear the Voice, especially through the Scriptures ? alone and with other saints. And God?s free to say whatever He wants without me passing it through the ridiculous sieve of my theology or religious preferences. And the saints I care for are free. Free from religious structure interrupting or stifling the flow of Divine life. Free from truths obscuring the Truth.
The opposite of religion is freedom, and I choose to live free. Free, not to sin, but free to know God as He is in the church. And I invite you to live free, too.
On a different note, I?m reminded in chapter 8 of the centrality of the saints? homes in cultivating the Life of God in the world. The emphasis on the church gathering in homes is obvious in chapters one and two, and supported again in 8:3. Paul begins “ravaging the church,” and where, exactly, is the church? We find him “entering house after house, dragging off men and women.” Clearly, the church was to be found in the houses.
Now, let me make clear what I?m not saying. I?m not saying the church only met in houses, and I?m not saying that we should engage house-meetings as some kind of program. Neither of these ideas would be accurate. Rather, the church met many ways. Two obvious manners of meeting are large, public gatherings (using big spaces like the Temple or schools or river banks), and smaller gatherings in the saints? homes. And these home gatherings weren?t programmed as much as they were the natural expression of the unifying Spirit?s life in the saints. They lived normal human lives, but they lived them together and full of God.
And that, dear ones, is the point. The church is not a building. It?s not a 501K charitable organization. It?s not a bunch of pro-Christians and their brilliant programs to make your life a little better. The church is the gathering of the called-out ones. Called out of the world. Called to Jesus. Called with one another. And to live this calling out, we must, practically, live our lives together.
This is why the home meetings are so very, very important. Apart from these, the church life can be taught, but it can never be lived. It doesn?t really matter how comfortable or convenient the home meetings are. It matters that they?re important. So make them. To learn about the church life, you need only read your Bible and listen to the elders teach. To learn the church life, to live it, you need also to gather and try. God will meet you in that, and we?ll all be blessed for it.
I adore you,
Virgil
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