“Life Is Good”
Acts
4:32-35
April 19, 2009
This morning’s New Testament passage seems like a more than appropriate
reading for “Holy Humor Sunday,” especially in light of the criticisms and
critiques of the T.A.R.P. & other Bailouts that have sparked “Tea Parties”
across the land in the last week.
Acts chapter four verses 32 to 35 has been at the center of much attention
over recent decades in discussions of “Christian Communism” or so called
“Christian Socialism.” The
connection between this passage and such philosophies is due in part to the similarity
between its closing words, “distributed to each as any had need” (4:35), and the slogan of Karl Marx who said,
“From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs” (Critique of the Gotha Program). It
is this similarity between Karl Marx and the writer of Acts choice of words that have led
many Christians to scorn, if not laugh at such ideas, regardless of their Biblical origin.
Please listen for how the Spirit is addressing
us this morning through God’s word found on page 114 of the New Testament Section of
your pew Bibles from the Acts of the Apostles chapter four verses thirty-two to
thirty-five….
32Now the whole group of those who
believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any
possessions, but everything they owned was held in common. 33With great power the apostles
gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them
all. 34There was not a needy person
among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of
what was sold. 35They laid it at the
apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.
This is God’s word to
us…
Life is good. You may disagree with
this simple statement, but did you know that “Life is Good” is a registered
trademark?
Perhaps you have seen the emblematic smiling face of Jake on a Life is Good T-shirt or coffee mug or Frisbee. This Jake is not the same as the yellow smiley face
that’s been co-opted by Wal-Mart as the “price rollback guy.” No, the Life
is Good logo is a stick figure named Jake who wears a black beret, beatnik sunglasses,
and flashes a giant Cheshire cat grin. Jake is
often posed in any number of activities that bring simple pleasure to life—hiking,
surfing, flying a kite, walking the dog.
People have been so in need of such a simple and sunny philosophy that the sincere
and optimistic slogan has ballooned into an $80 million a year merchandise line sold by
5,000 distributors in 14 countries! The
creators of Jake and Life is Good have been so
successful that they go by the titles Chief Executive Optimist and Chief Creative
Optimist.
One key to the success of Life is Good
merchandise lies in the interpretation of those who own the products. Someone wearing the kayaking Jake shirt announces
both his hobby and the simple pleasure that makes his life good—“I’d rather
be kayaking.” But cancer sufferers and
survivors have also flocked to this merchandise line with “Life is Good” as
their hopeful battle cry of both the cancer-afflicted and the celebration of cancer
survivors.
There’s an implicit sense of truthfulness to the slogan which preserves its
widespread appeal with rock climbers and octogenarians alike. Although life isn’t perfect or always great,
it can in fact, be good. Life is Good enthusiasts know there’s plenty
of bad in the world, but find it better to focus on what is good.
But for the Christians of the early church a more accurate way of describing their
situation would have been to say Life is Bad. This could have been their logo in part, because,
sometime after the birth of the church at Pentecost the book of Acts reads like a
police-report from the roughest neighborhood in the city.
Peter and John were arrested (4:3). Then
all of the apostles were jailed, flogged and given a preaching restraining order (5:40). Stephen
was stoned to death (7:58). The
church was persecuted and eventually driven out of Jerusalem (8:1). A
death bounty was put on Peter’s head (9:23). And
James was beheaded (12:2).
With such an inauspicious beginning you would think life for those first Christians
was bad, bad, bad, right? But that’s not
how the early church saw it. So we have to
ask: How can it be said of anyone who is part of a group that’s been arrested,
threatened, put in prison, beaten and killed claim that life is good?
We can find an answer through our morning’s text and author
Randy Frazee who points out three unifying characteristics through which the early church
thrived in spite of the bad times through common purpose, common place and common
community. First let’s think about the common purpose of the early church. Before getting into the radical concept of shared
possessions, note the important opening verse which makes everything else possible. “Now the whole group of those who believed
were of one heart and soul” (v.
32).
One heart and soul: the kerygma, that is, the proclamation of the early church told
the story of Jesus and his teachings, giving local groups of Christians the mission
statement around which they organized themselves. Like
the Rules that guided the monastic orders centuries later, commitment to shared values
made those early churches radically different from their culture.
As the new converts gathered together, they began sharing life in new ways governed
by a new purpose. In Acts chapter 2, they took
in the teachings of the apostles, fellowshipped in the temple and one another’s
homes, witnessed miracles, praised God, and saw daily additional converts (vv. 42-47). Certainly
different communities experienced and interpreted life differently but within each group
they held to a common purpose that originated
in Jesus.
Next, the early community of believers shared a common place. Compare
such a simple idea to our reality where technology has expanded and changed our circles of
relationship. We can call, text, e-mail,
Instant Message and Facebook each other. We
can drive or fly to see people who live across the continent which would have been the
equivalent of 100 days of biblical travel.
But has all this expansion and change helped us any?
Or has it merely fractured us even more, making us a less connected people? When we share proximity, like the early church did
four relational characteristics emerge:
Spontaneity—crossing paths unintentionally
or dropping in on short notice;
Availability—being close enough to lend an
ear or a hand in time of need;
Frequency—the early church met not once a
week, but daily; and
Hospitality—shared meals are the
historical centerpiece of the closest relationships.
If we want to develop deeper relationships that have more spontaneity,
availability, frequency and hospitality, then perhaps we should start by looking around
us. Maybe we should look to build community
within the community in which God has placed us.
The third and possibly most staggering feature of the early church was the one that
today’s text focuses on primarily. There
was one thing that made it clear that God was powerfully transforming peoples lives—believers began disregarding privatized ownership in
favor of a common purse!
As we all can guess from experience there’s rarely any way that happens apart
from God: shared stuff; give as you can; take as you need; I own nothing; we own
everything; that is by definition a radical kind community, even outside of our
hyper-consumer culture and sustainable only through the power of God.
Here in 21st century Western culture such a way of life feels idealistic
at best. And, even though it is right there in
the Bible, it certainly isn’t something that is going to be taken seriously outside
of the church or small utopian communities, is it? Can
you imagine this kind of behavior during the height of last year’s mortgage bailout
crisis? A family selling their vacation home
to prevent a fellow church member from foreclosing? Can
anyone really expect to live-out Acts chapter four today?
But if you “believe the Bible” or hold a
high-view of Scripture, then we not only need to think about living-out Acts 4, but we are expected to. Developing an Acts 4 community requires us to
remember that, ultimately, we are not owners of anything; but rather as Children of God we
are simply managers or stewards of what God has entrusted to us. We are to be open to God’s leading on how we
can use and share what God has given us. You
see, in a community of faith money and possessions are tools for others and not just
sustenance or indulgence for ourselves.
One example of just such a community comes from the Reverend Elyn MacInnis, an
Episcopal priest, serving God in China for the past 20 years. When the earthquake a year ago devastated the
Sichuan Province in western China, she was out there ready to help. She tells the following story:
“There was this one old church that was not strong to begin with. If it had been at the center of the quake, the
building would have completely collapsed. Since
it was farther away, the structure did not collapse, but it did have many cracks, lost
many roof tiles, and now the building is unusable and has been condemned by the local
government.
MacInnis said the congregation would need some funds for repairs before winter
weather set in. “The amount of need was
set at about 15,000 U.S. dollars to repair and strengthen the structure so that they could
use the building again and buy new roof tiles for the roof.
Reverend MacInnis told of “an older member of the church named Old Brother Wu,
in his 60s, who has no children, so he has no family members to take care of him. He also has a problem with his leg, making it hard
for him to walk with a bad limp. But he still
goes to church, making his way to the church each Sunday.
The small hut where he lives has no TV, no refrigerator, only cold water, one
electric bulb, all of which makes for a very difficult life in many ways.
“When the quake hit,” MacInnis continues, “the church members
didn’t even think about the fact that they would eventually need some money to repair
their church. They just got together, pooled
all their extra money and every cent they could get their hands on to send to the center
of the quake zone. They knew that the people
there were in much worse shape than they were, having lost family members and in some
cases, everything. So the church sent all
their money to the quake zone.
“When Old Brother Wu heard about the death and destruction, he took his whole
life savings, worth about 2,000 U.S. dollars, out of the bank and sent it to help the
rescue efforts. He gave away everything he
had. What he did,” MacInnis said,
“touched everyone so much that the news spread and a newspaper reporter went to visit
him.
“He told everyone he was a Christian, and Christians love people just like
Jesus did, and that life is the most important thing.
He hoped his small amount of money would help and encourage the people who were
rescuing those trapped in buildings and schools.”
He said, “it’s just what Christians … do.”
Life always seems to have plenty of difficulty and suffering to spread around. What we need most is a group of people around us to
shoulder the burdens of life with. We need
people who will draw us toward interdependence and away from individualism, isolationism
and consumerism. What we need is a community
of faith. So, are you ready to continue to share in creating a community where we all can discover what it
means to really believe Life is Good?
Amen.
SOURCES:
Frazee, Randy.
The Connecting Church: Beyond Small
Groups to Authentic Community. Grand
Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2001.
MacInnis, Elyn. Elynsjournal.com
Meeks, Wayne A.
The First Urban Christians: The Social
World of the Apostle Paul. New Haven,
Conn. Yale University Press, 1983.
On Life Is Good: lifeisgood.com,
inc.commagazine/20061001/life-lessons.html
