Part One by Rich Peterson, Church Relations
Verse Reference: Acts 2:42-47
The term “church shopping” is a familiar one in today’s American culture. To church shop means to go look for a church like you might look for a turkey to purchase from the grocery store. Usually, it means searching several different places for a particular church that will meet your particular needs.
When going church shopping, people look for things like…
- The style of music in the worship service.
- The kind of children’s programming.
- Does this church have a growing and active middle/high school ministry?
- Is there a Groups’ ministry?
- Are there programs for senior adults or others?
Just like almost every other shopping activity one looks at a variety of models and then chooses a church based on whether the church might meet their unique and specific needs. We shouldn’t be surprised at this phenomenon, especially in a society with hundreds of choices available to us in the grocery store, in a culture with so many different models of automobile, or in a day and time where customer options are so prevalent.
Is there another question we need ask ourselves before just settling on a church that feels right? The better question we might want to ask and the question we are in most desperate need of knowing is: “Does the Holy Spirit of Christ reside in this church?”
Even though every believer has the Holy Spirit, it is possible to operate our lives apart from his control.
–Charles Swindoll
In the same way, every New Testament church is empowered by the presence of the Holy Spirit, but it is possible to do church apart from his control. Does the Holy Spirit reside in this church? How do you know? Is there evidence of the Spirit’s presence that needs show up? Are there certain characteristics of a church controlled, empowered and equipped by the Holy Spirit of God?
Acts 2:42-47 points to at least six distinctive traits that each of us needs to be looking for when determining whether the Holy Spirit resides in a local church.
When the Holy Spirit shows up in a church there is Biblical Instruction
“They devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching.” (Acts 2:42).
Rick Warren has cleverly noted, “Americans spend more on beer than they do on books. No wonder their stomachs are bigger than their brains.”
The remarkably successful and eternally optimistic Zig Ziglar also knew the value of learning. Mr. Ziglar disciplined himself to read three hours a day for twenty-five years. It is no wonder he was one of the most captivating speakers from the twentieth century. The first evidence of the Spirit’s presence in the first century church is that they devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching. Not just an education – but an education in the school of Jesus Christ.
Is the church you are looking at, or the church you are attending, or the church where you have been a member for a number of years – is that church a LEARNING church?
John Stott explains it this way, “One might say that the Holy Spirit opened a school in Jerusalem that day; its teachers were the apostles whom Jesus had appointed; and there were 3,000 pupils in the kindergarten! We note that those new converts were not enjoying a mystical experience which led them to despise their mind or disdain theology. Anti-intellectualism and the fullness of the Spirit are mutually incompatible, because the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. Nor did those early disciples imagine that, because they had received the Spirit, he was the only teacher they needed, and they could dispense with human teachers. On the contrary, they sat at the apostle’s feet, hungry to receive instruction, and they persevered in it…. Since the teaching of the apostles has come down to us in its definitive form in the NT, contemporary devotion to the apostle’s teaching will mean submission to the authority of the NT. A Spirit-filled church is a NT church, in the sense that it studies and submits to NT instruction.”
William Barclay says that “we should count it a wasted day when we do not learn something new and when we have not penetrated more deeply into the wisdom and the grace of God.”
Is the church you attend a community where everyone can easily engage in biblical instruction?
When the Holy Spirit shows up at church there is loving community
“They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need.” (Acts 2:42, 44-45)
The first disciples also devoted themselves to fellowship (koinonia). The word bears witness to the common life of the church in two senses.
- It expresses what we share IN together and this is God Himself, for our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ, and is the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.
- Koinonia also expresses what we share OUT together, what we give as well as what we receive. To be a loving fellowship in the true sense of the word means that the church is a SHARING church. Verses 44-45 tell us that these early Christians had an intense feeling of responsibility for each other. William Barclay is convinced that “a real Christian cannot bear to have too much when others have too little.”
Chrysostom gave a beautiful description of koinonia:
“This was an angelic commonwealth, not to call anything of theirs their own. Not only that the root of evil was cut out…none reproached, none envied, none grudged; no pride, no contempt was there…The poor man knew no shame, the rich no haughtiness.”
John Stott adds, “So we must not evade the challenge of these verses. That we have hundreds of thousands of destitute brothers and sisters is a standing rebuke to us who are more affluent. It is part of the responsibility of Spirit-filled believers to alleviate need and abolish destitution in the new community of Jesus.”
When the Holy Spirit shows up at church there is living worship
“They devoted themselves to the breaking of bread and to prayer.”
“Every day they continued to meet in the temple courts.” (Acts 2:42, 46)
Living worship is balanced worship. Balanced in two ways Both FORMAL and INFORMAL in both the temple courts and in their homes.
John Stott writes, “Certainly it is always healthy when the more formal and dignified services of the local church are complemented with the informality and exuberance of home meetings. There is no need to polarize between the structured and the unstructured, the traditional and the spontaneous. The church needs both.”
When the Holy Spirit shows up at church there is living worship that is both JOYFUL and REVERENT.
As Christ-followers we have plenty of reason to be joyful – God’s Son sent into the world to save us, the Holy Spirit as His gift to us for transformed life! The fruit of the Spirit is JOY!
Every worship service should be a joyful celebration of the mighty acts of God through Jesus Christ. It is right in public worship to be dignified; it is unforgivable to be dull. -John Stott
However, celebration of God in public worship is never irreverent. The joy of the Lord is an authentic work of the Spirit, but so is the fear of God. Everyone was filled with awe – Christians and non-Christians. God had showed up, He was in their midst, and they KNEW it. They bowed down in humility and wonder. It is a mistake therefore to imagine that in public worship reverence and rejoicing are mutually exclusive. -John Stott
When the Holy Spirit shows up at church there is Biblical instruction, loving community, and living worship.
Discussion Questions:
On your social media or ours, post an answer as an update or leave a comment on Facebook, LinkedIn, X, Threads, our Facebook group, or Instagram.
- How do you currently approach finding the right church and how did this blog post challenge you?
- What does the phrase “Church Shopping” mean to you? How does it align or contrast with biblical principles for choosing a church?
- How does your church foster a sense of koinonia (fellowship) among its members?
Other Articles:
References:
Flying Closer to the Flame, Charles Swindoll,1993.
How to Stay Mentally Fit, Rick Warren, 1995.
Baptism and Fulness of the Holy Spirit, John Stott, 1971
The Daily Study Bible, The Acts of the Apostles, William Barclay
Pictured: One of 28 churches in Senegal, Africa