Anatomy of a Church: Generosity

Acts 2:42-47

Introduction

As we begin our time together as pastors and congregation, it is appropriate to ask what we hope to see out of our time together. When it comes to church goals, the most common areas that people look to are numerical growth, financial stability, and increased programs and ministries. Those are all very good things and both Amanda and I are in favour of those things.

However, those gains can be fleeting if we miss out on something much more fundamental and that is church health. You can achieve all of those goals in the short term but if the church is not healthy, they cannot last. We need to begin with basic church health and then we can branch off from there. In fact, if we are a healthy church, we should see these things naturally happening over the long term.

But the question is: what does a healthy church look like? For people, we have ways of measuring health. We can measure temperature and blood pressure. We can check for cholesterol and blood sugar. Whenever I get a blood test, I check the results online and it shows an alert if there is any result that is outside the normal range.

Church health is bit more tricky to measure. The best thing we can do is look back to Acts and the birth of the church. This took place back in Acts 2. We are not going to go into the details of what happened on the day of Pentecost but near the end of the chapter, there is a summary of what the earliest church was like. Luke wanted us to know these things, not just as a matter of historical interest, but as a guide for future congregations to be reminded of what we are supposed to be about.

The first part of the anatomy of a church that we are going to look at is generosity.

Generosity in the Modern Church

What we find in this summary statement is that the early Christians were extremely generous with their possessions. We shouldn’t be surprised at that as Jesus told a number of would-be disciples to see all they had and give it to the poor. The modern concept of “Whoever dies with the most toys, wins” would have been completely foreign to them.

There were people in the church who had needs. There were no organizations or governmental supports to help people when they were in need. Often people would be forced to beg on the street corners or sell themselves into slavery. 

The expectation was that people of God were a family and that the children of God were to take care of one another. People who support the so-called prosperity gospel claim that there is no reason for any Christian to be poor because they are recipients of God’s riches. That is an unbiblical idea. However, it is true that there is no reason for any Christian to be without the necessities of life because they should be the recipients of the church’s generosity.

We can see through Acts, examples of people who did sell their belongings, not to show off their piety but to make sure everyone in the family of God had enough.

I find that there is a certain reaction that many western Christians have to this passage. For many, the entire line of interpretation has to be either why this never actually happened as described or at least why it doesn’t apply to us. This idea of selling our possessions and giving the proceeds to the poor, that sounds too communist are at least far too socialist. For some Christians, the central value of the faith is that of capitalism, even though the Bible seems to place love in that place. Do not get me wrong, I am not critiquing capitalism, nor am I promoting communism.

All I am trying to say here is that we should not start with reasons why this doesn’t apply but rather we should begin with how it is relevant to our current context. Allow the text to speak to us apart from any fear of how it might threaten our comfort.

One other thing, who is it who is the recipient of this generosity? 

It says that they gave to anyone who was in need. However, reading this in the immediate context, looking throughout Acts and Paul’s letters, we see that those were in mind were those among the church that were in need. I don’t know about you, but that makes me uncomfortable. Much of the teaching I have received is that the church is too inward focused and not focused outward enough. The whole point of outreach is that we are to put those out there before ourselves. However, the more I study the new Testament, the more I see the idea of first making sure people are cared for in the church. This actually was outreach in the early church because people saw how the Christians took care of one another. None of this is to say that we refuse to help non-Christians. We do need to help anyone who is in our power to help. But healthy church will not care of those outside while neglecting those in the church. Think of our generosity as the air mask on an airplane. As a church, we make sure we are in healthy place so that we are able to help the person beside us.

Generosity in the Modern Church

So what does this mean for us? One option is that we could all sell all of our positions and then divide it up among all the members. But I don’t think that is what Luke is getting at.

The point is building a community based on extravagant generosity. I have been the recipient of generosity, including from this very congregation. I’m thankful that congregations love their pastors and care for them. But generosity is not just for pastors. Almost ten years ago I was quite sick and only partially employed. It was one of the most difficult times in our life. Things were extremely tight. I received an email from someone I knew but did not know that well. I was surprised to hear from him and even more surprised that he informed me that he felt as if God was telling him to send us some money. We were not close enough that he would have known our current needs. My initial thought was an extra one hundred dollars would really make a difference for us at that point. He sent $3000! That was generosity.

The truth is that not all of us have the financial resources to be generous in that way. I doubt that when we stand before God that he will count up the exact amount of money that was given to those in need. It is not about a dollar amount, it is about having a generous heart.

In the passage we are looking at, the point was that those in need had those needs met. Many needs more than just having money thrown at it. We need to pay attention to what the needs actually are. 

Simone Weil said “Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.” For those who feel isolated and marginalized, giving a person your undivided attention may be exactly what they need. There are those who feel low self-worth and whose entire day could be changed by a kind word from us. I have received phone calls and messages from people, just to tell me that they are praying for me.

Generosity is about taking something of your own that is valuable and giving it to someone else for their benefit. If you think about it, the possibilities are endless. It could be anything from paying a bill for someone to listening to their story over a cup of coffee.

Again, who is this generosity aimed at? The biblical picture is that of first showing generosity toward the community of faith. It does not mean that we neglect non-Christians but rather that we first take care of the family of God. This should spill over into the larger community but the incubator for generosity is within the church. There is a problem if we send thousands of dollars to an inner-city homeless program if there are people in our own congregation going without meals. If we care for our own with a generous heart, we will find we have what we need to meet the other needs.

Conclusion

Have you ever been the recipient of someone else’s generosity? It could be financial or anything else. Do you remember how you felt? It was probably a mix of humility and gratefulness. The early church was known for its extravagant generosity, first among their own and then beyond. In the first few centuries of the church, the Roman Empire was rocked by plagues. When every one else was running off to their own safety, the Christians were caring for the sick. After the Empire became Christian, the emperor Julian attempted to return the Empire to paganism. He found he could meet the Christians in terms of ritual and philosophical arguments but could not compete when it came to generosity.

We live in a world and context that is just as needy as any other time in history. It may be mental health or financial struggle or broken relationships. We have an opportunity to make a difference with our generosity. I know that sometimes the needs can feel overwhelming but we don’t have to fix everything. I appreciate the words of Mother Teresa: ”Never worry about numbers. Help one person at a time and always start with the person nearest you.” If we follow that advice, we will be well on our way to ensuring the health of our congregation.