Faith in Action: “Sharing Possessions”
Acts 4:32-37
April 7, 2024
“The whole group of those who believed was of one heart and soul,
and no one claimed private ownership of any possession,
but everything they owned was held in common….”
We begin today an Easter season worship series titled Faith in Action.
Our first text describes the life of the earliest Christian community in Jerusalem,
who voluntarily gave up private possessions so that none of their members would be in need.
Hear the Word of God from Acts 4:32-37
Now 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.
With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus,
and great grace was upon them all. There 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.
They laid it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.
There was a Levite, a native of Cyprus, Joseph, to whom the apostles gave the name Barnabas
(which means ‘son of encouragement’). He sold a field that belonged to him,
then brought the money, and laid it at the apostles’ feet.
The Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.
United Methodist Bishop Will Willimon once wrote:
“When you think about it, the quality of the church’s life together
is evidence for the truthfulness of the resurrection.
The most eloquent testimony to the reality of the resurrection is not an empty tomb
or a well-orchestrated pageant on Easter Sunday,
but rather a group of people whose life together is so radically different,
so completely changed from the way the world builds a community,
that there can be no explanation other than that something decisive has happened in history.”
(Interpretation: Acts, William H. Willimon, page 51)
What made the Easter event, the resurrection of Jesus Christ, real to people over the centuries
is not any explanation of how that might have happened.
The gospel stories and the witness of those first apostles are very succinct in their words
about the resurrection event itself.
It was the style of life, the quality of community,
the life and death commitment to God and to one another, of those who believed the resurrection
that caught the world’s attention. (Will Willimon, Interpretation: Acts, p.51)
In short, the resurrection of Jesus Christ brought forth a radically different sort of communal living.
“…The whole group of those who believed was of one heart and soul,
and no one claimed private ownership of any possession,
but everything they owned was held in common.
With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus,
and great grace was upon them all.” (4:33)
These who had so recently been hiding out in fear behind closed doors
came together in boldness and began to live as radically different people.
The power of resurrection gave them courage to live by the will of God,
and their priorities in life were completely overturned.
In a recent book I have been reading, Called to Community: The Life Jesus Wants for His People,
the introduction to the book includes a question that was asked some forty years ago:
“How would you go about destroying community,
(how would you go about) isolating people from one another and from a life shared with others?
The following strategies were offered:
-fragment family life,
-move people away from the neighborhoods where they grew up,
-set people farther apart by giving them bigger houses and yards,
-and separate the places people work from where they live.
In other words, ‘partisan off people’s lives into as many worlds as possible.’
To facilitate this process, get everyone their own car.
Replace meaningful communication with television.
And finally, cut down on family size and fill people’s homes with things instead.
The result? A post-familial, disconnected culture where self is king,
relationships are thin, and individuals fend for themselves.”
(Charles E. Moore, Introduction to Called to Community: The Life Jesus Wants for His People, pg. xvii)
This description of our current culture is perhaps a bit harsh, but there are many kernels of truth here.
We have said before that our nation is an epidemic of anxiety attacks,
as well as an epidemic of suicide, some 30,000 per year, as well as an epidemic of loneliness.
This human suffering from anxiety, suicide, and loneliness arises
when there exists a dearth of genuine human community,
a dearth of genuine care and concern and sharing of one’s life with others.
There were several marks worth noting in that early community of Christian believers.
Acts 2 describes how they met together often at the temple.
They broke bread together in different homes and shared their food happily and freely.
They praised God together, and every day the Lord added to their number.
Meeting together often at church is not to be taken for granted these days,
especially on the Sunday after Easter when it is still Spring Break for many!
Breaking bread together at homes…people don’t seem to host dinner parties as often as they used to.
But here’s the part that is really striking to our 21st century sensibilities:
“No one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common.”
A key element to that post-resurrection community was that possessions were held in common.
Now, this practice of communal ownership observed in Jerusalem by these early apostles
was unlike any modern communism practiced in the world today.
The key difference is that their offerings of land and possessions were completely voluntary.
There was no government requirement that the believers had to sell all they owned
in order to belong to the community.
They gave all they had, not by compulsion, but out of love for Jesus Christ and for one another.
And no one among their number went in need for anything.
Those who owned land and houses would sell them and bring the proceeds before the apostles,
who would distribute as any had need.
This post-resurrection community was of “one heart and soul”.
They were unified in their purpose and desire, which was to spread the good news
of the resurrection of Jesus Christ and to live as a community of “Easter people”.
Some will claim that the inspiration of those early disciples was the belief that the end was coming soon,
that Jesus would return soon, within their lifetimes.
However, Al Winn, in his commentary on Acts, wrote that the material sharing of goods was not
all about the end times, but simply a natural consequence of a deep inner sharing of the Holy Spirit.
Barnabas, who later became a key leader in the early church, was an admirable character.
The apostles gave him the name “Son of Encouragement”,
for he was quick to encourage others in what could often be a dangerous, life-threatening ministry.
The unselfishness of Barnaba is lifted up as he becomes the example of one who sold a piece of land
and brought all the proceeds and laid them at the apostles’ feet.
Pay attention: This just may be one of the most astounding passages in the whole of the New Testament!
We could easily skip right by it if we are not paying attention:
“There 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. They laid it at the apostles’ feet
and it was distributed to each as any had need.” (4:34-35)
We are aware of how important land was and is in the Middle East!
Not only was land the source of most people’s livelihood in those days,
but land was also sacred space passed down from one generation to the next.
Members of my former congregation in South Carolina could trace their land ownership
back to a grant from the King of England prior to the revolutionary war, which is significant.
But when I visited the Old City Jerusalem some years ago, I visited a pizza parlor
whose owners can trace back their land ownership not hundreds, but literally thousands of years.
People in the Middle East do not sell land lightly.
And certainly no self-respecting Palestinian or Jew would let go of land voluntarily,
land which they can trace back for numerous generations.
According to Luke in the Acts of the Apostles, soon after the resurrection,
these early disciples did so, willingly, voluntarily! (Joseph Gettys, How to Study Acts, p. 49)
Their security no longer would lie in their possessions.
Their sense of worth would not lie in the quality of the things that belonged to them.
Their hope for the future would not rest in their retirement portfolio.
Rather, their security, their worth, and their hope came to rest in the One to whom they belonged,
the One to whom they had given their lives, the One who had given his life for them.
Martin Luther once called “security” the ultimate idol for human beings.
Human beings are willing to exchange anything – their family, health, church, truth –
for a taste of security, and so often security is wrapped up in money and possessions. (Willimon, p.54)
Accumulating money or possessions, or spending money the way we want,
are attempts to deal with our insecurity about ourselves as limited human beings.
While we can argue that the viability of this nation’s economy rests upon private ownership,
and while we can argue that today’s economies are far more complex than the first century,
still, there are contemporary groups who actually practice voluntary communism quite successfully.
In Germany and in Pennsylvania today, groups called the “Bruderhof”,
or “Brotherhood”, live self-sufficiently in Christian community and share all of their possessions.
Some of the practices and writings which come out of these communities are quite inspiring.
Heinrich Arnold’s book Discipleship has had a radical impact
upon the way I think about life in today’s Christian community, and I commend it to you.
The key is that economic decisions are ultimately spiritual decisions.
No human being is an island unto himself or herself.
Everything we do, everything we spend, everything we invest has some impact on the people around us.
Nurturing genuine human community requires a significant impact on our daily life.
Genuine fellowship and sharing will require our time, our talents, and yes, our possessions.
Let me be clear. The intent of exploring this text today is not to take this idea of communal living
out of this first century context and try to make it work in Decatur today.
Our intent is to consider the quality of community life in those post-resurrection years.
Our intent is to examine their deep commitment to each other and to the will of God.
Our intent is to reflect upon the freedom and security they experienced
when there was not a needy person among them.
As Will Willimon claims, by the grace of God,
“the same power which broke the bonds of death on Easter”
and made the lame to walk and the blind to see
can also release our tight grip on our money and possessions. (p.53)
Those who received the fire of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost
caused the church to grow from a mere handful of fearful believers to a worldwide institution.
The Holy Spirit called them to live and proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ,
and nothing, not persecution, not death, and certainly not their love of money or possessions,
was going to stop them.
Friends, as we gather at this Table once again,
I am ever so grateful for the faith in action of this Christian community.
You regularly make genuine sacrifices of your time and your resources
for the sake of each other, for the sake of this community of faith.
And after raising over $355,000 for a Keep DPC Cool Campaign goal of $253,000,
I am no longer concerned about the debt we must retire or the future capital projects
we will address next spring in our bicentennial year.
Because of the power of the resurrection at work among you, this congregation is on a roll.
The present and future of this congregation is bright,
because you are committed to nurturing genuine human community.
As we gather at the Table, I am ever so grateful for your faith in action,
your willingness to share of yourselves, and of your time, and of your resources for the common good.
May it be said here that the power of resurrection has given us courage to live by the will of God,
and to have our priorities refocused towards living in genuine human community.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Dr. Todd Speed
Decatur Presbyterian Church
Decatur, Georgia
