Good morning! Today we are continuing our series as we start the year in the book of Acts. If you remember, Acts is the story of how God worked to form and grow this small group of Jesus’ followers into a multi-cultural, multi-national group of churches. A couple weeks ago, we talked about how Jesus’ command to his disciples in Acts 1 is to wait for the Holy Spirit. How we should be people who are attentive to where the Holy Spirit is leading us. Last week, we talked about how being led by the Spirit, this group of Jesus followers took on this lifestyle that looked different from the people around them as a response to the work of the Spirit in their midst. Today, we’re going to see how these apostles bear witness to the movement of the Spirit.

Let’s pray before we go any further:
Lord, thank you for our time together today. Thank you for using this weekly gathering to encourage us and form us into people who are more like Christ. If there’s anything from me today that’s not from you, God, I just ask that you will remove it from our hearing. Give us a message today that can plant itself in our hearts and grow us into who you want us to be. Thank you for Jesus, in His name we pray, Amen.

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Acts 4:1-14
The priests and the captain of the temple guard and the Sadducees came up to Peter and John while they were speaking to the people. ² They were greatly disturbed because the apostles were teaching the people, proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection of the dead. ³ They seized Peter and John and, because it was evening, they put them in jail until the next day. ⁴ But many who heard the message believed; so the number of men who believed grew to about five thousand.

⁵ The next day the rulers, the elders and the teachers of the law met in Jerusalem. ⁶ Annas the high priest was there, and so were Caiaphas, John, Alexander and others of the high priest’s family. ⁷ They had Peter and John brought before them and began to question them: “By what power or what name did you do this?”

⁸ Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them: “Rulers and elders of the people! ⁹ If we are being called to account today for an act of kindness shown to a man who was lame and are being asked how he was healed, ¹⁰ then know this, you and all the people of Israel: It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed. ¹¹ Jesus is
“‘the stone you builders rejected,
    which has become the cornerstone.’^[a]

¹² Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.”

¹³ When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus. ¹⁴ But since they could see the man who had been healed standing there with them, there was nothing they could say. 

So let me try and set the stage a little bit for what we just read. Before this, in chapter 3 of Acts, Peter and John are heading up to the Temple when they encounter a lame man, a beggar who asks them for money. Peter and John tell him we don’t have any money, but in the Name of Jesus, get up and walk. So, he gets up and he’s rejoicing! This miracle just happened. All three of them head on into the Temple and the people around are going crazy. Not every day you see a miracle happen, and they know it to be a miracle because they know this guy, they’ve seen him there day after day, and now all of a sudden here he is walking around with these two other guys saying he’s been healed.

Well of course, this draws a lot of attention to them. People are starting to think that this Peter & John guy are miracle workers. God has worked in a mighty way, and instead of accepting even an ounce of credit, Peter quickly lets the people know what really happened. He says this miracle wasn’t by us. That guy that was crucified, that you all wanted to be crucified, he’s the reason for this. And the truth is that most of you didn’t know any better when Jesus was put to death, but now you do. So if you are having a change of heart and want to undergo a heart and life transformation, now is the time. All those prophets you know about in Israel told your ancestors about this guy. Jesus was legit, the real deal. So come get on board and be renewed.

Peter and John had waited for the Spirit to arrive, and they had been attentive to the Spirit, and they just participated in this miraculous moment of healing, and now they are bearing witness to that. They aren’t willing to accept any praise from this. They are taking this moment of wonder and awe and pointing the people towards the good news of Jesus.

This is what we are going to see over and over as we work through Acts over the next couple months. People are attentive to the movement of the Holy Spirit, God moves in power through healings, prison breaks, and blinding lights, and the people of God bear witness to what God has done. Amazing things happen, and the people of God aren’t quiet about it. They step out and let people know that God is responsible, inviting those around into a renewed life.

And this is where chapter 4 starts…
While Peter and John are testifying to the Lordship of Jesus and the power of the Spirit to enter our world in mighty ways, the religious leaders step in. Peter and John are preaching this good news of resurrection and they don’t want that spreading around. That would mean that they were wrong in their assessment of Jesus. This could unseat these religious leaders’ place in society, and that’s not what they want! So they take Peter and John and throw them in jail. But these religious leaders were too late, a bunch of people heard and accepted what Peter and John were proclaiming, the church grew.

So the next day, they bring Peter and John in from jail and ask them “by what power or what name did you do this?” See there’s no debate that this did indeed happen. That crippled beggar who has been hanging out by the gate near the Temple, now he’s walking around. There’s no debate that it happened, they just want to know, how do you explain such a thing? And I wonder what in their mind they were hoping Peter and John would say. I don’t know, but what I do know is this: Peter and John once again took this opportunity to bear witness to what God had done. This was a miracle done by the power of and in the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.

Peter & John were attentive to the Holy Spirit, God worked in a mighty way, and now they are bearing witness to what God has done. And this is what we are called to do as well. We are supposed to invite God into our lives and into our world, be attentive to ways that God may be moving in our midst, and give God glory for the ways that we see God working. We bear witness to what God has done.

So why do we bear witness? I think most of us know that we should tell people about how we’ve seen God work, but maybe we’re not sure why. So let’s talk about it. For starters, I think sharing how we’ve seen God work helps other people gain some language or understanding that they didn’t have before. For instance, there have been times in my life when there were people who I was having a really hard time dealing with. I didn’t want to see them, and you all know this, we don’t always get to choose who we interact with. And through prayer, I have seen God work in my heart over time to help me view people more fondly and to forgive people that I have had conflict with. That’s bearing witness to a way God has worked, and there could be someone I share that with who may think, I’ve never thought about how God could change the way I feel about someone, that’s cool.

Another reason I think its important to bear witness is to encourage each other. Throughout our lives we’re not going to always feel the same way about God and how we’re seeing God move. This weekend the shepherds and ministers from both campuses had a little retreat where we prayed together and shared how we have seen God moving in the last year. On Friday night we shared moments of joy that we were able to experience in 2024. At the end, one of the shepherds was really moved and said thank you for sharing these moments of joy because the last year was really hard for her. They spent most of last year dealing with a tough diagnosis and the beginning of treatment for a loved one. There’s a lot of those days in our lives where its hard to see God working, but when we bear witness to what God is doing, it can encourage those who aren’t seeing it in the moment.

And finally, I think its important to bear witness to what God is doing so that God gets the glory for what’s happening. When I think about our Mobile Food Pantries, and how many people in our community got fed last year, I want you to know that those were successful because of God’s faithfulness and provision. I promise you its not because of our elaborate planning and good strategy. God continues to provide volunteers from unexpected places to come and serve in the Kingdom, and many of them don’t even have an understanding that that’s what they’re doing. If it was all up to our planning and our precision, we’d be falling way short on a lot more stuff. God is working among us. James 1 says that every good and perfect gift comes from God. We praise God for the good things that we see and experience.

So we know we should and maybe now we have a few reasons why, but what keeps us from bearing witness to what God is doing? Why don’t we do this more? I think there’s a few reasons that we don’t do this as much as we should. Number one, I think we’re a little too afraid of being socially weird. We don’t want to be that guy who’s always bringing up God, and we’re afraid that this may turn people off. And this concerns me, because I think sharing with people how we experience God working in our life is one of the lowest hanging fruits of evangelism. Like, sharing the good news of Jesus doesn’t have to be complicated or formal or even that thorough. When we share how God is transforming us or showing up in ways we didn’t expect, we are sharing our faith.

I think that another reason that we don’t bear witness to what God is doing is because we’re not looking to see what God is doing. I think we sort of operate on auto-pilot most of the time when it comes to the spiritual element of our lives. We’re so distracted and concerned with other things, that we don’t take the time to pause and reflect on what God might be up to among us. Furthermore, I think our understanding of how God might work or move in our midst is way too narrow. Can we ask God to wake us up to the work that we don’t yet see or know? So how can we slow down and be attentive to God? How can we wait? Practices like prayer and Sabbath help us resist the distractions and concerns of the moment and lean into listening and watching for God.

And finally, I think many of us probably feel too insignificant or too insecure. We don’t think our bearing witness to God matters. Well, if that’s the case, I’ve got news for you, God uses people like you. The religious leaders in this story were amazed because Peter and John are out here sharing how God is working with the people and they were just uneducated Galileans, just some country bumpkins. God wants to use us no matter our education, our race, our socio-economic status, our gender, whatever.

God is in the business of using people of all kinds to share the good news of the kingdom of God, and we’re going to see more examples of this as we continue to work our way through Acts. You are not too small a voice or too untrained to share how you experience God. God can work through us in mighty ways, but are we willing to share with each other and those outside of this room what God is doing?

Let us be people who begin to bear witness to what God is doing among us, the ways that God is transforming us, the ways God provides for us, the ways that God intervenes in our world for good. Let’s trust that God will show up for us and share that in our circles when it happens.

Each week, we go to the Table together as a way of bearing witness to one another as to what Jesus has done for us. The bread and juice at the tables around the room symbolize Jesus’ body and blood. And in eating and drinking this together we remember Jesus, who came and lived, died and was resurrected. Jesus is alive, and we celebrate that together at the Table today. All are welcome to join us at the tables around the room.

Let’s pray:
Lord, thank you for the ways that you work in us and around us, both those ways that we see and can articulate and the ways we can’t. God, wake us up to your work in our midst, and give us the boldness to bear witness to your movement among us. Help us to be more like Jesus. In His Name we pray, Amen.

This sermon was delivered on January 19th, 2025 at the New Garden Campus of Woodmont Hills Church. You can watch the video here.