We find our text in Acts chapter 2. I'm preaching from the 42nd verse of Acts chapter 2. Acts 2.42 and I'm really only preaching a part of that today because it is somewhat a shortened service today because we celebrate to suffer. But I'm going to read verses 37-47. Acts 2, 37-47. This is God's inspired and inerrant word. It deserves your careful attention. Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart. And they said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, Brethren, what shall we do? And Peter said to them, Repent, and let each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children, and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God shall call to himself. And with many other words he solemnly testified and kept on exhorting them, saying, Be saved from this perverse generation. So then those who had received his word and were baptized, rather were baptized, and there were added that day about 3,000 souls. And they were continually devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship and to the breaking of bread and to the prayers. And everyone kept feeling a sense of awe. And many wonders and signs were taking place through the apostles. And all those who had believed were together. And they had all things in common. And they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them all as anyone might have need. And day by day, continuing with one mind in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, They were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart, praising God, and having favor with all the people. And the Lord was adding to their number, day by day, those who were being saved. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the Word of our God stands forever. Amen. Please be seated as we turn again to prayer to call upon the name of our God to seek his blessing upon the preaching of his word this morning. Let's pray. Our God in heaven, your word is truth. Sanctify us in your truth. Bring your word, O God, to bear upon our hearts by the illumination of your Holy Spirit. Cause him to dwell in us with great power. Dwell in the hearts and minds of this congregation as they hear the preaching and be with the one who preaches that your word might go forth in a demonstration of the Holy Spirit's power. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen. I love Paris in the springtime, the old song goes. I've never been to Paris in the springtime, but I love just about any place in the spring. I've lived in some places that are pretty oppressive, even hotter and more humid than North Carolina, if you can imagine that. But I love the spring. in those places. It's a beautiful season of the year when everything around us is shaking the chill of winter off. Spring breezes are beginning to blow. Fresh and bright colors supplant the wintry brown. I remember more than anything that time of the year in Southern California which is a semi-arid climate and everything is brown in the summer. And then the early rains come in the winter, and then when spring comes, everything turns bright green. And that world of brown around becomes beautiful as the eye observes it. And so, when spring comes, there's new life, and there's new growth all around. The Church of God had come to the season of spring at Pentecost. In a sense, the winter was past. The spring breezes were beginning to blow because the breath of the Holy Spirit had just swept through the land. New life appeared. Three thousand souls were saved on that day. Three thousand souls on the day of Pentecost. came to saving faith, came to understand the word that Jesus had just preached, or rather Peter had just preached of Jesus. Now when they heard this, that is when they heard the sermon that Peter preached there. When he preached of this Christ who had been crucified, raised again unto new life, to give new life, they were pierced. to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, what shall we do? And Peter explained to them what they must do. They must repent and must turn from sin and be baptized for the forgiveness of sins. And he said, you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Three thousand people. I'd love to have been there, wouldn't you? On a day when three thousand people came clamoring to Peter and the rest of the apostles, begging them, standing on the threshold of the kingdom, longing, rushing in to take hold of God's kingdom. What a glorious day that would have been to see. But things went on. Luke explains to us things continued to flourish in the local church and among other things we read in the conclusion of our scripture reading this morning that day by day the Lord was adding to their number those who were being saved. Tremendous power, tremendous growth in the life of the early church. Now what does a church that's growing biblically look like? What means and what methods has God appointed to affect that growth? Now in our day and time you would get a lot of different answers from a lot of different people. Many would say we need to multiply programs in order to see the church vibrance and to see it grow. We've got to have a program for every age group of the church, from our toddlers all the way up to our seniors. There are all kinds of man-made, new-fangled methodologies in the church today. by means of which those who have invented them want to see the church grow. I don't want to doubt their sincerity. They want to glorify their God. They want to see the church grow. They want to see God glorified. But God has given us a means. God has given us biblical means by which the church is to grow. We aren't to invent them. We aren't to be clever in the way we do things in the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. God has set forth some very clear means in His Word. And we have four of them. in our text today. We're only going to talk about two of them today because our service is abbreviated by the observance of the Lord's Supper. And those two are devotion to the Apostles' teaching and to the breaking of bread. God gives us in this passage what we could call the profile of a vibrant and growing church. This is what we should look like. Not only is this what we should look like, but he's shown us then the means to achieve that. And they were continually, those 3,000 souls along with the apostles and the rest of the disciples there in Jerusalem, they were devoting themselves to the apostles teaching and to the fellowship and to the breaking of bread and to the prayers. Now I've taken some translation liberties because for I think clear reasons Luke has written this in the original with a definite article the word the preceding each of these items and so it's the apostles teaching and it's the fellowship and it's the breaking of bread and in some of your translations it reads to prayer but in the original it's the prayers and so I hope to explain that to your satisfaction later in the sermon but today this is our theme Here's what a vibrant and growing church looks like. Here's the theme of this text. There is an unwavering devotion to the means of grace in their corporate context. Now let me explain that because that's language that's somewhat unique to Reformed congregations. The means of grace. What are the means of grace? Well, our Shorter Catechism, the Westminster Shorter Catechism, defines three. But there aren't only three means of grace. It says that these are especially used by God. These are the means of grace that are especially used by God for the building up of His people, for the salvation of sinners and the edification of saints. And that is the Word of God, the sacraments, to include the Lord's Supper and baptism, and prayer. Even the word means needs explanation in our day and time. We don't use that word very much anymore, at least we don't use it in that way. When you think means, think channel. These are channels of grace. Think of a water channel. Think of a conduit. These are channels, these are conduits by which God in heaven, the Triune God, communicates His grace to His people. Especially. our catechism teaches, because that's what the Bible teaches. And so, the early church was devoted, it was intensely devoted, it was unwavering in its devotion to these means of grace. The apostles' teaching, the fellowship, the breaking of bread, and the prayers of the saints. God hasn't left it to our imaginations. to devise things, to conjure up in our minds the methods, the means by which God's people and by which His church may grow. He's given us these things. And if we will devote ourselves to these things and wait on our God, then we will grow in God's time. The problem is that God's people are impatient. And when they use these means and they don't see growth, then they determine that they're going to try something else. That's the problem. That's really the crux. of the issue. What God has told us is here are the things that I've told you to be devoted to. If you will devote yourselves to these things, you will be a vibrant and growing church in my time. The church of Jesus Christ in our day and time has said no. These things aren't working. And so we must devise things. We've got to use the things that are at our disposal. Marketing methods. We've got to market the church. We've got to do things in our worship services. Whether or not they're ordained by God, well, that's beside the point. If it brings people in, and if it causes the church to grow numerically, then God must be blessing these things. That's wrong-headed. God has given us the things to which we ought to be devoted. And this morning especially, we want to consider the Apostles' teaching and the Lord's Supper. Now, it's important to note that these things, with the exception of the Lord's Supper, can be done more or less privately. I can read the Word, I can engage in the fellowship of the saints, I can pray privately. I can pray with my family. I can do these things more or less in a private setting. I can't do that in the case of a Lord's Supper. But with the rest of them, it's possible to do these things in private. Now, that's the reason why Luke has set this definite article before each of these things in our text. The Apostles' Teaching. the fellowship, the breaking of bread, the prayers. Let's talk about corporate, the corporate aspect of each of these things. That's what he has in mind, so that's what we're going to focus on. as we talk about these things. Notice furthermore that in these three things, we're still in our preliminary comments here, we're going to get to the main theme here in a moment, but still in our preliminary comments, that in these things we see what the Reformational Church has identified as the three marks of the true Church. The preaching of God's Word, the faithful preaching of the Word, number one. Number two, the faithful exercise, the faithful administration rather, of the sacraments, baptism, and the Lord's Supper. And then wrapped up in that second aspect is a third, which is why Calvin only saw two marks of the church. He saw discipline, church discipline, that third mark, as incorporated into the Lord's Supper. Now you can see why that is, because the elders of the church are given a responsibility to bring members into the church and to admit them to the Lord's table. And one of the censures, that is one of the means of discipline that we use in Reformational churches, is suspension from the Lord's table. That's a means of discipline. And so, there are the three marks, here for us in the text. in the preaching of the word, in their devotion to the apostles teaching and to the breaking of bread to the sacraments. Pastor Ian Hamilton expresses a valid concern about the tendency in our day to dislocate these means or channels of grace from their corporate setting. God has ordained that. God has ordained that these should be practiced in the corporate setting. Resulting, he says, in the pursuit of the Christian life in isolation from the fellowship of the saints. He writes, the way God works in his people is profoundly individualistic. And that's true, isn't it? It has to be. God is my God and God is your God. And so God works in me and he works in you individualistically. But it is no less, he goes on to write, and even more foundationally corporate and covenantal. God is preparing a single bride of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's what Luke is referring to. Ian Hamilton writes in this 42nd verse when he speaks of the great company of converts who were converted so gloriously that they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship and the breaking of bread and the prayers. Finally, in these preliminary comments, let me Let's try to come to an understanding, a definition of what it means to be devoted. You know what it means to be devoted, right? We know, we have a sense of what it means to be devoted to something. According to the English definition, it's the state of being enthusiastically dedicated and loyal to a person, an idea, or a cause. Now the word that Luke uses here in the Acts of the Apostles in our text means that and much more. It means to persist or persevere at something, to do that something intensively and to continue to do that thing with intense effort with the possible implication of despite difficulty. Now that's where the trouble comes, isn't it? It's not easy to be devoted to these things. We get easily distracted. There are so many things that tear us away from our devotion to these things and those distractions have an impact on the Church of Jesus Christ and its vibrancy and its growth. And so let's look first at these two things today. We'll go on, Lord willing, in the future. What are the things to which they were devoted? Well, they were devoted to the apostles' teaching. Luke begins with doctrine, of all things. Not too popular these days, but of all things, the apostles' teaching, which Calvin comments is the very soul of the church. Ask members of the Church of Jesus Christ what the very soul of the Church is today, and I doubt very often that you will hear them say doctrine. What's in view here? Luke has in mind the authoritative public reading and preaching and teaching of God's Word. The Bible teaches that the public reading of Scripture itself is a channel of grace. The public reading of Scripture is a channel of grace. So, I don't read the text, or one of the elders, if they should be leading a worship. We don't read the text, just to kind of get ourselves in the frame of reference of the text. When God's Word is read, pure, simple, and plainly in corporate worship, it's a means of grace. And you ought to see it that way. You ought to give your attention to it in that way. Luke is setting before us this idea of reading, but especially the preaching and teaching of that word in the corporate context. And that's what the larger catechism says. It says that God makes the reading, but especially the preaching, an efficacious means for the salvation of sinners and the edification of saints. I'm paraphrasing there. But that's what it teaches. When Paul was finished with his discussion on qualifications for elders and deacons in 1 Timothy 3, he followed those instructions by saying that he hoped to come to young pastor Timothy. Timothy was a young evangelist. He was a church planter. And Paul is giving those instructions in 1st and 2nd Timothy to this young evangelist, this young church planter, in order, he said, that you may know how things ought to be ordered in the house of God. And there are instructions regarding worship in that epistle to Timothy. And so in case Paul was delayed, he's writing these things And after he gives those instructions concerning elders and deacons in chapter 3, he goes on to write, until I come, give attention to the reading, the public reading, that is. The apostle goes on in the second epistle to Timothy, give yourself to exhortation. Now, what does that mean? It's preaching. In that second epistle, he says this very strongly. He says, preach the word, Timothy, in season and out of season. Rebuke, reprove, exhort. Because, he says, in the latter days there is going to come a time when people don't want to hear the rebukes and the exhortations and the pleadings of Scripture. they'll want to get somebody who will tickle their ears and so he says preach the word and so we believe that in these passages 1st Timothy 4.13, 2nd Timothy 4.1 and 2 we believe that the Westminster Shorter Catechism is right when it says that God makes the preaching of his word, the primary means of grace. The primary means of saving sinners. The primary means of edifying his things. Now the church doesn't believe that anymore. That's why they've devised all other sorts of things to use in public worship. That's why there are dramatic presentations in church. That's why there are slideshows in churches. That's why all sorts of things like ballet and other means have been brought in. These new measures have been brought into the church because the church no longer believes that the preaching of the word is God's primary means of grace. The primary means by which he'll save sinners and edify his saints. Preaching, they say, is outdated. People won't listen to preaching anymore. They won't sit and listen. They don't have the time. They don't have the patience. We live in a video, a visual world. And so, preaching gets pushed to the side. And all these other things are lumped in its place. But the truth of God's Word stands. It is the primary means of saving sinners and edifying his saints. Now, what did it mean that they were devoted to the apostles' teaching? What were they devoting themselves to? Well, they didn't have the New Testament at this time, of course. And so, they were devoting themselves to the apostles' explanation of the Old Testament Scripture. That's what Peter had just done in the sermon that he preached. You notice how he says in verse 25, he makes reference to David, the psalmist David. David says of him, Acts 2.25, I was always beholding the Lord in my presence, for he is at my right hand, that I may not be shaken. Therefore, my heart was glad and my tongue was exalted. Moreover, my flesh will also abide in hope, because you will not abandon my soul to Hades, nor allow your Holy One to undergo decay. You have made known to me the ways of life. You will make me full of gladness with your presence." Now Peter explains. This is what the apostolic teaching did. He goes on in verse 29. Brethren, I may constantly say to you, regarding the patriarch David, that he both died, and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day." What's he saying? He's saying David's body did undergo decay. It's rotted. Well, who's he speaking about then? Who's David speaking about there in Psalm 16? And so, because he was a prophet, he knew that God had sworn to him, verse 30, with an oath to seat one of his descendants upon his throne, and he looked ahead and he spoke of the resurrection of Christ. that he was neither abandoned to Hades nor did his flesh suffer decay. And he goes on. Springtime. Springtime, brethren, had come to the church of Jesus Christ at Pentecost. And for the first time, it wasn't the first time that the prophets understood that these prophecies had reference to the Messiah. But it was the very first time that they saw with so much clarity that the Apostle Peter could stand on the day of Pentecost and proclaim to that multitude of souls that were there that day, Brethren, this is what the Old Testament Scriptures meant when they said that the Holy One wouldn't undergo decay. those glorious and wondrous warm spring winds were blowing that's what the apostles teaching was the explication then of what the Old Testament scriptures meant in all their fullness, the fullness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now you see, that teaching, the apostles' teaching, by God's glorious grace and providence, has become inscripturated. So that we have the fullness of that revelation mapped out for us in the Old and New Testaments. And so we like those believers at Jerusalem after Pentecost may devote ourselves to the apostles teaching because God has provided that there should continue to be an office by which this word shall be proclaimed authoritatively as God's people gather together And so let me ask you, are you devoted to the apostles teaching? What did it mean for these folks to be devoted? It meant when the apostles were teaching, when the apostles teaching was in progress, they were there. They were there at its Preaching. Can you imagine, in those days of vibrancy and growth of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, missing such an event? When with great authority, accompanied then, not now, but then, with signs and wonders, God's Word went forth with such great power in the Spirit's presence, so that it struck the souls of those who heard it, just like it did that day. of Pentecost. Can you imagine being among that company of believers and hearing the apostles preach the Word? Are you devoted to that Word today? When the Word is being preached, are you there? When God's people gather together in the corporate assembly for worship. Do you see that as God has ordained, it's an absolute necessity that you be there, unless, in God's providence, you're prohibited. What does that mean? Well, it means you're sick, or you're in the desert somewhere, in Iraq or Afghanistan, You can't get to the public assembly. The Old Testament saints knew what it was to be in the corporate assembly. David, you remember, bemoans, remembers, as he's wandering around being chased by Saul, what it was like to be in the throng of God's people in the assembly of the saints at temple worship. He remembered and he bemoans. the fact that he's not there with God's people. Is that the way you feel when you're not in worship? Do you feel like that? Do you feel as though you're missing something absolutely important, absolutely vital to your spiritual growth? God has ordained that wherever I am on planet Earth, unless I am providentially hindered, that I be, if I'm a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, if God has saved me unto Himself, if God has revealed Himself to me, God has ordained that I should gather every Lord's day in the assembly of the saints, to worship with them, and to sit under the preaching of His Word as the primary means by which He brings growth to my soul. Do you hear that? Not Bible study. Bible study is a good thing. Not my private worship. Private worship is a good thing. Not family worship. That's a marvelous thing. But the primary way that God has determined to channel His grace into our souls is the preaching of His Word. Are you there morning and evening on the Lord's Day when the Word is being preached? The elders of this congregation have seen fit, as I think every session of every congregation ought to see fit, to arrange for two public worship services on the Lord's Day. and at those public worship services the Word of God is preached. Now the exception is today. We have for some years now had an afternoon service of singing and corporate prayer where we pray for our foreign missions and our home missions and our Christian education and the life of this denomination. But every other Lord's Day we have two worship services. Are you there? Would you dare miss an opportunity to sit under the preaching of the Word? What about when we arrange for special conferences like we do in the spring, where there is a season of preaching? Are you there? Do you commit yourself? Is it important enough for you to sit under the preaching of the Word that you gather with God's people and hear it preached when the elders of the church arrange these special conferences. That's what it means, brethren, that's what it means to be devoted to the apostles' teaching. Now, the Westminster standards see the preaching of the Word as primary because the Bible teaches that God's Word is over the sacraments. God's Word is over the sacraments. The sacraments are subordinate to God's Word. Because as Calvin said, the Word explains the sacraments. And that's the second thing to which this company of believers was devoted. They were devoted to the breaking of bread. Now the breaking of bread is a technical term. used in the Book of Acts. The breaking of bread means they observed the Lord's Supper as Jesus had established it. Do this, Jesus had instructed them, as often as you eat the bread and drink the wine in remembrance of me. Because though the springtime had come, the wintry death of the Lord Jesus Christ was still fresh on their minds. certainly the apostles knew firsthand of Christ's suffering. His arrest at Gethsemane, his trial before the chief priests there at Jerusalem, and then when the Lord died, the cursed death of the cross. And no doubt many others who were presence with this company of believers at Jerusalem had also a close brush. If they were not there to witness the Lord's suffering directly, they knew what their Lord had undergone. And so it was fresh on their minds. It was fresh to them. Later, Paul would say, you proclaim the Lord's death. First Corinthians 11, 26, until he comes. That's what we do. It's a proclamation of death. It's a proclamation of a death sentence that God brought upon His only begotten Son. And so, as they came to break bread, they had that freshly upon their minds. Now, as they came to observe the Lord's Supper, There's this corporate aspect of participating together. The scripture tells us, Paul tells us, that the sacraments are a fellowshipping, a fellowshiping together in the cup, 1 Corinthians 10. It's not the cup we drink of fellowshipping together in Christ's blood. There is an individual sense to the Lord's Supper, obviously. I can't take the cup for you, I can't take the bread for you, you can't take it for me. I must participate individually in the Supper. This is a symbol of our oneness as the mystical body of Christ. That's what we're doing this morning, among many other things. The Lord's Supper is a pregnant symbol. It means so much. Difficult to get a grasp on what it means, but it's important that we do. It's important that we do so if we're going to participate individually. I must grasp for myself, I must take hold of what the sacraments mean for myself, and I must take hold of what they mean for the body of Christ, corporately. And if I'm going to do that, then I must give the sacraments more than a passing thought. And that's why the elders encourage you before At least we try to be faithful to encourage you before the Lord's Supper approaches a week before, prepare yourselves. We ask you to do so by reading 1 Corinthians 11, 23 and following. And we ask you to do so by considering the larger catechism 168-175 to work your way through bit by bit these answers to the larger catechism's questions concerning Lord's Suffering. And if you will, you see, if you'll do that, if you're faithful, then it will help you to be devoted to the breaking of bread. Because you, individually, will take hold of that sacrament by faith. That's how we enjoy the body and blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Carnally, that is, not in the flesh, there's no mystery, there's no mysterious way by which these elements become the body and the blood of Christ. There's not a mysterious way that Christ's body and blood are somehow with, at, above, around, present, the elements of the bread and the wine. Christ makes himself known. Christ comes to visit us. through His Spirit in the Lord's Supper. That means I must apprehend the Lord's Supper by faith. And faith, you remember, has a component of knowledge. And so I must know what God intended for this supper. I must know, I've got to get a grip, a good grasp on what it means when I take the elements of the bread and the element of the wine and as they're assimilated into my body that by faith Christ becomes a part of me in a greater way spiritually that's what the supper is And so the more, the more you know, those, got those commercials on TV these days, the more you know about this or that. It's very true in a sense. The more you know about the supper, the more you will profit. And it won't just be a formality for you. That's not the way God has designed us. He hasn't designed us to come as believers and sit in the pew and rotely take the bread and take the wine without any preparation or without any thought. He's designed these things as a channel, a channel of grace. Do you believe that? Do you believe that God by His Spirit and by His power channels grace to you through the Lord's Supper. We apprehend that by faith, brethren. It's going to take some effort on your part. Calvin says that in the sacraments God provides first for our ignorance and then our weakness. must not have a very high estimation of us believers. He provides for our ignorance because we can comprehend all that Christ has done for us. And what we do comprehend, we forget so easily. And so He provides this meal of remembrance so that we don't become blind or short-sighted, as Peter says, having forgotten our purification for sins. But furthermore, He makes provision for our weakness. He extends the promise of salvation in His Word. And the purpose of the sacraments is to confirm and seal the promise of God's Word for us. Now, God doesn't need to confirm His Word. His Word is already sure. It's already strong. It's already established. What's needed is to establish our faith in that promise. Calvin says, God's truth is firm and sure, but our faith is slight and feeble, unless it be propped up on all sides and sustained by every means. It trembles, wavers, totters, and at last gives way. Does that describe your faith? It describes mine. I hope you've come to the realization that it describes yours as well. That it is weak, that it trembles, it wavers, it totters, and unless God props it up on all sides, it at last gives way. And God takes you God comes to you in the sacraments. God comes to you in the Lord's Supper. He comes alongside of you as His children, as His precious little children. And He undertakes to nourish us and strengthen us by this means of grace. The Lord's Supper is a grand demonstration of the Father's care for his little children. And he says to you, let me come alongside of you. Let me remind you of what I've done for you. In the death of my only begotten son. Let me remind you of his body broken, his blood shed on your behalf. In it he says, here's my little children, this is the supreme sacrifice of your elder brother. Let me show you how much I love you. That's what God does in a Lord's Supper. If the sacrifice of Christ is a demonstration supremely of God's love for us then the sacraments are meant to remind us of how much God loves us as his children I'm afraid that the same is true here as it is in any other element of worship that it's so easy to be here and to take the supper and to hear the explanation of the supper and it doesn't mean a thing to us because we haven't taken hold of it by faith. Would you see this church become more vibrant? Would you see greater growth spiritually? Numerical growth is overrated. Now, we all long to see numerical growth as well. But we've said that that's in God's timing. A vibrant, growing church is one that is growing in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. And apprehending these things, devoting itself to the apostles' teaching, devoting itself to the breaking of bread. If you would see a more vibrant expression of the church of Jesus Christ in this local entity, then devote yourselves to these things. We'll go on to consider two other things the next time we're together, Lord willing, the fellowship and the prayers of God's saints. But devote yourselves to these things, because these things are those things to which the early church was devoted and God blessed her for it. Modern church growth gurus cannot look at the early church, they cannot look at this account in the Acts of the Apostles and say that this was not a vibrant and growing congregation. Now with that in mind, let's turn very briefly as we conclude to what we said devotion means. We said it means to continue to do something with intense effort with the possibility of despite difficulty. And I've already alluded to the fact that it is difficult, isn't it? It's difficult to sit in a service like this and give your attention to the preaching of God's Word because sometimes it gets rather long. But that's what the word means, despite. It's difficult to devote ourselves to the preaching of God's Word morning and evening on the Lord's Day. But that's what the Word means. It's difficult to arrange my schedule so that on Saturday evening, or at least sometime in the week, take myself and if I have a family if I have a wife and children I gather that family and children and I come before the family altar and I say family we're going to we're going to feast on the Lord's body and blood this coming Lord's Day I know it's difficult because I'm a father and I have responsibilities and I have a wife and children and I failed many times in this obligation but that doesn't mean I don't try to be faithful to do so, to gather my family and to read that passage in 1 Corinthians 11 which tells me to examine myself to see whether I ought to come to the Lord's table and then to consider what it means so that I might apprehend these things by faith. Now, we might Someone might think, someone might say, that those early Christians, they just didn't have all the stuff to clutter up their lives like we do. They weren't as busy as we are. They didn't have as many things to do as we have to do today. But I would argue just the opposite. They didn't have all the conveniences that we have in life today. They didn't have microwave ovens and conventional ovens to prepare their meals. They were by and large an agrarian society and if you think you work hard, visit a farmer sometime and you'll find out what hard work is. And yet they were devoted to these things. And so the question that you ought to take away today is am I, not somebody else, But am I, do I devote myself to the apostles teaching and to the breaking of bread? May God bless his word by his spirit, because if he doesn't, it will have absolutely no impact whatsoever. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, you are good and gracious and kind to give us these things. You're good, oh Lord, to give us your word in the apostolic teaching and in its Old Testament formulation. You are good and gracious, O Lord, to give us these, to give us the visible word in the sacraments, that we might understand what Christ has done. O Lord, teach us to be devoted to the things to which we ought to be devoted. and use these channels of grace, these conduits of your favor as you have designed them in the lives of your people today. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen. It is fitting for us as we gather today to worship the Triune God that we recite some expression of our common faith in the Triune God which we'll do today using the Apostles Creed which is found on 845 in the back of the Trinity Hymnal 845 at the back of the Trinity Hymnal