The first seven verses. Philippians 4 verse 1. Therefore, my brethren dearly beloved and longed for, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, my dearly beloved. I beseech Eudeus and I beseech Cynthia that they be of the same mind in the Lord. And I entreat thee also, true yoked fellow, help those women which laboured with me in the gospel, with Clement also, and with other my fellow labourers, whose names are in the book of life. Rejoice in the Lord all the way. And again, I say, rejoice. Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand. Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God. On the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Amen. I'd like to turn now back to Acts chapter 2. When I've been doing the Bible studies for the last few months, we've been looking at Acts and we've arrived at the end of chapter 2. And I want to try and finish tonight on this chapter, so God willing, we'll be able to move on to chapter 3 in a few weeks' time. So, Acts chapter 2, beginning at verse 41. You will remember that it's the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit has descended, and the disciples are filled with the Spirit. And then Peter stands up to explain what's happened in terms of fulfillment of the prophecy of Joel. And then he speaks about the Lord Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth. He starts with what they knew, and he builds on that, the crucifixion and the purposes of God in that. The resurrection, he quotes from the Old Testament from David the Psalmist. And then he comes to a conclusion that, Verse 36, Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made the same Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. He lays the responsibility very heavily upon them, even though this was obviously in the sovereign purposes of God. And the response to this gospel and the work of the Spirit in their hearts, they are told in verse 37, Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart, and said unto Peter and the rest of the apostles, Men and brethren, what shall we do? And Peter said unto them, Repent, be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you and to your children and to all that are far off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call. And with many other words did he testify and exhort, saying, Save yourselves from this untoward generation. And then what follows is the response to that. Verse 41 says, Then they that gladly received his word were baptized, and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls. and they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship and in breaking of bread and in prayers and fear came upon every soul and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles and all that believed were together and had all things common. and sold their possessions and goods and parted them to all men as every man had need. And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God and having favour with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily, such as should be saved. I've often mentioned my interest in revival, not just because I'm Welsh and the Welsh revival, but in Ireland and Scotland and parts of England and indeed parts of the world. One of the things that has interested me is not just how it started and from very little beginnings, often a little prayer meeting, one or two gather together to seek the Lord, not only how it began and how it progressed, But what happened afterwards? What happened when all these folk brought into the kingdom? What happened afterwards? What was it like weeks, months, years later on? And it's very informative to find out, well, okay, but did it last? Did it continue? And often the high peaks did not continue. These were great high peaks and they slowly went down. But what was left? What was genuine? What continued that was of benefit, yea, eternal benefit? And again, as I say, very interesting to see this. Well, we are looking now at what happened after this great day of Pentecost. Some of it will be the same day and I guess the rest of it will be days and weeks that followed. and we're told that they received the word they were baptised. Interestingly, it seems that they were baptised almost the same day in which they were believed. I was talking to a man on Sunday and he said he was converted in a local church and he had to wait two years before he was baptised. because they wanted to see and make sure that his conversion was genuine. Now, I can understand that and we don't want somebody saying, yes, I'm a believer and yes, okay, we baptise you the day after. I know we have to be careful, but when you come to the Scriptures, it does seem, not only here but we think of the jailer, people were baptised the very same day if not the very same hour. Now, I just present that to you as a fact, all right, whether we will change our practice or whether other folk should or whatever, but that's what happened. But we have to then say, yes, but don't forget that the folk who were doing this baptising and receiving these people as it were into membership, in British commas, they were apostles and they were given a Holy Spirit-inspired discernment. which, alas, we do not have and certainly not to the extent that they have it. So, we have to be a bit careful and say, well, that is what they did then, therefore, that is what we should do. We have to be a bit more careful because we are not apostles, obviously. Anyway, let us go on from verse 42. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship and in breaking of bread and in prayers. Great verse, standard verse, classic verse, we all know this and it is often preached upon. I want to just emphasize one little word there, and they continued. They continued. As far as I can see, as I read my Bible, there must be a continuing. If there is a genuine work of grace, if the Holy Spirit genuinely works in conviction and conversion and regeneration, if a person is really brought to faith, then there will be, yea, there must be a continuing. The Lord talks about the truth and the truth will set you free. And if you continue, there's an if there, if you continue, When Paul writes to Timothy, he urges Timothy to continue in the things you have heard, and from whom you have heard them. There must be a continuing. And I'm concerned that sometimes, if we're not careful, we can say, oh yes, somebody's a believer. Yes, they've made a commitment, or they're seemingly generally converted, but it doesn't last very long, and out they're back in the world. There's no continuation and you have to wonder, was that person genuinely converted? Was he, she genuinely, did they come to faith? Or was it a little flash in the pan? Was it a psychological thing even? Was there pressure brought upon them? Now I heard a preacher last week, some of you know I've been in Aberystwyth at the conference, I heard a preacher say something I don't think I've ever heard a preacher say before. And I thought it, particularly because of something somebody said to me locally in Hailsham. And he said this. He said, I'm concerned, particularly with Christian parents who say that their little girl or boy came to faith at a little age of five or six or whatever, but then as they grow older, they went away from church and from the Lord and they've been far away ever since. And he said, I wonder if they were ever saved. Now, having heard that from this man who was very famous, I thought, wow. Because somebody said it to me, locally. Their children, they prayed a little prayer. And obviously, they're saved. And therefore, of course, once saved, always saved, they'd be there in heaven. But they've not lived a Christian life. And they're nowhere near the kingdom. I thought, that's dangerous. Now, I go carefully, right? I go very carefully. I believe that children can be converted, genuinely converted, at an early age, particularly if they understand a little of the Gospel. But we have to be very, very careful, because if we are making people Christians who are not and they've grown up with a false assumption that they are, because mum and dad are, and they go to church, and then they reach their teenage years and they lose all, they stop going to church, they're not interested in Christian things, and you have to ask the question seriously, are they really, were they really converted? And you see the problem is, if they were not, then we need to pray that they are. if we think they are and they'll come back or they'll be all right in the end. We could be doing them a serious, a real serious disservice. And I spoke to him afterwards and said to him, it's the first time I've heard such a thing from a preacher. And I said, I remember when I was a young Christian, there was a young lady in our churches back in Wales and she was at an evangelistic meeting and the preacher preached a powerful message and At the end of it, she said, I don't think I'm saved. I don't think I'm a real Christian. And she went home to her mother and said, ma'am, I don't think I'm saved. Oh, yes, you are. Yes, because you asked Jesus into your heart when you were three or four, and yes, you are. And she said, oh, well, I don't think I am. And of course, she wasn't. She wasn't. The mother wanted to try to persuade her she was, when actually she wasn't. And the Lord was dealing with her. And during the next few nights, under the sound of this ministry, she finally came through to a real faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. So we have to be careful. We heard a sermon recently, didn't we, about enduring to the end. Those in whose hearts and lives God has done a genuine work of grace will continue. They cannot but continue. Well, there may be ups and downs. There may be some backsliding. There may be going cold. But they will continue. They cannot live happily in the world. It's like a fish out of water. A fish who comes out of the water is not happy on land because that's not his environment anymore. He's very unhappy being out of water. And I've known one or two, and I think perhaps this person is a genuine backslider because he or she is so miserable. You cannot be happy in the world if you've had a genuine experience of grace. You can't live as you like. Now, I'm stressing that because it's so important. And one of the tests of genuine revival here and in days subsequent to this is, did it continue? Did the reformers continue? Did the work they began in these various places, did it continue? And although some didn't, The majority did. I'm just going back to Wales. I had the privilege to meet a few who are now obviously in their 80s who had been converted in the revival and it was a joy to speak to them. This was back in 1960. A joy to talk to them because they still had this glow of having met with God. So, they continued and they continued steadfastly. There was a steadfastness. They wanted to continue. It wasn't that the preacher said, now you must get together and you must pray and you must study the Bible and you must do this and you must do that. They wanted to. See, this is the evidence of the work of the Spirit in regeneration. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. All things are passed away. Behold, all things become new. There's a desire. Peter talks about desire in the Word as a newborn babe. It's our delight to have a little one here this evening. Male or female, can I ask? Male. Little boy. Love him. Good. All right? And he will want to be fed. Hopefully not during the service. But I mean, he will want to be fed. Because that's his nature. He'll want to be fed. And he'll make it known. All right? And some of us have been through that several times. And now our children, we've gone through it again. And they make a terrible noise. They want to be fed. They must be fed. and someone who has genuinely been born again in the Spirit is like a child desiring the sincere milk of the Word, says Peter. So, what do they steadfastly continue in? Well, the first thing is the Apostles' doctrine. Now, doctrine for us is systematic theology but, of course, doctrine in the New Testament is simply teaching. apostles teaching what the apostles were teaching. They wanted to learn. There's a spirit in the new-born believer that wants to be taught. The new-born believer says, I know very little, I know hardly anything, and I want to learn. I want to be taught. I want to hear what these men of God have to say to me. I want them to explain to me the scriptures. Most of these, of course, have been Jewish and they've had their Jewish background and Jewish Old Testament. They'd have known that or part of it. And now the apostles are explaining the New Covenant, the New Testament in terms of the Old and explaining who Jesus is and was and what he has done and what he's accomplished. And they were learning. There was a thirst for knowledge. Some of us remember when we were first converted that everything was so new to us, and we wanted more, and we were asking questions, and we wanted to know why is this and what's that, and we were so ignorant. But there was a desire to learn the things of God, and these people, they steadfastly continued in the apostles' teaching and fellowship. They talked together about the things of God. It's amazing, isn't it, how much we have to talk about that's got nothing to do with the things of God. Even on the Lord's Day, before or after the service, very little do we talk about the things that matter most. Here are people having fellowship, and they're sharing their experience, and they're sharing their knowledge, or lack of it, and they're having fellowship. Fellowship is fundamental to the believer. Again, this is part of the Spirit's work, creating a longing for fellowship, a longing for one another. We want to meet. No one says, you must now come to the prayer meeting. You say you've been converted. You say you've come to Christ. Right, we expect to see you at the prayer meeting, at the Bible study. We want you to come. We want you to pray. We want you to hear God's Word. Fellowship and in breaking of bread. I'll pause there. Interesting. Some discussion on that. Is it breaking of bread as in the breaking of bread as a communion? Or is it breaking of bread as in sharing a meal together? There's a lot of hospitality that goes on in the New Testament. It's encouraged, not only in the New Testament, in the Old as well. But certainly in the New Testament, the people of God came together and shared their food. They shared what they had. It may be either, it could be both. We won't worry about it. It was part of the fellowship. It was part of what they did as this little infant church. And in praise. Here are people who prayed. Do you remember one of the first things that was said about Saul of Tarsus after he met with the risen Saviour? The Lord speaks to Ananias who's got to go and meet him. And I mean, he doesn't want to go and meet him. Wow. You know, there's a man who hates us. And he wants to put us to death. And are you sure, Lord, that you've got the right name here? Are you sure you've got the right man? Are you sure? Yes. You go and find him. And we're told that he prays. He's praying. Go and find this man. And he'll be praying. one of the first things we do. Isn't that how we believed in the first place? We prayed. Very simply, Lord have mercy upon me, Lord save me. Very simple, but we prayed. And the more we prayed, the more we wanted to pray. And we found that the Bible, this new faith that we'd found, encouraged us to pray. God wants us to pray. God wants us to come and praise him and God wants us to come and make our supplications before him. We read in Philippians, with thanksgiving, God wants you and me to come and pray and pray and pray again. And if we come in the name of the Saviour, if we come by the power of the Spirit, God never tires of hearing us pray. We have a little expression in Wales, you're always on, on, on, on, you're always on, you're getting on my news, can't you keep quiet, go away, go and talk to your mother. Now God never liked that, God's never liked that. Now God doesn't say, didn't I see you yesterday, weren't you doing this yesterday, weren't you praying this yesterday? God always is happy to have his children praying. When they come in the name of the Saviour, when they come by the Spirit, when they come according to his word and according to his will, God is always happy to have us. So here are these people. They continue to spread fasting, the Apostles' Doctrine, fellowship, break their bread, and in prayers. Now here's... that would be common, 42, to our churches, our fellowships, our evangelical congregations, I trust. But here's something that's different. Fear came upon every soul. Now that's rare. Sometimes we say, there was such a sense of the presence of God, wasn't it wonderful, the service, we praised God and it was great and so on and so wonderful. Thank you. We say such nice things, but I can't remember ever saying to me, and I never said to anybody myself, did you sense the fear of God you tonight? Now, it may be that it's peculiar to these times of revival and a real outpouring of the Spirit. It may be that it's not the norm. But I think the Bible does encourage us, even in the New Testament, that there should be what I call a healthy fear of God. Our God is a consuming fire. Perhaps it's because we have a shallow view of God. We forget who He is, what He is. He's the Sovereign. He's righteous and holy and pure and magnificent and transcendent. There should be a healthy fear as we come before Him. Fear lest we say that which will offend Him. Fear lest we say and do that which will displease Him. A fear that comes in a healthy way as in a Father whom we love and respect and we fear Him in a godly way, not in a craven fear as we might say. Well, great fear came upon every soul. Many wonders and signs were done by the apostles that may have contributed to the fear or came after the fear. I'm sure they were together. Verse 44, and all the believers were together and had all things common. Now, some would say, well, of course, this is the beginnings of the Christian socialist gang company, almost a communistic state. But here were people, remember, they were all from these 3,000, they were from all over the place, Jewish folk from all over the place, some proselytes amongst them, and they came from all parts, and some would have been rich and some would have been poor. But such is the work of the Spirit in it, they began to share what they had. So no one had too much and no one had too little. And you can think right back in the days of the manna. Remember what it says about the manna. None had too much and none had too little. God provided enough for all of them. Now he's doing the same here, but he's doing it through his people. His people are sharing what they've got. And it's wonderful, it's wonderful when you see this happening in churches. Now, on a small scale, it can happen in a church lunch. Various people bring things for the church, and that's always good, and actually that's great. Christian people share. Some can't share. I remember a lady we had in our church in London, and we were having a harvest supper, and you had to bring something. And because they were multicultural and multi-ethnic and international, we had all kinds of food from all over the world. Not literally, but you know. So they all bought a little bit. And it was quite interesting to see some of these very prim and proper English folk who were roast beef and carrots kind of thing was their staple, having this kind of rice and all kinds of weird stuff from the Caribbean and India and other ways. And they didn't know what to do with it. Just stick it in your mouth. That's what you do with it. Anyway. It's only when they share, when they share, when God's people share. And this was an outworking of the Spirit of God in their heart. We want to share. We want to do our brothers and sisters good. Sometimes we can share materially. Sometimes we can share with our talents, with our time. I know that Jane and Betty are very grateful to those who go and sit with Betty for Jane to get out. Now, it's just a physical presence. Just sit in there, make sure she behaves herself. Well, just look after her, I mean. All right? Just sit in there. Now, it's time. Not all of us have got that time. Some have. And so they can share their time with this lady. The things we have that others don't, the things others have that we don't. I've said I've been to Aberystwyth and before that I've been to Llandrindod Wells for a convention. When I was 18 I went there for the first time and there was another chap called Colin, two Collins, he was Colin Jones and he was a miner and I was in school and he said to me, Colin, he said, if ever you need anything let me know. So I said, can it be very super spiritual? Yes, but the Bible says it is more blessed to give than to receive. Hmm, he said. But it's more humbling to receive than to give. So I've been humble ever since. Some can give, some can receive, some can receive, some can give. The Lord knows. They sold their possessions and goods and parted them to all men as every man had need. Wow, this is deep stuff, isn't it? Now, interestingly, this is not repeated anywhere else, this particular thing. Some would say this is special for this occasion. Unfair enough. But I think there are principles here as on when we should try and do this. We're not expecting everybody to do that today. But there are principles here of sharing and doing what we can to help others in the faith. And they continued daily with one accord in the temple, breaking bread from house to house. That looks as if it's fellowship and hospitality rather than communion. They did eat their meat or their food, and listen to this, with gladness and singleness of heart. These people were glad to have fellowship, glad to be one another, glad to be in the house of God, glad to hear the word, glad to be under the teaching of the apostles. They were glad people. Oh, that we were such glad people and singleness of heart. They were focused. That's the word. They were focused. They were focused on this. Focused on worship. Focused on listening. Focused on sharing. Focused. This took up their main priorities. Singleness of heart. And the final verse, verse 47, praise in God. And all these things, these practical things and these everyday things, ultimately they were praising God. And why wouldn't they? Why wouldn't they, praise God? The things that had happened to them brought out of religion into a relationship with Jesus Christ. A religion upon which they focused on keeping the law to justify themselves and now being made free and justified by faith without the works and the deeds of the law, by faith in Christ alone. Are they praising God? We are not as praising as we ought to be. I'm not, and you're not. We ought to be a people characterized by our praise in God, even when things don't go so well. Thank God for little babies who cry. Now, I say this because I had an experience in Northern Ireland. I'm sharing this because of our visitors, obviously. I had an experience in Northern Ireland, and it was a deaf church. And you say, how would you preach to people who are deaf? Well, of course, you have a translator who signs. So I'm preaching, and she's signing by me, and she's translating. Now, she had a baby, a little boy, and a baby. Now, the little boy was in the service, and he was running around, and he was making a noise. And I thought to myself, he'll be a distraction, making so much noise. Then I realized, only I could hear him. Because if you couldn't hear him, you're all deaf. And I thought, thank God I can hear him. I can hear him. When I came back to our own church and we had some children there and some babies and they were squawking, sometimes they did, I thought, thank God they're here making a noise. It shows they're alive. It shows I'm alive. I can hear them. I've never known a sheep farm and sheep farmers who had lambs that had been silenced. I've known a few sheep and shepherds. Praising God and having favour with all the people. Now, this won't always be the case. Having favour with all the people. But such were their lives and such was their behaviour to one, to another and to outsiders that people noticed and said, well, I don't quite know what's happened to these people and they don't seem like they were. But certainly there's been an improvement in their behaviour, certainly the way they are and the way they behave and the way they act and react. It's much better than before. I'm not quite sure what they believe. I'm not quite sure if I agree with what they believe, but they believe it and it makes a difference to them. And they had favour with all the people. And finally, and the Lord added to the church, daily such as should be saved or such as were The church is built by the Lord Jesus and he adds whomsoever he will to it day by day, week by week, month by month, year by year. Thank God he does. Now, he chooses to use his people. He hasn't got to. He could do it directly without you, without me. He doesn't need you. I don't like these hymns and these preachers who say, God has no hands but our hands, and God has no feet but our feet, and God has no tongue. That's nonsense. If God wanted to, he could zap people directly. But God is pleased to use such as you and such as me to make the gospel known. Hallelujah. It's a privilege not even angels have. It's men and women like you, like me. And the Lord had it, and he will add to his church day by day. We may not see it here in Hailsham every day, every week. Other churches may not, but there are churches, some in the UK, some abroad, where God is doing an amazing work. And it thrills me to hear some of these missionaries come back and talk about the work that God is doing in some of these places. And you think, wow, it's amazing. China, Korea, the Philippines, all over the place, God is doing such a great, sovereign work. And He's doing it. because he can and because he wants to. Hallelujah! And our prayer is, Lord, do it here. May it please you in Haleshire, in Gordon Road and elsewhere. Do it, add, add to the church those that would be saved, those that should be saved. Well, may the Lord bless us as we think on these things. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your Word. We've just briefly gone through some of the things that happened way back in the day of Pentecost. We long for such things to happen again in our land, in our time. We know that there's so much sin and there's so much unbelief and there's so much that is rotten in the hearts of men. But Father, you are God and you're still God. You're no different to what you were then, today. You're the sovereign God. The Lord Jesus Christ is still the only saviour of sinners, and the Holy Spirit is the only one that can make a person regenerate and bring them to faith. The triune God, the triune Jehovah, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, still almighty, still all-powerful, still absolutely sovereign. Lord, we pray, have mercy upon us. And we long, we long, we long that you will add to the church in these days, daily, in this place and in our area, such as should be saved. For Jesus' sake. Amen. Amen, amen, amen. So we're going to sing a hymn from the section of in fellowship, love, and so on. So we're going to sing three, four, six. 346. Bless be the tie that binds.