Testimony and Generosity

April 7, 2024 | Second Sunday of Easter 

Focus Scripture: Acts 4:32-35

Testimony and Generosity

Our Christian faith is grounded in love, something we discuss frequently. We are taught that we are to love the Lord our God with all our hearts, minds, and souls. And we are to love our neighbors as ourselves.

As United Methodists, we should take a moment to consider this point as treated and taught by John Wesley. As described in Paul Chilcote’s book, Multiplying Love, 1 John 4:19 was foundational to both preacher John and hymn-writer Charles Wesley: “We love because God loved us first.”

In John Wesley’s Explanatory Notes on the New Testament, he wrote, “This is the sum of all religion, the genuine model of Christianity. We live in the light and love of Christ, the risen Christ, and we are called to share that love. It is that simple.”

From this starting place, consider today’s short lectionary reading from Acts. In it, we find two main points, both of which tie back to this concept of love and both of which are mutually supportive of each other. This was important then, and it is important now.

Let’s look at the environment immediately after the birth of the Church. Jesus had been resurrected and ascended. The Holy Spirit had given birth to the Church at Pentecost, and the people of the early church were being guided, encouraged, and supported by the apostles. These people needed this support because their lives had been transformed.

Consider all that had happened up until Jesus’s crucifixion. The powerful leaders in the temple had just been successful at ending the threat that Jesus represented, or so they thought. With Jesus out of the way, things could get back to normal. The cash would flow, the animal sellers and money changers could get back to business, and all the other cultural, religious, and political norms would fall back into their previous states.

Imagine being one of the many people who had come to believe that Jesus was who he said he was and is. You have a choice to make. You can go with what you know and believe based on what you saw and heard concerning Jesus. Or you can reject it, go back to living as if you had never come to believe in the Messiah. You can play it safe, at least in this world.

It might be a hard choice. Follow Christ because you truly believe and, probably, be ostracized and cut off from the social network, maybe your family and friends, and everything else that you knew that made living possible. Or you could go back to predictability, all you had known.

Clearly, it was vital to the growth of the church and the survival of its members that two things happened. One was the need for encouragement, teaching, and profound grace. Second was the priority to meet physical needs.

During the earliest days of the church, before the Gospels and epistles to the churches were written, from what sources were people to learn other than the testimony of the apostles? The people who had been following Jesus, listening to his teachings, recalling the parables, and watching all the healing were primary sources of information. They had seen and heard things, so they shared it. Their strong testimony concerning all they had seen and heard was vital to the formation and maturation of the faith of others. When the apostles were giving their testimony to those who would listen, God was working mightily through their words as hearts, minds, and souls were turned to Christ.

Then there was the issue of physical needs. When people turned to Christ as Messiah, counter to the wishes of the entrenched power, the Pharisees, they were taking action that would cut them off from the temple, employment, social connections, and other benefits of staying in the good graces of those powers. If there was not a communal effort to care for all who became the people who would be known as Christians, the physical risks would have been daunting.

In this short passage of just a few verses, we see that the apostles were caring for both the spiritual and physical needs of the people who were attracted to the saving message of Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection, the message of salvation. Through caring hearts and minds, as well as the guidance of the Holy Spirit, they knew that they needed to be concerned about testimony and generosity.

Testimony of those who had been touched by Christ and the generosity of those in this community were both vital elements in the early growth of the church. That has not changed. Each remains important.

When it comes to generosity, we are absolutely effective at using our available resources as a church to do good works. In our local church, this includes our blessing box food pantry. At the United Methodist Church level, this includes all the relief work by UMCOR and much more.

In this regard, the bigger issue is giving. We know how to use the resources when we have them, but we do not necessarily have the resources needed to get the job done. This is where faithful giving is an important part of our effectiveness as a church. Cheerful, abundant giving makes everything possible.

Of course, we should give. And our giving should be done cheerfully, not with an attitude of “What can I get?” but with anticipation. “What can I give to build God’s kingdom?”

Your consistency and commitment are invaluable in this regard. You make good work possible with your gifts. But these missions are not our primary purpose.

Our mission is to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. Why? At it’s heart, our purpose is to bring souls to Jesus.

In our Methodist tradition, this is up to all of us, laity and clergy. As we look into the future, we need to consider how our work today will help create people who will continue these efforts after us. Part of our effort is to care for people now, and part is to create and inspire people who will do this in the future, people who will also help create future disciples.

We can only do this if we are prepared to discuss our reason for what we do. We must be able to share our faith story. It does not need to be elaborate. In fact, brief is best.

Some in our congregation attended our district conference in 2023 during which Priscilla Pope-Levison led us through an activity to give our faith statement in seven words or less. Mine, at six words, was, “When I follow, there is fruit.”

“Bill, why do you do what you do for the church? Why do you give it your time and energy?”

“When I follow, there is fruit. In short, when I follow God’s call on my life, good things happen. When I try to ignore it or go in a different direction, the fruit is…bitter, if it exists at all.”

As the apostles shared their testimony of the resurrection of Jesus with great power, we should, too. We should be able to explain in the simplest of ways why we choose to be Christian. You do not need to deliver a sermon.

There is no need for an explanation grounded in heavy theology. You do not need a seminary degree to do it. All you need to do is explain what your relationship with God means to you.

What has God done in your life?

How has your experience of the resurrected Jesus transformed you?

How does the Holy Spirit inform your behavior, your words, and your interactions with others?

Some of you have heard the statement attributed to Francis of Assisi. “Preach the Gospel always. Use words if necessary.” There are two problems with this. First, history shows that Francis preached a lot, so he was not afraid of using words. Second, historians do not think he said it. And that is good, because it does not make much sense.

How would anyone learn of the Gospel of our Lord and Savior if we did not put it into words? Scripture writers worked tirelessly to capture the words, and the church has been committed to passing those words forward to us for thousands of years. Yes, words count! Strong testimony is built with words inspired by faith and experience.

In the end, we must do both things we see described in this Acts text. God’s goodness and grace are alive in us. God loved us first, so we both love God and others as ourselves. We must do the work for which we are called. And we must be able to explain why.

Our generosity of time, talent, and treasure that enable missions as well as our caring, Spirit-led testimony are the things that will make disciples of Christ. One or the other is not sufficient. Let us rise to that challenge daily. And let us see what God will do to transform the hearts and lives of those we touch. 

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You are welcome to join the congregation of First United Methodist Church of Shelton (CT) in person or online at 10 AM Eastern Time any and every Sunday. Services are streamed live, and past services are recorded. The church's web address is www.UMCShelton.org.

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Questions? Comments? Feel free to post your thoughts. Please keep it civil. Peace to you, and thanks for reading. - Bill Florin