The Marks of a Gospel Community

Photo by Pearl

One of the things I love about studying Scripture is seeing how the Spirit worked with the skills and styles of many different writers to tell the great Story of God’s redemptive mission. In Luke, the Spirit found a careful, diligent investigator and an intentional, well-organized storyteller. I pay a lot of attention to how Luke arranges his material, because it’s an integral part of how he communicates the message. Luke is quite fond of “sandwiches” in his writing (there are more technical terms like chiasm or inclusio, but “sandwich” works just as well). Since we’re not far removed from Pentecost and still in grilling season, let’s call these Luke’s “Pentecost burgers.”

At the beginning of Acts, we find a really significant Lukan sandwich. With a fresh-off-the-grill burger, the bun and the meat together provide the unique flavor combination that we savor and identify as “the taste of summer.” In the same way, in Acts 2–3, we need both elements to really taste the flavor of the early church. Sometimes, however, our reading of Acts leads us to grab the “bun” that Luke has provided without proper attention to “the meat.” And just as a burger-less bun would be a really sad dining experience, so missing the filling in this narrative sandwich makes for a puny engagement with these key chapters and limits our response to the Spirit-inspired text.

Acts 2:42-47 is Luke's first summary of the life of the early church. Luke wants us to see these summaries not just as descriptive and historical (that's the way it was), but also as prescriptive and motivational (that’s the way it can be and should be). So what does Luke’s careful organization of this first summary reveal about the marks of a gospel community and its powerful witness to the world?

First, Luke’s careful positioning of this summary reveals the powerful role of Christian community in the early church’s witness. The sequence of the narrative in Acts 2–3 is significant. Luke begins by relating the Pentecost event, which is followed by Peter’s explanation of the event and a massive response to the message (2:1–41). Then immediately after the summary, he narrates the first Pentecost miracle, which is followed by Peter’s explanation of the event and a positive response to the gospel message. Luke’s picture of Christian community is nestled right inside those two “Pentecost power” narratives, making it the meaty filling in this “burger.”

I think Luke uses this narrative sequence to highlight some very important things about Christian community. He wants us to see that this visibly countercultural kind of life together was an integral part of the gospel communication of the church, just as much as the miraculous events that surrounded it. Peter gave gospel explanations of the tongues and the healing, but the church gave embodied gospel witness to the life-changing power behind those events. The attention of onlookers was captured not just by the miracles, but also by the kind of community life that the church was displaying—another type of miracle! And by surrounding his portrayal of gospel community with Pentecost events, Luke also makes clear that the marks of a gospel community are only possible through the power and presence of the Holy Spirit. The early believers weren’t guided by committees or motivated by a novel program; they were formed and transformed—together!—by the sanctifying power and presence of the Holy Spirit.

Second, not only is Acts 2:42-47 the "meat" in the larger narrative sandwich, Luke also sets up the passage itself as another "Pentecost burger." His careful framing of this summary reveals the heart of the early church's witness (vv. 44–45). The "bun" around this burger is the extraordinary growth that God gives (vv. 41, 47). Luke insists that there is an intimate, inseparable connection between the body-life of the church and the growth of the church. He also makes clear that the church did nothing to engineer or cause that growth—it was sheer gift, as God's grace and power worked through the witness of the church to reach multitudes with the gospel.

In this carefully crafted summary, there’s a second layer of framing around the meaty center. (Maybe this is the lettuce, tomato, and condiments.) Twice Luke says that the believers were devoted to certain things, that is, they were insistently pursuing those things. “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers” (v. 42, NRSV). We might miss the parallel in most English translations of verse 46, but the CSB captures it well: “Every day they devoted themselves to meeting together in the temple, and broke bread from house to house.” There was a dual object to their devotion: catechesis (making sure that believers were fully grounded in the story of Jesus and the grand Story of Scripture) and community (learning to live together in a way that reflected Jesus' own life, through discipleship, fellowship, and worship). Learning, being disciples, fellowship, worship—all these are described as ongoing actions. These were the holy habits of the early church—and they generated responses from the onlookers. Their life together was so radically counter-cultural that it produced astonishment, admiration, and goodwill (vv. 43, 47). And when God added new people to their number, it wasn't just to "fill pews"—it was to incorporate them into this new Jesus-shaped community.

The third thing we notice is what is inside the layers of framing. At the meaty heart of Luke’s description is this: “All who believed were together and had all things in common” (v. 44). “Together” communicates both physical proximity (inhabiting the same space) and unity of mind and heart (cf. Phil. 2:2). What this unity looked like in practice was “having all things in common.” This was a group of people with a radically changed relationship to their possessions. Individualism no longer ruled; land and material goods were held loosely, ready to be released to meet needs that arose within the community. As Willie James Jennings puts it: “People caught up in the love of God not only began to give thanks for their daily bread, but daily offered to God whatever they had that might speak that gracious love to others” (Acts, Belief, p. 40). In the words of Wesleyan scholar Richard Thompson, “Their identity and solidarity as God’s people defined their priorities rather than the social systems, classes, and values within which their everyday lives were immersed” (Acts, NBBC, p. 99). This is what seems to have caught the attention of the onlookers. The quality of their life together had missionary impact.

If we had any doubts that Luke’s summary was meant to be prescriptive as well as descriptive, a trek through Paul’s letters would dispel those doubts. Romans 12 is a particularly explicit example of the apostle’s concern for the “body life” of the local churches. Paul carefully and passionately sows into the churches the same ethos that Luke portrays, because this is an unchanging fact: the collective life of a Spirit-filled community is its greatest and most powerful witness. 

Space does not allow for a detailed unpacking of Romans 12:9-21. But we can see three ways that Paul expects the Roman believers to practice the kind of life Luke describes. First, the apostle exhorts them to "hate what is wrong" and "hold tightly to what is good" (v. 9). How does a community of people do this? By being devoted to a deep, comprehensive knowledge of Scripture ("the apostles' teaching"). It is only by Spirit-guided intimacy with the great Story that we have the capacity to discern the difference between good and evil and the strength to hold fast to the one and to reject the other. Second, all the qualities that Paul desires to see in the Roman church—sincere love, delight in honoring one another, rejoicing with those who rejoice, mourning with those who mourn—result from the kind of being together that Luke has described. Finally, Romans 12:13 sounds just like Acts 2: "When God's people are in need, be ready to help them. Always be eager to practice hospitality" (NRSV). Paul envisions a community of people that lives with a loose grip on possessions, holding them ever at the ready to meet needs within the body.

And in the same way that Luke showed us the visibly disruptive and missional impact of the Jerusalem church’s community life, Paul envisions the same kind of witness for the church in Rome: “Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable. Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone. . . Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good” (vv. 17–18, 21).

May our churches faithfully bear these marks of a gospel community—and may the Lord bless that embodied gospel witness, adding daily to the number of those who are being saved.

Rachel Coleman is affiliate professor of Biblical Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary, profesora adjunta de Nuevo Testamento for United Theological Seminary, and the regional theological education coordinator (Latin America) for One Mission Society. She serves on Firebrand’s Editorial Board.