The Apostles

Philippians 1: 3-8 "I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
It is right nor me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart; for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God's grace with me. God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus."

How many friends do you have who are Christians?
How many friends do you have who are Christians and actually talk with you about faith, encourage you, go with you on missions and pray with you?

The book of Acts (The Acts of the Apostles) is a record of some of the most successful Gospel outreach in history. If you are wanting to go into ministry, or be able to share the Truth of Jesus with the people around you, I would highly recommend reading it through beginning to end. Even if you DON'T want to do either of those things, keep reading, maybe you'll be inspired.

Most of the Christians mentioned in Acts are the guys who received the Great Commission directly from Jesus, and boy did they take it to heart. We can learn a lot by looking at how they lived their lives, effectively spread the gospel and led the way for Christianity to become the biggest "religion" in the world.

Right now I want to focus on one aspect of the lives of the apostles, one that is often overlooked:
Community.
Jesus called the 12 disciples to follow him, right? Which they did. For the entirety of Jesus' adult ministry on Earth (3 years I think), they went everywhere together. If you spent just about every minute of every day with 12 other people for THREE YEARS, don't you think you'd get to know them pretty well? Maybe get sorta attached, become friends even? Just a little. So, even after Jesus gave them their mission and went up to heaven, they stuck together. Not always physically, but even before cell phones, email, and facebook, they managed to keep in touch. They prayed for each other, met to worship and teach, and often traveled in pairs. As their community of believers grew, they had people in almost every city whom they could go to for help or rest if they were passing through. They kept each other accountable but still trusted each other. When Saul was converted and began his ministry, he tried to meet with the apostles, but they were afraid of him. Then Barnabas stepped in and basically said "He's for real, God called him." From then on he was accepted and allowed to stay with the other believers.
The first Christians really understood the power of prayer- of asking God to do something that humans never could. A big reason for this may be that they had actually met Jesus and seen Him perform miracles, so to them, praying was just like talking to Jesus, asking Him to do what He does best. Which is what prayer still is today. Anyways, they prayed SO MUCH! And it paid off. After Herod killed James, the brother of John, he captured Peter also because the citizens liked it when he killed Christians. So Peter was thrown in jail before his trial. He had SIXTEEN guards in charge of him, and was literally chained down within his cell. His trial is the next day. That's pretty much the most hopeless situation I can imagine. Still, he had his close friends, and all their close friends, and so on praying for him. Acts 12:5 says, "So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him." Can you guess what happened? While Peter was praying, an angel woke him up, Peters chains fell off, and Peter walked behind the angel right out of the prison, past the guards, and outside the city gate. Peter didn't even know what was happening, he thought he was dreaming! He was freed by the grace of God and through the many prayers that the church said on his behalf.
The first thing Peter did once he was out was go to Mary's house, where there was a prayer session going on. He encouraged them with the story of his rescue, and made sure they would tell "the brothers" about it as well. It was important that the church hear Peter's good news.

Okay, so I don't know how clear those stories were to you in regard to our lives today. What I'm trying to get across here is that it's important to stick together. When the disciples gathered together to preach at Pentecost, THREE THOUSAND people came to faith in Christ. That's amazing. The church made it a priority to meet together and pray for each other. The result was an extremely effective ministry that was the foundation for the Christian church we have today. A lot of people that I talk to who don't have a home church say that they feel they don't need a church. You can still believe in God without going to church, right? That is true, but as the stories in Acts show, the benefits of having a group of believers who will pray for you and help you out far outweigh the sacrifice of having to get up early on Sunday. If you don't connect well with "church people" or have another reason why you can't go to a regular church, please consider finding a TEC (teens encounter Christ, www.southerntec.org) or Young Life (www.younglife.org) near you.
If you already know a good group of Christians- consider yourself very blessed!! I speak from past personal experience that many Christians feel alone, even if they've grown up in the church. Make an effort to connect with those Christians and do something as simple as let them know you'll be praying for them. We are stronger together than alone. Blogging is a good way to share your thoughts with other Christians, teach each other, encourage each other, find out who you can be praying for specifically, and share any prayer requests you might have.

Basically, I can't emphasize enough how amazing it is to have believers who will go through life with you. We are closer than brothers and sisters. God brings people together to work for His good, and it can be stronger than any earthly friendship. The love and fellowship between followers of Christ is absolutely amazing and truly rewarding.

Acts 18:27 "When Apollos wanted to go to Achaia, the brothers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples there to welcome him. On arriving, he was a great help to those who by grace had believed."

Acts 15:32-35 "Judas and Silas, who themselves were prophets, said much to encourage and strengthen the brothers. After spending some time there, they were sent off by the brothers with the blessing of peace to return to those who had sent them. But Paul and Barnabas remained in Antioch, where they and many others taught and preached the word of the Lord."

1 Thessalonians 5:11-15 "Now we ask you, brothers, to respect those who work hard among you, who are over you in the Lord and who admonish you. Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work. Live in peace with each other. And we urge you, brothers, warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone. Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and to everyone else."

Philippians 1: 3-8 "I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
It is right nor me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart; for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God's grace with me. God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus."