Salvation Time!

Acts 2:46-47(NIV)—

‘And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.’

 When I was a kid, I was a bit of a bulldozer when it came to the gospel. My working hypothesis was that anyone who wasn’t a follower of Jesus was either thick or just hadn’t had the gospel explained properly to them. It was my personal mission to fix that. My approach was to ask all my friends, teachers, bus drivers etc. why they weren’t a Christian and then proceed to lecture them on why and exactly how they were wrong! Funnily enough the response to my daily lectures wasn’t a flood of new disciples. Turns out that people don’t want to be railroaded into the kingdom!

This week, we’ve been looking at a passage in Acts which paints this beautiful picture of the early church. The first 90% of the passage is a description of what the church did, what it looked like, what it devoted itself to. In the last verse, the Lord responds. He blesses them by adding to their number daily those who are being saved. Salvation is a work of the Lord. It cannot be coerced or manipulated, it cannot be strategized: there’s no formula, there is no preacher gifted enough, no worship song catchy enough, no sign miraculous enough. Salvation is a work of the Lord.

But the beauty of this passage is that whilst salvation belongs to the Lord, he chooses to partner with his church. He breathes fire and anoints their devotion, their community, their prayer, their preaching. He honours their faith and boldness and works through it to reach the community around them with the good news of Jesus Christ. This is what we long for at Gas Street: to see the Lord add to our number daily those who are being saved.

PRAYER- Thank you Jesus for your saving grace. Please add to our number those that are being saved.