By Apostle Aje Pelser.
Preached at Harvester Reformational Church, Cape Town
Sept. 2019
After the outpouring of the Holy Spirit for the first time in the early church, we see 3000 souls repent and become converted to the Way of Jesus Christ. Those who gladly received the word were all baptized and 3000 souls were added to the church. It is not enough to visit a church and say Amen. There needs to be a baptism into Christ and into His Body of Believers called a church. The burial of the old self is essential and precludes the addition to a church of any soul.
So what was next? The initial experience and heightened awareness state of Holy Spirit Baptism is a wonderful adrenaline rush!
What on earth could compare to that feeling of ecstasy and moments of forgetfulness in God’s presence? Should they not build tents and stay in that place of excitement and awe speaking in tongues and glorifying God?
In the months to come God would give the church opportunity to really use that prayer language to pray for Apostle Peter who was locked up in Jail and through the persecution of the church by Herod and later Saul.
But for now there was a simple formula to help the church continue on the accurate path Jesus set for them in the first place:
Act 2:42 And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers.
The combined meaning of continued steadfastly is: “to set a direction for oneself to endure courageously with devotion to the teachings and revelation set forth by the sent ones.”
1. Continue with Apostle’s Doctrine
God sends an ambassador and delegate from the kingdom of God with a message and orders to fulfill on a mission to reach a group of people or even an individual. IN a sense Jesus was the best example –
Joh 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
Or to paraphrase:
“For God so loved the world he made so much, that he sent His Son to die for our sins, and so if we received Him and believed in His words, we will be saved from ourselves, from sin, sickness and Satan, from the enteral judgment awaiting the world and live eternally with Him.
The doctrine of the apostles is not merely a teaching. Doctrine is the set of keys of the kingdom unlocking the treasures of the Scriptures that reveal Jesus Christ and His plan for His Bride the Church. Peter received those keys when Jesus was revealed by God to him as being the Son of God.
Apostle Paul received those keys when God took him through tremendous suffering and appeared to him saying “MY grace is sufficient, My strength is made perfect in weakness.” That moment when Paul was caught up into the third heaven, his spirit was awakened to doctrine and revelations that he could not even release at that time.
Doctrine comes from a supernatural experience with God and it is an instant download of understanding that takes a lifetime to explore.
When Apostle Andre Pelser had an experience with Jesus concerning His church his rely was: “Then Your church is God’s genius at work”.
Remember that the faithful Bible Dictionary authors of our age are not apostles. They are generally very good scholars, but they often lack the apostolic perspective necessary to truly unlock the Bible for a believer.
It is time for a Reformational Bible and some new Bible Dictionaries. By now we have seen the outworking of the genius of God’s Church on multiple levels and in a diverse multi-cultural network of churches across 6 continents. We still need to reach Antarctica! Although one Harvester member did place his foot there once and we prayed for him throughout his journey – he was on the Augulus Ice-Breaker Ship. So we really have reached 7 continents praise God!
What just happened there was apostolic perspective. We thought about what we perceived to be the reality, but the Holy Spirit reminded us that wherever we place our foot, He has given it to us. Even if a member of a church reaches out and steps on a patch of earth, we can now clam it for Jesus! It is not about the individual alone, but a body of believers and if one wins we all win. Christ is revealed in His Church and the corporate revelation of Christ is proportional to the individual revelation of manifestation of Christ within our hope of Glory.
Dr Gray and his peers used to say to the students of MVBC: “Find Christ in every scripture.” That is what we continue to do at MBTC!
2. Continue to Fellowship
1Co_1:9 God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
2Co_8:4 Praying us with much entreaty that we would receive the gift, and take upon us the fellowship of the ministering to the saints.
Eph_3:9 And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ:
Eph_5:11 And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.
Php_3:10 That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death;
1Jn_1:3 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.
1Jn_1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.
Apostle Andre writes that “fellowship are two fellows in a ship going in the same direction.”
That lines up with the definition of continuing steadfastly from earlier on in this message:
“to set a direction for oneself to endure courageously with devotion to the teachings and revelation set forth by the sent ones.”
3. Continually Break Bread
After Jesus’ resurrection he broke bread with some believers on the road to Emmaus:
Luk 24:30 Now it came to pass, as He sat at the table with them, that He took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.
Luk 24:31 Then their eyes were opened and they knew Him; and He vanished from their sight.
Luk 24:32 And they said to one another, “Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the road, and while He opened the Scriptures to us?”
1Co_10:17 For we, though many, are one bread and one body; for we all partake of that one bread.
4. Continue in all forms of Prayers
Eph 6:18 praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints—
-Different kinds of prayer
-Tongues and Interpretation
-Spiritual Warfare
-Faith
-Commitment
-Consecration
-Intercession
-Thanksgiving
-Governmental prayer
From MBTC Subject Manual Prayer 1.