And as always, we welcome those who are watching online. We get notes of encouragement from people who have watched online, and we always appreciate that. Just keep those notes coming. Include a $100 bill with them, please. We're gonna be in Acts chapter 2, verse number 41. chapter two and verse 41. I hope you enjoy church like these people did that we're about to read about in that first church in Jerusalem. Let's begin in verse number 41. Then they that gladly received his word were baptized, and the same day there were added unto them about 3,000 souls. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread and in prayers. And fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles. And all that believed were together. We should underline that word together. And had all things common. and sold the possessions and goods and parted them to all men as every man had need. And they continuing, underline that one, continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness. Now underline that one, maybe circle that one. Did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart. praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily, such as should be saved. Father, we pray that you'd bless us as we come to this important time of the service where we look into the word of God and allow you to challenge our hearts and to encourage our hearts, to instruct our hearts, and to change our hearts. We pray that you'd bless us today, help us to adopt that joy that these people had in that first church because Jesus had saved them. I pray that you'd give us that same joy. In Christ's name we pray, amen. Well, I think it's Friday, Friday evening? My phone rang. I was in the kitchen. My wife was watching the baby for Erin and Erica for a few minutes, and I kind of like to eat supper, and she hadn't started supper yet, so I went to the kitchen. We get serious about food, right? And so we had some Mexican food we were planning on eating, and so I had gotten some corn tortillas, heated up the skillet, throw in a corn tortilla or two in that skillet to warm them up, And right in the middle of warming up my tortillas, my phone rang. And so I stopped and trying to keep an eye on the tortillas and talking on the phone at the same time. And the fellow on the other end of the phone said, this is Wayne Brooks of Balnob. He said, do you ever do any disking or tractor work for other people with that tractor of yours? I said, well, I said, no, I don't. And he began to tell me what he had on his mind. And his voice sounded like our boy up in Isard County, who is always calling me or texting me and torturing me with his foolishness. And so I thought, this is him. He's faking somebody else to try to get one over on me. And so he's asking about that tractor of mine. Sounds just like him. And so I said, no, but, I said, I don't do any work with my tractor. But I said, I've got a boy up in Missouri County, and he loves to do tractor work. I'll give you his number, you can call him. He said, no, no. He said, that's too far. I wouldn't ask him to come all the way from Missouri County down here to do any disking for me. I said, no, that's fine. I said, he'd love to do it. In fact, he probably won't charge you anything, because that's just the kind of guy he is. He wouldn't care to drive down here and just do it. Let's get him lined up. He said, no, no, no. I don't want to do that. And so we ended the conversation. And I went back to my corn tortillas. I was afraid they were going to burn while I was talking to him. I was trying to brush him off as quickly as possible because he's always talking that silliness to me. He was the family clown and still is. And so after I got my tortillas done and got through supper, I went and sat down in my recliner and I got to thinking, you know, he sounded really confused. I must have really got one over on him. He called me to try to get one over on me, and I ended up, I've never heard him be that frustrated before. Seemed like he just didn't understand and didn't have any comeback, and that's not like him. He always has a comeback. And I got to thinking, I wonder if that could have been somebody else. And so I called him up. I said, do you know Wayne Brooks in Balmob? He said, yeah. Yeah, I do." He said, he's a race car driver. I said, oh. I said, was that you that called me imitating him just a few minutes ago? He said, no, I'm at work. He said, I'm doing something. He said, I haven't called anybody. I said, you're not joshing me. He said, no, it wasn't me. I said, uh-oh. I've just convinced whoever Wayne Brooks is, I've just convinced him that I'm a complete idiot. And so after I hung up from talking to him, I called that number back, it was still on my phone under the recent calls, and I called him back. He answered, and I said, is this Wayne Brooks? And he said, yes, sir. I said, well, I just wanted to call you back. This is Rick Brooks down at Searcy. You called me a little while ago to ask about tractor work. He said, yeah, yeah, I did. I said, well, I just wanted to call and apologize to you for confusing you and acting like a complete idiot. I said, I thought it was our boy up in Injured County, and I was just trying to get one over on him, And I said, I really went overboard. In fact, before we got through with the conversation with Wayne Brooks, I told him, I said, now, our boy come down to do that. And he said, no, no, I wouldn't want to ask anything like that. I said, well, then come down this evening and just have supper with us. So that really confused him then. I said, when I was apologizing to him, I said, man, I feel so bad. I was talking to you that way. You didn't have a clue what was going on. And I thought I was pulling a joke. I said, I'm sorry. He said, that's okay. He said, I help people do that all the time and I do it to people all the time. He said, everything's fine. So we hung up. I said all that just to say this, things are not always like they look like they are. And it might be that way about church too. We may have ideas about church that the Bible doesn't express it that way at all. And that's what I want to talk about today. and the joy of it. The joyful church. Church is our home base. For the Christian, this is our home base. And it ought to be a joyful place. Your home ought to be a joyful place. Your work ought to be a joyful place. But above all, the place where we recognize the Lord Jesus Christ who saved our soul, it ought to be a place of joy. And it's not always the way we have it materialized in our mind. The church used to be a big deal, and people took it very seriously, and when they got saved, and they got baptized, and they joined the church, and they got in, and they didn't want to miss. They were there for everything. And they thought it was a great privilege to be in the membership of a church, to belong to it, instead of just giving it a tip of the hat on the way by. And those folks at one time got really involved in church, and they were busy, and they were going to hear the preaching of the word of God, and they were going to be uplifted and encouraged by the brethren that they met with. There was a time when people, instead of canceling church out for something else, they canceled the other events to make room for church. And united in that membership, they moved in the same direction that that church was moving. That was a central part of their life. Now the appearance of visitors and guests in our churches today is still fairly good, fairly constant. But another problem, aside from just seeing and desiring guests to come to visit with us, another problem is, I reckon every pastor faces, and every church faces, and that's trying to keep the members coming. Did you get that? Just trying to get the members to show up. Sometimes it seems like we got more visitors in the church house than we do members. That's kind of sad. And it makes me wonder, has the local church that Jesus died for, that's his program, have we failed in some way to articulate the importance of church, what a privilege it is, and what a joy it is. Maybe if we go back to the Bible and form a really scriptural view of what church is, maybe we would see the churches flourish once again, and maybe we'd be able to pass on that love for our church onto the next generation, as well as our neighbors today. These believers at this Jerusalem church, man, they were on fire. I mean, 3,000 of them got saved in one day. That's nothing to thumb our nose about, man. I mean, something was happening. The Holy Spirit had showed up on the day of Pentecost, and man, people were beginning to get under conviction, and people understood that they were sinners and needed to be saved, and they began to give their heart and soul to Jesus, and they showed up together to assemble together to worship the Lord that saved them. Well, they experienced, as we read in our passage, they experienced a deep degree of fulfillment and joy. How did that happen? Well, let's look at it one by one. First thing, they accessed a certain point of belonging. So let's talk about the access they enjoyed. How did all this begin? How did they get in the door to start with? And I'm not talking about just the door of the church house, but in the door of the Lord. Jesus said, in one place, I am the door. Aaron was right, the crowd is a little quiet this morning. Sound like the natives in the back, they're pretty restless. They get a little restless as they sing and they get excited. And so as we hear about the church and we hear about what the Lord did for these people, maybe it'll excite our heart as we go along. They access some things. The church began to grow in the best sort of way. They were seeing people saved and come in instead of just churches swapping memberships. Hello? And they began to grow and they joined this church. Listen, they joined this church instead of just joining it as some sort of social club, man, they were plugged in and things were happening. In verse number 41, it says, then they that gladly received his word. Notice that word gladly. Man, they were glad to get saved. And it says, and they gladly received his word, were baptized. So after they got saved, man, they got baptized, they started following the Lord in obedience. And it says, the same day they were added unto them about 3,000 souls. So the first thing that happened, listen. The first thing that happens before church means anything to people, before it becomes really important to people, the first thing that they have to do before they get into the church house as such, and before they get into the church membership, they need to be in Christ. In Christ. These people were born into Christ, according to verse 41. This was something that was more than just a ritual that they went through, some sort of catechism or baptism. This was getting born again into the body of Christ. and they did it in a public way, but before they did it, man, there's 3,000 of them getting saved and they were getting baptized. Can you imagine baptizing 3,000 people in one day? That would be pretty exciting and pretty time consuming and pretty public. But before they got to this public part, something happened privately in their heart. They were born into the family of God. These Jews took a great risk of accepting Christ, publicly being baptized. It was a great risk. A lot of them, their family disowned them. I mean, these were Jews. These Pharisees, as we already read in the Gospels, the Pharisees, they were hard against Christ. The leadership was hard against Christ. They were established in their religion, and they didn't want Jesus coming along messing things up. Well, people started getting saved. And it took a great deal of courage to step out and identify with Christ in a public way. You remember the story in John chapter three, verses one through six about the Pharisee Nicodemus when he came to Christ? He came to him by night. Listen to this. There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. And the same came to Jesus by night and said unto him, that thou art a teacher come from God. For no man can do these miracles that thou doest except God be with him. And Jesus just cuts to the chase. He says in verse three, Jesus answered him and said unto him, verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Boy, I mean, he went right straight to the heart of the matter. There's people that want to join the church. There's people that want to get baptized. There's people that want to join in the Lord's Supper. There's people who want to be called a Christian. But the starting place, the entry place, the place of access, the door that must be entered before any of these other things make any difference is being in Christ himself. being born into the family of God. It says in verse number four of that same passage, Nicodemus say unto him, how can a man be born when he is old? Now, Nicodemus was being a little bit dense here, but it's cause he was a Jew, and that's all he'd been taught. And Nicodemus saith unto him, how can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb and be born? He's talking about the fleshly, natural birth. because Nicodemus was born a Jew. He said, to be born again, can a man enter his mother's womb and be born a second time? In the Greek, Jesus says, Nicodemus, you're a dummy. He says in verse five, Jesus answered, and verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do you see the two things that's compared there? There is a huge misunderstanding in this passage of scripture today. There are those who teach that, well, the water there must be born of the water. That obviously means you gotta be baptized to be saved. Wrong. That's not what he's talking about at all. He's not talking about water baptism. And then there's those, and I can identify with some of these people. There are those who, like Warren Wearsby and some other great commentators say, Well, the water being spoken of there is the washing of water by the word, that you have to hear the word in order to be saved. Well, that's true. It's just not, I don't think, in the context of what's being said right here. He said you must be born of the flesh and born of the water. So born of the flesh is that natural birth. Ladies that have had babies, you ever hear of somebody's water breaking? That's the water. That's the natural birth. Nicodemus is saying, man, I'm a Jew. I was born into the Jewish family. We're the chosen people of God. I ought to be good with God just like I am because I was born a Jew. And Jesus said, no, that natural birth from your mother's womb doesn't get you anywhere. All that gets you is a fallen spirit, a fallen nature, separation from God. What you need instead of the natural birth of being encased womb full of water until you're born. See, when you're born, you come out of that water. Is everybody with me? See, there's a comparison here. The fleshly birth and the spiritual birth. The fleshly birth is the birth of water, not baptism in a baptistry. I'm all for baptism, but that ain't what it's talking about. It's talking about comparing the natural birth to the spiritual birth. Let's read the last part again. Except a man be born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of flesh, now watch this, that which is born of flesh is flesh. And that which is born of the spirit is spirit. See the comparison? The water, he that's born of the flesh, born of the water, you're not getting anywhere on that birth. Hey, it doesn't matter what kind of family heritage you came from, you might come from a good You might have had parents who were saved and living for God, but that doesn't get you into the kingdom of God. You have to make your own decision. You have to come to Christ yourself with a repentant heart saying, Lord, I'm a sinner. I believe you died for me. I accept you. I trust you because of what you did on the cross of Calvary for me. Thank you, Jesus. Please save me. Now, that's the spiritual birth. And that's the first point of access. Before you get baptized, before you take the Lord's Supper, before you join a church, nothing else matters unless you get saved first. That's a heart matter. That's a spiritual birth. And that has to happen first. And that happens generally before you get in this water. Now I know there's some that teach that, That's how, when you step into baptistry, that's how you contact the blood of Christ. Nope, no blood in there, I just looked. Nah, just water. Came out of city water system. It's symbolic. Baptism is symbolic. It's a picture of what Jesus did. He died on the cross, He went into the grave, and He came out of the grave after three days. Baptism is symbolic. Once that spiritual birth takes place, the next thing that happened to these people at Jerusalem Church, they did get baptized in water. You see, it is a good thing to get in here. It just doesn't get you into heaven. Now, if you're dependent on your entry into this baptistry to get you into heaven, sorry, it won't get you there. It won't get you there. The mistake that so many make is getting the cart before the horse. The cart won't do any good putting it in front of the horse. You gotta get the horse in front so it pulls the cart. And you gotta get salvation that takes place in the heart taken care of before the cart of baptism is to follow. Baptism, and we see it right here. They got baptized in verse number 41. They got baptized. Later on, we see them taking the Lord's Supper, breaking the bread. And they did the things, those are good things to do, things we ought to do, things we're commanded to do. You say, well, if it's commanded, it probably means that we gotta do those things in order to be saved. No, there's a gazillion commandments in the Bible. Do you keep them all? Of course not. And baptism is a commandment, just like all the other commandments are a commandment. It's a good commandment, but keeping commandments gets nobody into heaven. It's a heart transaction. These people got saved. And water baptism re-enacts, it re-enacts the spirit baptism of the new birth. 1 Corinthians 12, 13, listen to this. 1 Corinthians 12, 13. For by one spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles. Now notice the comparison here. For by one Spirit, that's the Holy Spirit, we are what? Baptized. When does that happen? That happens at the new birth, the moment in your heart that you trust Christ as Savior. It happens in the heart. This is a spirit baptism here. When you get in the water baptistry, after you get saved, that's a preacher or somebody else, official of the church that puts you under the water. But when you get saved before that, that's the spirit of God putting you into the body of Christ. For by one spirit are we all baptized into one body. That's a spiritual birth. When you got saved, the spirit of God took you and immersed you into the body of Christ. You became a member of the body of Christ. That happens upon salvation. So they obeyed baptism. That's good. Then it says in verse 42 about breaking of bread and in verse 46 it talks about breaking of bread. Now, one of those may be talking about the common meal they had together when they would break bread from house to house. They were fellowshiping together and eating together and going over to have tamale pie at the other person's house. Well, maybe not tamale pie, but they were breaking bread from house to house. But when they broke bread with the apostles, they were practicing communion, the Lord's table. That's when you take the little piece of bread and it symbolizes, symbolizes, reenacts the breaking of the body of Christ, the putting of him on the cross. When you eat that, you're not gaining a sacrament like the Catholics would teach, that taking that bread somehow has saving grace. It doesn't. Like baptism, it is symbolic. There's two ordinances in the church. Two ordinances, baptism and Lord's Supper. They're both symbolic. That's why they're ordinances. And the act of baptism reenacts the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. The Lord's table, when you take the bread, it reenacts his placing on the cross. And the juice that you take, the fruit of the vine during the Lord's table, symbolic of his blood being shed for your sins. It's a reenactment. It's not a means of grace. It's not a means of salvation. It does zero to help you to become saved and that's why you'd be put in the cart before the horse. Taking the Lord's Supper before you get saved would be of zero value to you as a lost person. You must be born again first. Let me move on. Let me just say so that there's no mistake about this, baptism always must come after salvation. If baptism happens before salvation, all it means is you got wet. And so sometimes people will make a profession of faith, and later on they discover, well, I didn't really get saved, I just, going forward, because everybody else did, and they got baptized, but it didn't really mean baptism, they just got wet. And so later on they discover, boy, I need to be saved. And so then they get saved. Did that first dunking in the water count for them? No. So after they get saved genuinely, that second profession of faith, when they really meant it, that's the time they need to get baptized after that. These people were happy. They were joyful that they were getting saved. They were joyful to get to be baptized. I mean, they might have been like that one guy. One guy got saved, and he didn't know anything. He didn't know beans about Christianity or the Bible. He got baptized, and as soon as the preacher raised him up out of the water, some of the other people got baptized and raised up out of the water, and they'd say, praise the Lord or hallelujah or glory be to God. Well, this guy, he got raised up out of the water, and he didn't know what to say, so he just said, Merry Christmas. Well, you ought to be happy about something. These people got saved and baptized and began to take the Lord's Supper, and they were joyful about it. Joy is elusive to those who don't follow the Lord's instruction, but these people got it settled in Acts chapter two. Now, before we leave the Lord's Supper, just let me say this, because some of you are not here on Sunday nights. and when we normally have the Lord's Supper on Sunday nights. The reason we do that is because it's the supper, not the breakfast or the lunch. And when it happened, it says that as soon as they had the Lord's Supper and the Gospels, they went out and it was dark. So if you really want to be a stickler, I got nothing against those who take the Lord's Supper in the daytime, but I'm just saying, if you really wanted to be a stickler about it, it ought to be in the evening meal, because they did it when it was getting dark. And so the Lord's Supper, we hear of those who have built a fence around the Lord's table, and meaning sometimes that you must be a member of that particular local church, that local Baptist church, or you can't take the Lord's Supper. And they call that closed communion. And then there's the other far end of that spectrum that's called open communion. And they just have communion and say, come whosoever will. It doesn't matter if you're saved, lost, or whatever. You don't have to be a member. You don't have to be nothing. Just take the Lord's Supper. Well, that's off base. The Lord's Supper, it symbolizes the fellowship we have with Christ. You have no fellowship until you get saved. And so, do we fence the Lord's table at all? We don't limit it to our local church. We say if you're saved and baptized and of like faith. So the instructions are a fence around the table, but we're not gonna come down and knock it out of anybody's hand. We tell you how you ought to take the Lord's Supper, you ought to take it worthily, but let me move on quickly. I'm running out of time, and I got a lot to say. That's first point. Second point, as we move along, the assistance they enjoyed. We're talking about a joyful church. Man, they got saved, and that made them happy. They got baptized, and that made them happy. They were taking the Lord's Supper, and they're fellowshiping with one another, and with the Lord at the Lord's table. And they were joyful about all that. But number two, notice the assistance they enjoyed. Verse 42, it says, and they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine. That means they went to hear some preaching. And they were getting some strong, if you hear a church say, well, we don't preach doctrine around here. Well, they're not preaching what they preach in the Bible then. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship and in breaking of bread and in prayers. So they had an assistance. What is this assistance? It's the gathering together, assembling together around the word of God and expecting that Jesus is gonna be present in that. They continued steadfastly. You know what that means? Steadfastly. Means they didn't just come in once in a while to the fellowship. They were regular in attendance. The word was preached. If you go to a church where it's all fun and games, I believe if you're a joyful church, you'll have some fun and games. We're having watermelon tonight in the shady side of the parking lot after church is over tonight. They're cave city melons, right? Does anybody know? I wonder if those are iced down yet. We're gonna have watermelon tonight. We're gonna have fun. I mean, what's more fun than eating watermelon? Well, putting salt on watermelon's fun. So it's okay to have fun at church, and a joyful church is gonna have fun, but wait a minute, there's something that's the center of everything at church, and that's the preaching of the word of God. Nothing else is as important. Eating watermelon is good, but it doesn't take the place of the preaching of the word of God. the teaching of the word of God. Because this is the final authority for all matters of faith and practice. It's everything for our life. The preaching of the word of God. If you come to church, listen, I read this just this morning. Seven reasons people, Christians choose a church. I'm gonna start with the second one. Why do people choose a church? Well, they feel welcomed by the leaders, 79% of them said that. Number three, the style of the services. Number four, the location, where the church is located. Number five, education for the kids. Number six, having friends and family in the congregation. That's why people choose the church, but you know what was number one? This is even by today's standards. The number one reason people pick a church is number one, 83% of them said because of quality sermons. I don't know if you're getting quality sermons, but we try. What I'm saying is, preaching the word, if it's real preaching and not just giving a bunch of opinions and traditions, if it's preaching of the word of God, That's what people are looking for. People are still hungry for the Word of God. They're still looking for some place that puts the emphasis on the Word of God. Not on theatrics. Not on fun and games. Not on frilly programs. But they're looking for the Word of God because it helps their soul. It feeds their soul. And they're looking for the Word of God to be presented. The way was practiced. in this Jerusalem church. Man, they were continuing steadfastly. They were practicing and establishing a way of church. They were being steadfast. Being steadfast. You know what the hope of every pastor is? To finally talk people into coming to church three times a week, Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night. He said, I don't need all that. I can get all the religion I need on Sunday morning. Well, maybe that's just what it is, religion. Real Christianity consists of, these people are coming together daily in the Jerusalem church, they're coming together every day. And three times a week, Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night, as Lee Robertson used to say, it takes three to thrive. Three services a week gives you more spiritual vitamins, more spiritual vitality, more spiritual vigor. The more you get, you see we don't ever get enough of Jesus. You won't ever overload, you won't ever overdose on Jesus. You won't get foundered. Their worship was empowered by prayer. Then notice thirdly, the alliances. they encouraged, verse 43 through 46, 43 through 46. I'm not gonna read all of it for the sake of time, but here you'll see that brotherliness is being exemplified. You know what people really need besides the preaching of the word of God? I mean, you could get the word preached just by watching on live stream or listening to a CD or an MP3 Watching on YouTube, you could get the word preached. I'm not sure it carries the same passion and fervor and effectiveness as hearing it preached in person. It's better than not having any. But these people formed alliances within the church. You can't do that online. You can't do that on YouTube. You can't do that watching the TV preacher forming alliances. Hey, listen, if you have a funeral in your family and you need a preacher, call up one of those TV preachers, see if he'll come and preach the sermon at your funeral, or your loved one's funeral. I don't think he will. Send a message to the YouTube preacher. Say, I've got a loved one that just died, will you come and preach his funeral? I doubt if he will. That's why we need a local congregation where we belong to it and we form alliances and we have friendships and brotherliness where we care for one another. And when one cries, we all cry. And when one laughs, we all laugh. And where we're unified together because we're in the group and we know each other. And you need to know each other. You can't have that just by watching TV or some other mode. We need each other. Three pastors got together for coffee and you know, Sometimes we pastors were always trying to get people to get back in church, come back in church. Somebody drops out of church, we try to get them back. And sometimes it's hard to get them back. And it seemed like people just scatter. Three pastors were having coffee together and one of them said, man, they decided they all had a bat problem in their church. Bats were coming into their church. One of them said, man, I got so mad I took my shotgun and I tried to shoot him with that shotgun. He said, I blew some holes in the ceiling, but I didn't get rid of the bats. And the second one said, yeah, he said, I tried trapping the little rascals in my church, and he said, that didn't work either, I've still got bats. Third one said, I ain't had any more problems with bats in my church. And I said, well, what'd you do? He said, we baptized them, gave them a box of offering envelopes, and we hadn't seen one of them since. Sometimes it works that way in church too. These people worked together, laughed together, and they wept together. Some of you have lost loved ones. Isn't it good that you can just come back into a congregation where people know about it and they might not say any magic words to relieve your pain? but they know, and you know, and you embrace each other, if not physically, at least in heart. Little boy came home from school, and he told his mom, he said, boy, at school today was a sad day. She said, what happened? He said, well, Bobby, my classmate, told the class that his daddy died last week. She said, well, what happened in class? He said, well, after Bobby told us, he just put his head down on his desk and began to cry. She said, son, what did you do? He said, well, I didn't know what to say, so I just put my head on my desk and cried with him. You know what we do as a church? You might not know the magic words to say, and I don't think there are any. When somebody's weeping, when somebody's suffering, somebody's in pain, but just knowing you've got some brothers and sisters that embrace you in their prayers and in your heart, and they're there for you. They'll cry with you. And when you have some victories, they'll laugh with you. And that's good, too. When you have a victory, man, you want somebody to share it with. Joey just finished his academy Friday at Benton, had the graduation. We loaded up a van and took him down there just to be with him. Now the rest of them went to see Joey graduate. I went because I heard we were going to Tamales to eat Mexican food. You know what we were doing? We were celebrating with him. That was a milestone in his life. We wanted to let him know we care. He's our brother. I don't think, did anybody off YouTube show up? Don't think so? and radio crowd didn't come either, I bet. We're brothers and sisters. We need each other. This is the idea of brotherly support that's in Romans chapter 12, verse 15. It says rejoice with them that do rejoice and weep with them who weep. That's what we do as a church. See, they had great joy because they had brotherly love and fellowship. And when you see me having an emotional overload in my life, I want you to be there for me and bring me coffee. Finally, notice this wonderful benefit of the joy of those at the Jerusalem church. The attraction they exerted. They were like magnets. I mean, these people had joy. A lot of services, a lot of churches are more like a funeral service than they are a church service. Now funeral services are necessary. And we weep for a good reason when we go to a funeral. But church services ought to be something that connects us with joy. And these people had such joy, listen, they had such joy that when they were heard about, Other people started saying, wow, what they got going on over there? We better go see about this. Look at verse number 47, then we'll be through. It says, I'm praising God and having favor with all the people, all the people outside the church. Having favor with all the people, the Lord added unto the church daily such as should be saved. When the people outside the church saw the joy of the people in the church, they said, we're gonna go over there and see what all that's about. And they got over there and wasn't saved. And the Lord kept adding to the church. People kept getting saved. And more people will get saved when they see your joy than they will get saved because of your orneriness or because of your criticism or because of your gossip. They'll come if they see something joyful, they won't in on it. And I do too. Joyful Christianity is like honey to the bees. In the summertime, about this time of year, the blossoms are about over till fall. June and July are horrible months for the honeybees because they can't find any flowers much, nectar to gather to make honey out of. And you can take a little, take a fruit jar lid or something and fill it up with honey and just put it out in your yard at this time of year, and boy, it'll be covered with bees in no time. They're sucking up that honey and they're saying, wow. They go back to the hive and say, wow, look what we found. And the rest of them say, where's it at? We're going with you. And then they bring their brothers and their sisters and they show up to gather that honey because it's sweet to them. You know what people outside the church see? They see your joy and that makes them want to come like the bees come to honey. But if you criticize your brothers and your sisters, you gossip about your church or its leadership, you talk about why you don't like it, then they're probably gonna say, yeah, I don't think I'd like that either. but if you seem to like it and you're joyful, they're gonna say, I think I might come and check that out. At least plant the seed. Well, let's tie all this together. The Jerusalem church was a thriving and joyful place. They had fulfillment in their hearts on a daily basis. They were fulfilled. Isn't that what we're looking for, is fulfillment? I mean, nobody wants to just sit and be bored. Nobody wants to just sit and be sad. People are looking for fulfillment, to belong and a good church is a good place to belong. Do you love the church that the Lord died for? Do you look forward to hearing more from the word of God that will satisfy your soul? Is satisfaction inside a response that you have to attending church services? Is being with your brothers and sisters in the Lord just kind of exciting? It is to me. If so, thank the Lord for your church. Are you saved? And then after being saved, are you baptized? Do you look forward to participating in the Lord's Supper? Do all these things bring gladness and joy into your life? And does it glow towards others that they say, man, I'm drawn to that? If not, why don't you get on the altar and just ask the Lord to do some changing in your heart. If you're not saved, I'd suggest get saved today. It's a fast transaction. If you already understand how to be saved, you don't need a whole bunch of, you don't need nine gazillion verses from here on out. You already know. You're a sinner. You're born a sinner. And you can't get to heaven because you are a sinner until you trust what Jesus did on the cross of Calvary. And if you'll just say, Lord, and believe it in your heart. Lord, I believe you died for me to pay for my sins. And I cease from all of my attempts to earn my salvation by being good or going through some ritual. I put a cease to all of that. And I'm just trusting you, Lord. If I get to heaven, it'll be because you brought me based on the cross of Calvary and for no other reason. I ask you to bow with me in prayer. Father, I pray that you'd help us to understand the joy that this church at Jerusalem had. And Lord, put that same joy in our hearts because we recognize what they recognized. And Lord, I pray that you'd bless us today. With our heads bowed and eyes closed, I'm going to ask you to stand.