I see myself in their lives. I want to trust God after feeling disappointed. I want to keep believing in God even when I sat on the proverbial pencil and got injured. Despite whatever happened in the past I keep moving ahead even when it doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t always get it right. But I regroup myself and try again. I start trusting in God a little each moment and with each new experience.

Awesome post, Jeremy!

Trying to get back to the Early Church is a noble goal, yet the first century or two had its share of fighting. Reading over Acts you can see that things weren’t an idyllic paradise, it wasn’t a workers paradise by any stretch of the imagination. Imperfect people were in the Church, which means that they were still being formed into the image of Christ (even Paul and Peter).

It would be interesting to see how the other churches grew, not just the Jerusalem one. If the letters of Paul are any indications, it looks like they had some growing pains!

“Soul Searching” by Christian Smith is a huge help on MTD, the findings are pretty disturbing!

The church I’m currently attending believes this is the case, but there are certain aspects of the church in Acts that are inconceivable in modern American culture, such as selling all your goods and living communally (which you mention in the headline).

The early church in Acts did seem to call all Christians at that time to the same lifestyle, from what I remember. I’m sure there were practicing Christians outside of those groups as well, though.

Thanks for the interesting thoughts, as always!

In turn, this individualistic way of thinking has taken over Christianity as well, which you point out when talking about “consumer driven spirituality.” I had not heard of MTD before, but it seems to be a natural progression from our individual-based society. We’ve come to expect to “have it your way.” I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that culture attempts to mold God into whatever feels good to each individual.