Pastor's Ponderings: Monday Bible Study on Acts of the Apostles 6:1-7 (October 13, 2025)

October 13, 2025:  Monday Bible Study on Acts 6:1-7

May the Grace and Love of our Savior give you comfort and peace and strength for this, and all coming days.

Good morning my dear friends! Our church council met yesterday at American, and one of our business items had to do with homeless people around our building at night, and disturbances which they are causing in the neighborhood. The church property has been trashed, and human waste has had to be cleaned up. I started last night to make evening rounds of the property close to 7PM, and I was back again this morning making certain that no one is having any problems with this group of approximately 10 unhoused people. We will be working to make our property more secure. This is a real problem for us because we are called to be Christ for all people, but we are also called to be stewards of the church property, creating a safe atmosphere for members and building use communities who are on our site during the day and the night.  Please keep this situation in your prayers. Please also pray for Kandice Kartchner and her wife Lisa as Kandice is now in the final stages of her cancer taking her life. Offer prayers of support and love for this family in this difficult time. We are having a yard sale this Saturday to help support their family as many unplanned expenses will come to them soon. Hours are 8AM - 2PM on October 18, Saturday, at American Ev. Lutheran Church on Tucson Blvd. All proceeds will be sent to the Kartchner family in Hawaii. I know that there is plenty of "bad" in the world today, but our good news is that Teri Hardy has had her special hip replacement surgery and is now in rehab to regain strength and learning how to move with this new prosthetic. Please pray for her continued healing. Thanks for your patience in my absence during my vacation to Colorado. We had a wonderful time with our son and his wife, and friends that we have known for 25 years who now live there too with their new baby girl.

Today we are in Acts 6:1-7 in our Bible Study. In our passage for today we encounter the normal everyday issues which happen in businesses and organizations. There are no perfect places to work, worship, and live. Of course, the same was true for the new Christian community in Jerusalem. At this time in the new church, her members were from a wide variety of backgrounds. Those who believed were gentiles, radically conservative Jews, moderate Jews, as well as others from a variety of mid-eastern locations, gathered in Jerusalem for business and life. The problem that arises in this passage is that there was a historic dislike for the gentiles by the conservative Jews, and this group of Jews was not happy with the other Jews who had become members either. So, the complaint in this passage has to do with the distribution of aid to those families and homes where there just weren’t enough available resources to live from day to day. In the Jewish traditional faith home, there was a Friday offering made to aid those in need in their community. It could be food, money, or clothing. This happened every Friday, and it seems obvious that the new Christian community had chosen to continue this program as a good way to provide equity for their own members. BUT THERE WAS A PROBLEM! There were conservative Jews helping to run this distribution, and they tended to leave out the same level of aid that have been given to their own conservative Jewish Christian community. Of course, this could become an issue of division for lack of care in this new community. So, the disciples step in and select people of faith from the community who would then handle the fair distribution of aid. The Apostles were busy in the faith community doing the important work of prayer, healing, and proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ to try to manage this issue on their own. So, they selected men of strong character and faith to handle this on their behalf. This passage is a great source of information for us. The variety of Spiritual Gifts that are in our communities is meant to be identified and called into service to take on the issues for which their Spiritual Gifts are suited. Just stop and think for a few moments about your gifts, not just the ones you think you know about yourself, but more specifically the gifts which others identify in you. The men who were called to handle the issue of irregular distribution because of bias and dislike, had truly important work to do in their community in Christ. Please know that your gifts are important too!

Thank you for being with me this morning. I will be back to share with you again tomorrow.

With Love in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior, Pastor Kim