The 10 Commitments of a Vintage Church Part 2

This message explores the powerful blueprint of the early church in Acts 2 and challenges believers to become a “Vintage Church” — a Spirit-empowered community grounded in God’s Word, united in authentic fellowship, devoted to prayer, and expectant for the miraculous. Through biblical truth, shared life, and bold faith, we are reminded that God still desires to move through ordinary people to bring healing, hope, and transformation to the world around us.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hello everyone, I'm Dr. Steve Holtz. I want to welcome you to the Road Church Podcast. Each week we go into God's Word. We teach chapter by chapter and verse by verse. We are here to build the Kingdom of God revolution through empowering people to change the world. So we pray this will minister to you at your heart level and change your life. Take your Bibles that you have in your hand and go to Acts chapter 2. And I wanted to read God's word while we're standing because sometimes our passages are so long. And I used to do this a lot in the early days of the road. And it came to knowledge again to me just when I was praying for the road the other day. Some of these little things that we used to do, and I sometimes want to revisit them again, but to stand when we read God's word. Now, if the pericope, if the pericope or the passage is too long, it's you know you're standing for like forever. But this is a short one, and it relates to these ten commitments of the vintage church, which is this little mini-series we're on under the rubric of going through the book of Acts. So look at verse 40 of Acts chapter 2. Acts 2, verse 40. And we've already done the first three. That was last week. And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, Be saved from the from this perverse generation. Verse 41. Then those who gladly received his word were baptized, and that day about three thousand souls were added to them. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship in the breaking of bread and in prayers. Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all as any one had need. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who are being saved. So, Lord, anoint your word, bless it, empower us with it, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen. You guys can be seated. So this is the blueprint. I mean, this is the blueprint of the local church. So if we were to ask the question, what is a New Testament church? What is a church that is a vintage church? That's what I'm using. I'm using the word vintage because vintage means of quality, but it also means with age. That's why you have vintage wine. It's aged and it's quality because of age. And last week I showed you this tree that's at 12,000 feet or so here in the area around Alma that one of our members had taken a picture of that's 3,000 years old. And if you recall, I showed you that pine cone tree, pine cone pine or something like that, bristlecone pine. Bristlecone pine. Remember, it was just like bent way over? That's the church. The church has been through a lot through the 2,000 years, and I gave you, what did I give you? The history of the church in 12 minutes. So we are standing on what Jesus said. I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. So when we talk about a church that's standing for all time, we're talking about the true church. The true church has gone through highs and lows, almost like a roller coaster throughout history of deep highs. I mean, the first 500 years were amazing in the church. And then the Middle Ages were really a big downturn with a corrupt church. And if you recall, if you recall, my thesis is that when the church is stronger than the culture, you have a kingdom of God revolution. When the church is stronger than the culture, you have a kingdom of God revolution. When the culture is stronger than the church, you have corruption. And so here we are today, now 2026, the 21st century, we are seeing God move in unprecedented ways. It is amazing what He's doing in the two-thirds world, but it's I I feel like I can see the etchings of the spirit happening in media on college campuses, among youth, among Gen Zers and millennials, and what God's doing with business leaders. It's amazing. God is really on the move. So let me bring everybody up today. So last week I talked about the first commitment, as I see it in our passage, and that's the whole book of Acts, chapter 2, the whole chapter, empowered by the Holy Spirit. So they were a church empowered by the Holy Spirit. And we looked at Pentecost and what God did there and the languages. And I and I mentioned to all of you that there were 17 different ethnic groupings that were involved at Pentecost that were filled with the Holy Spirit. Second commitment, gospel-centered preaching. And I gave you five different aspects of gospel-centered preaching and what gospel-centered preaching must have within it to be truly kingdom-centered or gospel-centered. And then thirdly, last week we looked at the baptism of new believers, and that it's the first step. And we had 51 baptisms three weeks ago here at the church. So we believe in baptism, and every gospel-centered church since the Protestant Reformation in the Protestant tradition has two major sacraments. The first is baptism, and the second is the Lord's table. So let's look at verse 42. Verse 42, we read, they continually, now mine is the New King James Version. So how many of you use the New King James version? Raise your hand. Okay, yeah. So it doesn't matter. There's a variety of great versions, but I always use the New King James. But in this one, I'm actually reading New King James, but I want to bring out something that's in the NIV. And they continued steadfastly. They continued steadfastly. So in the New American Heritage Dictionary, it talks about giving yourself entirely to, and the NIV says they devoted themselves to. I love that. I actually like that translation better. They devoted themselves to the things that we're about to read. Okay? And the first thing, the first thing mentioned is apostles' doctrine. The apostles' doctrine. Everybody jot this down. If you're a note taker, write this down. This is fundamentally important, and that is you cannot have sound doctrine without the Bible. Boy, Steve, that's really insightful. But it's really true that if you're not in the Word, if you're not a church of the Word, it's going to be hard to have sound doctrine. And there's churches today that are really more about growing their church than about sound doctrine. And that's fine for a while, because I believe in the pragmatic. I believe that we have orthodoxy and we have orthopraxy. So orthodoxy is what we is the doxology. It's where we go to the doxology. It's the doxus, it's the doctrine of the church. Very, very key to what I'm talking about right now. But then there's orthopraxy. How do you practice that? How do you put that into practice? Well, every church is going to be different. If you go to a Roman Catholic church, they're going to do Roman Catholic stuff. If you go to an Orthodox church, they do orthodox stuff. If you go to Presbyterian church, they go to Presbyterian stuff. That's fine. I don't think that we're judged by how we live out our orthopraxy unless it's heresy. But I think in most cases it's not. But the reality is you can get into trouble, gang, if you don't have strong orthodoxy, if you don't have strong doctrine. And that's why at the road it became my conviction back at Mountain Springs. So we were at Mountain Springs Church. We had planted that in our living room, and we had moved out to Woodman where the campus is today. And I determined in 2002 I'm going to teach the Bible. Not from the Bible. I'm going to teach the Bible. And that meant I was going to start learning how to go book by book, chapter by chapter, and verse by verse. It's the only way I understood to have the right guardrails on the discipleship of the people at the road was to go chapter by chapter and verse by verse. So listen, everybody, listen. You can teach from the Bible when you're a topical teacher. And you know, sometimes we do topical stuff for I'll do a series occasionally on what I think is something that the Holy Spirit's accentuating for us at the road. So if you recall back in 2025, around January, we were on spiritual warfare. So we did a whole thing on the cosmic war. And I talked about Satan and demons and how the kingdom of God comes, and it was really, really exciting. And then we've done different series. But at the end of the day, where we always want to land again, I have people coming up. Steve, I really like that series we're doing. I'm learning so much, but when are we going to get back to the Bible? Like, oh wow, okay, this is my kind of people. That's what we've trained ourselves in. So we get back to the Bible. And so even in devotionals, like devotional times of the Lord, as I've grown older, I felt like that it was more important that I'm reading the Bible than reading a devotional. So a devotional is great as long as it drives you to the word. So I've been through, like in the last few months, I've been through Matthew, and now I'm going through Luke. And I just love to read it and underline stuff and write in my journal stuff. PBJ, prayer Bible journal, PBJ, prayer Bible journal. And that's how I learn, that's how I grow the most. And I think that's true for most of you. Be in the word. And so last week when I started this point, I talked about a peer. Remember that? I was talking about a peer. That, you know, when you become a new believer, your peer is about this big. And here's the oceans that you're in, and you're looking at it, and you're still so frustrated because you really haven't changed that much, because you just got saved and you read the Bible maybe 10 times and you don't know even, you don't even know what the six, is it 66 books or 46? I mean, that you don't know anything, right? And so that's about the length of your peer. But the more you start studying, the more you start reading, the more you start meditating in God's Word, Psalm 1, Joshua 1, your peer grows. As your peer grows, you can go into more turbulent waters. You know, the Santa Monica Pier, the Newport Beach Pier, I've surfed all around those places when I was younger. And that pier's strong. I've been out there in a red flag warning day. And that pier is solid. And so the word is solid, and I might be on a surfboard and I'm in danger on a little surfboard. Okay? But if I'm on the pier, I'm pretty safe. So, church, stay in God's word. Be in a church of God's word. If you move on from the road and go to another church, be in a church with God's word is front and center. That's what we're committed to around here. And so sometimes it's not fancy. We read, we're gonna read passages in Acts that are B-O-R-I-N-G. They're just boring. But we're gonna go through it systematically because I think it's the right thing to do. Have any of you figured out the Christian life can be boring? Okay. One time I was meeting with some pastors and they were talking about mountain springs, and they wanted to meet with me about mountain springs, and I said at the end, as we were leaving, I said, May all of you have a boring Sunday this week. And they're like, What? Just be just be faithful. God sometimes makes the most boring things exciting, sometimes he doesn't. It's okay, but stay true to the word in your life. Sometimes your marriage is boring, and sometimes, you know, work is boring. And but we stay steadfast with God's word. God's there, He's with you. Guess what? The key element to creativity is. Every study shows this. Boredom. When we moved to Black Forest, Liz used to tell the kids, go out today and be bored. Because we wanted that land out there and we wanted the property because we wanted them to go out and build tree houses and play with frogs or, you know, chase squirrels, because that's the creativity element that's built out of boredom. So when a kid is constantly on a tablet, constantly playing video games, I promise you it's gonna be difficult for that kid to be very creative as they grow older because they're used to being utterly stimulated from the outside in. We want to be stimulated from the inside out, and that comes through boredom. And so being in God's word is sometimes boring, but it's really good for you. It's really good for all of us, and it is for a church too. The other thing about the word that I think is important, it's like a fireplace for the fire. It's like a fireplace for the fire. Clark Pinnock, in his great book, The Revived Church, wrote this. We need neither supercharged churches without discipline, nor a lifeless church without the spirit. Renewal needs wise oversight to protect it from abuse. It needs leaders who encourage and supervise the ministries of the laity. Such leaders benefit the body when they are visionary and create room for the spirit. A challenge for tomorrow's church today is to both construct fireplaces, that means structure, organization based on the word of God, and stoking of the flames, which is the Holy Spirit. How do you know when you've achieved this balance? When the word is emphasized and the fruit of the Spirit is evident through servanthood, governed by faith, hope, love, and walking and being led by the Spirit with an openness that leads to freedom. And so when we talk about the manifestations of the Holy Spirit, the guardrails of that is God's word. And sometimes we've done that very, very well at the road, and sometimes we've done that very poorly at the road. So it's it's uh it's a road that we're on of growing and learning and and making mistakes and being willing to take risk. And so sometimes here at the road, you know, the worship is to your liking. Sometimes it's not to your liking. Maybe the prayer up front is to your liking or it's not to your liking, but let but I promise you this our guardrails we try to establish is from the word of God and our belief in and strong conviction we have about the word of God. So when we look at the Sermon of Peter here in Acts chapter 2, which we looked at last week, I think it's amazing that ten times he quotes the Old Testament. There's ten times that the Old Testament verses are quoted in Acts chapter 2 because they were locked and loaded in God's Word. They were committed and devoted to doctrine in the Word of God. To Timothy, senior pastor at Ephesus, Paul says, Be diligent in these matters. He's talking about the Word of God. Give yourself wholly to them so that everyone may see your progress. Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers. Really interesting how he mentions the fact that there's a diligence, there's a forthrightness that he would say to Timothy, who is probably his closest son in the faith. Now he follows up in his second letter. In 2 Timothy, he says this all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work. Now, in my Bible, that every good work is circled. You should circle that for every good work. That means the word of God can apply to marriage. The word of God can apply to singleness. The word of God can apply to going through a divorce. The word of God can apply to sickness. The word of God can apply to healing. The word of God can come to the restoration of a marriage. The word of God can deal with those areas in relationships where there's broken relationships. It's the guardrails, man. It's that which we can find for every good work. Something is there. But listen, really important. You can't know God's word and his will for some of the battles that you're going through if you're not in it. I'm from Georgia. I'm not very smart. I figured it out. That you gotta read it to know what it says about it. And so systematically going through the word covers a multitude of sins. Because as you're doing it, you know what God's Word. You gradually, not overnight, but over time you start knowing what God's word says about something. And it helps you, it guides you. It's not the answer to everything. I mean, like, for example, when we were purchasing our first home in Briargate, we just were not sure what God wanted us to do. All I knew was that we were going to plant a church out of that house, so I needed a pretty good basement. I thought a basement would be great. That's all I have. But Lord, you guide us. And then he led us. But but I knew from God's word I need to seek God to know where to live. But he didn't say, he didn't give me the address. He didn't say the street, you know, I had to use wisdom in that. So there's this combination of natural wisdom, but also the guardrails of God's word. So during the 16th century, when Martin Luther, and then later a guy named Zwingli, and later that another guy named Calvin were leading what became known as the Protestant Reformation. There were five solas, and this is in Latin, five only's. And I mentioned this last week. I wanted to just mention them again because I got so many great comments from people. As far as guardrails, I'm going to call them doctrinal guardrails of the Reformation that are true for us today. Number one was sola gratia, salvation by grace alone. Not by works, but by the grace of God alone, you are saved. Number two, sola fide through faith alone. It's your faith in Jesus. It's your faith in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ that saves you. Number three, solus Christus, in Christ alone. There's no other salvation except in Christ alone. Number four, solideo gloria, to the glory of God alone. God gets all the glory, man does not get the glory, the church doesn't get the glory, the road doesn't get the glory. The road in any church in town did not go to Calvary, Jesus did. So he gets all the glory. And then fourthly, fifthly, sola scriptura, what I'm talking about right now, and that is scripture alone. Now, let me say this about what was happening during that time in the Reformation. It's really important. So the Catholic Church has been very strong on tradition. Tradition is a part of that ethos of doctrine that is part of the Catholic Church. Let me just say this, not that's not wrong. Tradition's really important. So when you look at what God's done over the last 2,000 years, the tradition of the church, the great martyrs of the faith, and the saints of the church, those are very, very important. And we grow through this. But there was a little bit of a honing in the Reformation time of Scripture alone being the guide for the church. Go back to verse 42. Go back to verse 42. Fellowship. Fellowship. Fifth commitment was this idea, the word here is Cononia. So look at verse 42, Cononia, but then look over at 44. Now all who believed were together, had all things in common. So look back, just put your finger, keep your finger where it's at Acts 2. But go back to Acts 114. 114. Continuing with one another in one accord, one accord in prayer and supplication. Look at chapter 2, verse 1. And when the day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all one accord in one place. Now Now they're saying they were in fellowship with each other together. Verse 45, selling their possessions and goods and divided them among all as anyone had need. For 46. So continuing daily with one accord. There we go again in the temple and breaking bread from house to house. The fifth commitment is a unified spiritual family. A unified spiritual family. Really important. Konaniya means sharing life together. It's being of one accord. Everybody's got a weird family. All of you in this room have some weird stuff happening in your family. The Holts have weird stuff happening in our family. Where are we going to find a spiritual family? It's not always our physical family, it's not always our biological family. We've been away from my mom and dad for a really long time. Really at 18 is when I went to college, and then after that, immediately into missions and stuff. So I really haven't been with my mom and dad day to day, week by week, since I was 18. And I always found spiritual family, though. Through Campus Crusade, through churches that we were involved in, through the vineyard family, just all these different families we had. Guys, you need spiritual family. Your biological family may be there for you. That's great when they are, but sometimes they're not. There's this problem. The problem is these kids grow up and become adults. And they have a mind of their own. And sometimes it doesn't include you. And it's really hurtful, right? But that happens. And so we go through life and we we have some pitfalls, we have some shortcomings. And I'm telling you that you need spiritual family. They found it here. And this is a really, really crazy group. Think about this. Think about this for a second. Palestinian Jews. I mean, just let's just start with the let's just start with Jews. They can't even get along in Israel right now. They can barely get the Jews in America can barely get along with each other. So there's some ethnic issues there. Americans are worse, but Palestinian Jews in the early church, Hellenistic Jews, Jerusalem Jews, Samaritan Jews, and Galilean Jews. All together in this first church. Then you got Mary Magdalene, who just got saved out of prostitution a couple years ago. Then you got Peter, who's the courageous man of God, who gets out of the boat and walks on water and denies Christ. He's their leader. You have Simon the Zealot. So that is about as almost like either extreme left-wing leftists or extreme right wing rightists. They wanted the overthrow of the Roman government. That's Simon. So he's he's on the internet every day listening to podcasts about what's happening between the Jews and the Romans. Okay? Then there's the Sons of Thunder. The Sons of Thunder are James and John, and they are the ones who wanted to call down fire on the Samaritans. That's the group. And then we're not even done yet. 17 ethnic groups get saved in Acts chapter 2. That's the church. And what does it say? This can't be right. I mean, I can understand it at the beginning. It was only 120. But here it says, what does it say? Holy smokes, verse 45. They're selling their possessions, their goods, they're dividing them up among all as anyone had a need. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple. I want that. I want that at the road. You want that. It's we were built for Koanea. The Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, the first Koania. The Trinity who created the heavens and the earth together, working in unison. God wants that in the church. Even with all the problems we have and disagreements that we have, we work together as a church, gradually, two steps forward, one step back, sometimes one step forward, two steps back, but we work toward being a spiritual family. So recently we did a retreat. We call it an advance. And at this advance, we had Jerry Forte. Some of you know Jerry, former CEO for Colorado Springs Utilities, been a part of the road since the beginning. He led it, and we as pastors came together and formed a leadership declaration. And here's the leadership declaration that we wrote. We are a leadership community marked by love, honor, humility, and trust. We see and value one another, creating a safe, grace-filled environment that brings life to our team and to the entire church. We seek first to understand, communicate with honesty and empathy, extend forgiveness freely, and take ownership of our words and actions. In times of stress and loss, we will stay curious about each other, about each person's situation, and commit to journey together for healing. We lead with clarity and shared purpose, walking in unity, accountability and trust as we reflect the heart of God in all we do. I want a church like that. How about you? It takes a lot of work, but it's worth it. Now look at verse 46 again. Continuing daily with one accord in the temple, breaking bread from house to house. So how many of you are in a small group? Raise your hand. Wow, that's great. Well, our goal is 100%. I know that's a lofty goal, but we would like by the end of this year to see everybody in the church in a small group. So when you leave today, if you have a heart for having intimacy and cononia within a small group, you can go right over to the welcome center. We have maps showing where the small groups are. I think we have 35 home groups, and if you count wholehearted men, which is almost like a home group within our how many tables do we have?

unknown 29:02

66.

SPEAKER_01 29:03

66? That doesn't sound like a really good biblical number. We're gonna have to get to 67 really fast on that one. But those guys are seven guys at each one of those tables, and it's really exciting. Sixth commitment, the Lord's Supper. The Lord's Supper. It says they were breaking bread. Most scholars believe that when they mention breaking bread in Scripture, they're talking about the Lord's Supper, meaning communion, the sacrament of communion. So tradition tells us that the early church, either before or after every meal together, they took communion together. Seventh commitment, bold prayer. Look at this, verse 42. They were committed in prayers. That's interesting, it's plural in prayers. We believe from scholarship and from history that that meant Jewish Old Testament prayers, because that's what they knew at that time, which would be related to the feast and the prayers of ascent in the book of Psalms, but also we're gonna read in Acts chapter 4 what that looked like. It was amazing. So turn to Acts 4, so two chapters over, verse 23, 423. This is so cool that Luke, in writing about the church, gave us this beautiful example of a prayer meeting. We get to almost like be a fly on the wall at an early prayer meeting. So it says here, and being let go, so James and John have been in prison, they've been let go, verse 23. Being let go, they went to their own companions and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said to them. So when they heard that, they raised their voice to God with one accord and said, Lord, you are God who made heaven and earth and the sea and all that is in them, who by the mouth of your servant David have said, Why do the nations rage? And the people plot vain things, and the kings of the earth take their stand, and the rulers gather together against the Lord and against his Christ. So the first thing you see in a New Testament book of Acts, vintage prayer meeting is the Bible. They're quoting the word. That's what we do at noonday fire. So at noonday prayer on Mondays and Wednesdays, Josh and Desiree and others that lead us during that time, we say, come with the Bible verse first, read the word, and then pray the word back to God. You want to know God's will? Pray God's word. So number one is Bible. They're going to the Word and they're quoting the Word, verse 27. For truly, against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, were gathered together to do whatever your hand and your purpose determine before to be done. Now, Lord, look on their threats and grant to your servants that with all boldness we may speak your word by stretching out your hand to heal, and that signs and wonders may be done through the name of your holy servant Jesus. So, number one, Bible. Number two, boldness. They're praying for boldness. That's like the hardest thing, right? To pray for boldness. Say, God, make us bold. When we leave church today on Mother's Day and we're gonna celebrate moms, I think that's fantastic. Do that. But this week, be bold. God's gonna give you situations where you can be a representative, an ambassador, and a witness for Christ. They're praying for boldness even under persecution. Even under persecution. And then verse 31. And when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken. Can you imagine like a little mini earthquake after a prayer meeting? Whoa. We're not really a New Testament church until we get shaken a little bit in a prayer meeting. People say, Are you a New Testament church? I say, Well, we haven't had anybody killed yet. And we haven't had any earthquakes, so I guess we're not. They were assembled together, was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. And then they did go out. They spoke the word of God with boldness. So the third is breakthrough. Bible, boldness, breakthrough. That's a good prayer meeting. That's a good prayer meeting. So here's my two challenges this morning. Would you consider Kononia, fellowship in a home group? Would you make room in your schedule to have relationship with a spiritual family? And then number two, would you start considering to come Monday or Wednesday or both? And pray for one hour. It's just noon to one. And it's Bible, it's bold, and we see breakthroughs. Love to have you there. It's over there in the chapel until we fill it up, and then we'll bring it in here. And we'll fill up this place with prayer.

SPEAKER_00 34:22

Thank you for listening to the Road Church Podcast. We pray today's message has empowered you to make a difference in your world. For more information about The Road Church and to find more content like this, go to theroad.org. That's therode.org.