Being The New Testament Church, Part 3 Being Added

“… and that same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls.”
Acts 2:41b

After those that heard Peter and believed in the massage he spoke, the messege of Christ crucified and risen, there were about 3,000 souls added to their number. It is interesting to see that the 3 thousand were called souls and not persons or bodies.
In manufacturing when we need an unskilled person to perform small tasks in order to keep regular employees doing their production work, we call on a “temp” agency to provide these persons. These persons are referred to as “warm bodies”. Now not all temp laborers are in this category. Most go on to prove them-selves and gain employment with the company that has contracted them. I have worked as a temp and after being proven reliable, gained a full time job. But those who do not push for a steady job and are just content them-selves to a pay-per-day get by day-by-day attitude moving from job-to-job are the “warm bodies” of the industry. They work to get what they can and move on.
The industry is looking for those who apply themselves and work for the betterment of them-selves and the company. Seeing that they are both hand-n-hand.
They want those who commit their whole soul or mind, emotions and intellect to the enterprise.
The adding to the Church is that same way. The Lord wishes to add those who will commit their whole soul to the Church. He wants those who will give mind, emotions and intellect to the growth of the Church. Committed to the growth of themselves and others. Seeing that they are all the same in His eyes. One cannot grow with out the other.
Disturbingly the Church as a whole is full of “warm bodies” that only come to fill their own needs. And when the group stops providing the fulfillment, they move on to the next group doing as little as possible for the most they can get. They go for the preaching until they think they have heard it all before. They go to put their kids in the nursery until some other kid makes theirs mad or the attendant doesn’t do like they want. They attend so they can put their teens in a youth group so the youth pastor can straighten out the mess they have made with their youth. And when he or she cannot do the impossible, they move on.
We need those the Lord has added to our number, committed to the full success of the New Testament Church. They will be givers that can also take a gift and use it for the glory of the Lord.
This is all a part of being the New Testament Church.