A Church That Couldn't Be Ignored
Edited directly from the sermon transcript of Matthew Miller’s message at Highland Hills Church of Christ on April 12, 2026. Adapted for length and readability while preserving his voice and message.
There are some things in life that are easy to ignore. In a crowded room, conversations can fade into the background. Elevator music is one of those things. I’m not sure why they put it in there—perhaps it’s supposed to make us feel better about the experience—but I usually try to ignore it.
Some of us find it easy to ignore the blinking fuel light on the dashboard. Some more than others. You know who you are.
Other things are impossible to ignore. They command our attention and demand a response. I’ve been so close to a lightning strike that I yelled without even thinking. The sheer magnitude of that power demanded something of me.
Here is the question I want us to wrestle with in Acts 5: Which category does the church fall into?
The church is the people of God being sent on the mission of God. The building is where we meet and send from, where we can help and serve people. But when we go into our community and the world, are we just background noise? Or does our presence demand a response?
My concern is that contemporary American Christianity has learned very well how to stay safe in its faith. We can have a faith that doesn’t command attention or require much faithful witness. Fear keeps us quiet. Comfort keeps us still. We can convince ourselves that this is normal Christianity.
Acts 5 doesn’t know that kind of Christianity. We find a church whose fuse has been lit by the Spirit of Pentecost. Now it has become a blaze that cannot be ignored. Wherever this church shows up, people have to reckon with the kingdom of God breaking into the world.
A church that cannot be ignored chooses bold obedience over fear and comfort because God’s presence and way in the world are too important to keep quiet.
The chapter begins with an unsettling story. Ananias and Sapphira sell a possession and bring part of the proceeds to the apostles. At first it seems like more of what we have already seen: people sharing their resources to meet needs and carry the gospel into the world. But there is an intrusion into the heart of the church.
Peter asks Ananias why Satan has filled his heart to lie to the Holy Spirit. While the property remained unsold, it was his. After it was sold, the money was still under his control. Peter is not confronting him because he failed to give as much as somebody else. He is confronting deception.
Ananias and Sapphira are trying to conceal the truth from God himself. That’s a fool’s errand. When Adam hid in the garden and God asked, “Where are you?” God already knew where Adam was. He wanted to know whether Adam knew where Adam was.
Here God acts decisively, and both Ananias and Sapphira die. That raises a difficult question, because God does not always act this way. We know the struggle between the Spirit and the flesh. Paul describes it in Romans 7: wanting to do what is good, yet finding ourselves doing what is wrong. We know the tension of those competing desires.
But here are people proclaiming themselves followers of Jesus while deliberately trying to deceive God. At the beginning of this movement, God makes something clear: his presence cannot be managed or ignored. His holiness is real. He wants his church to be about him.
That does not mean the church is made up of perfect people. Peter isn’t perfect; later Paul will rebuke him. The question is whether we are living honestly before God. We cannot expect the public power we see in Acts while tolerating private compromise before him.
Great fear comes upon the church and those who hear what has happened. Then we see signs and wonders through the apostles. Believers are added to the Lord. People bring those who are sick and suffering, and they are healed.
God wants a holy church: people whose hearts beat for him. If we want to be a church that cannot be ignored, we need to ask where our hearts are. Are they turned toward God or toward ourselves?
The church also needs to be visible. That is why holiness matters first. A visible church without a holy heart will become absorbed in its own plans, projects, and ideas. But the church in Acts is active in the open. As opposition increases, they gather, serve, and speak. The community knows them.
Some people believe and join them. Some seek healing. Others oppose them. When the church is active and living for God, people respond. These believers are known for one thing: they are Jesus people. If you know them, you are pointed toward the one they follow.
Years ago, I heard a young woman describe how she began her day. Before getting out of bed, she asked God to show her what he was doing and help her join him in it. That is powerful. I believe that is what the church in Acts was doing. They were drawing attention to Jesus, who was still at work through his people. People were in awe of what God was doing.
When a church lives visibly and actively, it also encounters opposition. In Acts 5:17, the high priest and the Sadducees are filled with indignation and put the apostles in prison. They are losing control as people join this movement.
That night, an angel opens the prison doors and tells the apostles to return to the temple and speak the words of this life. Early the next morning, they are teaching again. When the council sends for them, the prison is secure and the guards are at the doors, but the apostles are gone. Someone reports that the men they imprisoned are standing in the temple teaching.
They are brought before the council again. The high priest asks why they have continued teaching when they were strictly commanded to stop. Peter and the apostles answer, “We ought to obey God rather than men.”
I’m not going to drop the microphone, but that is a mic-drop moment.
They had been arrested and imprisoned. When they were freed, they returned to the work God had given them. Their message and their lives were threatened, yet God’s intervention was greater than their fear. They made a defining declaration: their obedience belonged to God.
Once your obedience is settled, fear loses its grip. When God’s authority is ultimate, human resistance loses its leverage. Nothing someone does to you can diminish whose you are when you belong to God.
So we need to ask: What is fear currently silencing in our lives? Where is God calling us to be faithful witnesses while fear encourages us to draw back and become invisible?
The church in Acts could not be ignored. The harder the authorities tried to stamp it out, the more it spread. In our day, the church is often ignored. Would that change if we stopped ordering our lives around comfort and began ordering them around obedience?
Imagine being dropped into your workplace, school, doctor’s office, or a store. You don’t announce that you are a Christian. You don’t tell anybody which congregation you attend. How long would it take for someone to figure it out because they can see it for themselves?
What would change if we organized our lives around obedience? What areas do we still need to bring before God and submit to him? I’ve had to confront areas like that in my own life. It is uncomfortable to realize that something remains unsubmitted to the Lord. Making the change is uncomfortable too.
But when we lay down comfort as our organizing principle, we grow in holiness and in boldness about Jesus. People begin to see something different. When God’s presence fills his people, his glory is put on display. Jesus told us to let people see our good works so that they would glorify our Father in heaven.
Our world needs more than a message that soothes it. Ultimately, people need to be saved, and Jesus is the one who can do that. Your life can open a door to speak of him.
Jesus died on a cross to bring us salvation. That is how much he wants us to have it. He invites us to come to him. And if we have been maintaining a comfortable faith rather than an obedient one, we can bring that honestly before him and begin to change, with our church family alongside us.
