Its ironic if not tragic that the very religion that was waiting on a Messiah failed to recognise him when he came – and then rather than admitting their mistake after his resurrection, decided to persecute and kill his disciples.

It seems little of the conflict we see in the gospels and the book of Acts is related to religion per se, but in fact is more about power and authority and control. Its about ‘who gets to call the shots’.

That Judaism wasn’t able to contain the new move of God that arrived in Jesus is somewhat bizarre, and yet quite understandable. He came along claiming to be a (the) king, and Messiah, but then broke many of their cherished religious rules. He established a community of people with huge influence and supernatural power (see Acts 3-5) who did not conform to the established order either.

And it wasn’t just that they were mavericks. I think that’s too easy a solution and maybe too appealing for those with an anti-authoritarian streak of their own.

They were people who had learnt a whole new way of life – a way of life that was in sync with the priorities of God – and oddly enough sometimes out of sync with the priorities of their own religious tradition. Whatever structures had formed within Judaism (and no doubt some of them were good) were now serving to undermine the future of their faith rather than advance it and the main culprits were the ones in power – the elders and chief priests – the Sanhedrin.

I wonder what would have happened if the Sanhedrin had been able to say ‘wow – God is really at work among us – take a look at that!’ I wonder what have happened if they had embraced this new move of God rather than fighting it.

Instead the ‘system’ wouldn’t bend. Power could not be re-allocated and the people were the casualty. As I was reflecting on this last week I was thinking again that any structures in churches must always be functional and flexible. They need to serve the cause and the people and be easily adaptable when they fail to do so.

Everything has structure of some sort, so to be ‘anti-structure’ is just a bit naive, but to recognise that structures can facilitate either good health or poor health is important. In Acts 6 the apostles need to work out a ‘food roster’ for the widows who weren’t getting their fair share. We don’t have one of them today… and rightly so because its a non-issue.

But we still seem to have many other irrelevant or superfluous structures that don’t change easily. If you aren’t sure what is a ‘not negotiable’ structure in your community then just try and change it. You will soon find out.

So the challenge to us this week as we read this book of Acts is to consider how to create and sustain a church community that has healthy structures and then to recognise when those structures need to change without worrying about who ‘gets control’.