Hey! It's my parent's anniversary! Happy Anniversary, Mother!
PR's prayer excerpts-"Manifest yourself through this offering...", "May the lost be found and the found be discipled..."
PF-"Most churches are more involved with their theology than they are with evangelism."
Pastor Frank's Sermon, taken from Ephesians 2:19-21-"Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and the members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit."
#1-God is carefully planning and putting the church together; adding you and your name to the kingdom and grafting you into the household of God. It is important to know our value and our worth in the particular body we are in. We are the treasure in our body.
#2-We are in the process of becoming holy. None of us have it together. Through all the difficulties in the church and in our lives, He is in the process of maturing us and He is making something that He can fill. He is in complete control.
#3-He is carefully putting the church together and bringing us into fellowship with one another in order to make a place where He can live through His Spirit.
In Acts 2, the believers were fellowshipping with each other, in one accord, and were waiting on God when the Holy Spirit fell on them.
We pray for revival and for the Holy Spirit to come into our midst, but before that can happen, we have to be aware that He is joining us together and keep in fellowship with each other. Again, there is an order to the Holy Spirit being able to come and be in our midst.
(Mathematically speaking,)
Being fitly framed together +Being devoted to one another=a dwelling place where God's Spirit is welcome to live.
Hebrews 10:24, 25 says it this way, "And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching."
In our spiritual journey, fellowship is not an option. Fellowship is a relationship, not an activity. Get devoted to fellowship. Find your niche. ( Or create one.)
In Romania, there are orphans who have 'Failure to Thrive' Syndrome. Because the infants and children are only touched when it is necessary, they become isolated and enter a semi- catatonic state-much like skitsophrenia. (mispelled, I'm sure) They actually die from the lack of human touch.
If this is the case for our physical existence, what about our spiritual existence? Jesus has died for us and risen for us and is preparing a place for us. He has given us all He has, but if we isolate ourselves from other believers, we will die spiritually. We need to experience His touch through others and we need to touch others as well.
What separates our fellowship from worldly fellowships?
What separates our 'building' from another?
It is the fact that Jesus Christ, Himself, is our Chief Cornerstone. He holds our building together and keeps it straight.
(I think of the body of Christ as a huge building. Jesus is the biggest stone in the corner, and different bodies of believers in Christ are represented by different stones and we are all connected to Him and each other to make a strong and beautiful building, mortared together by the Holy Spirit, to make a dwelling place for God. I like to think of our church as being the stone right next to His stone.)
"When true fellowship exists it is the most convincing evidence of the continuing activity of Christ among men."-(P.F. quoted someone-?). This is miraculous. People looking in say, "Only God can do this."
We no longer have to rely on the sacrifice of animals to bring us into fellowship with God. Christ sacrifice has accomplished this for us once and for all. He calls us to be suffering servants with Him, to live a life of love, and to give ourselves up as a fragrant offering to God.
We now have fellowship with God and with the Redeemed of the Lord.
We are to love God and to love our neighbor as ourselves.
God's Spirit will only dwell in pure fellowship.
We are in this together.
We are in this together so He can be in us.
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