“Life aboard the Fellow-ship” (Full Service)
Sermon starts at 19:21
“Life aboard the fellow-ship”
During these next few weeks, before we get to the season of Lent and our preparation for Easter (which actually comes very early this year), we’re going to be talking about how we’re supposed to live – and live out – the new life that Jesus gives us. As we heard last week, Jesus came, first of all, that he might open the door for us, through the cross – so that we might experience God’s glory and his grace… But, in John’s gospel, we also hear Jesus say that he came that we might have life – that we might experience life – and do so abundantly. And it’s that life – the life we’re called to and, offered as the Church -- that we’re going to be exploring over the next five weeks. And, this morning, we’re going to talk about one of the most important aspects of that life, and that’s fellowship.
Now fellowship is one of those rather churchy words, the meaning of which has become more than a little fuzzy over the years – and, these days, even people within the church often seem to use the word fellowship as a synonym for drinking coffee. Now I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with having a cup of coffee (or tea) together after worship. Most of you know my fondness for Tim’s too well to think I’d ever suggest anything like that. But what I am saying is that coffee and fellowship are not identical – because fellowship involves a whole lot more than just the sharing of a caffeinated beverage.
The best definition for fellowship that I could find in my on-line dictionary was “being part of a community” or “a company of equals or friends”. What fellowship means, then, is having a relationship with people – a relationship that grows out of something we have in common. And, for all the other things that we might have in common within the Church, the reality that forms the very foundation of the relationship we share with one another is that experience of God’s grace toward us in Jesus Christ. In other words, he – Jesus -- is the basis of our fellowship. He – and all the things that flow from him – are what we have in common...
In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul highlights some of those points of commonality we share as the Church. He says, “There is one body (which is the church itself), and one Spirit (the Holy Spirit), just as [we] were called to the one hope of our calling...” There is “one Lord (that’s Jesus), one faith (our faith in him), one baptism, one God and Father of all...” So, what fellowship really means is that you and I recognize that, as Christians, we’re all in the same boat. In other words, we’re in this together. So let’s explore what it means to live life aboard the “fellow-ship”…
One of the first indications we get of what that life looks like comes almost right away after the resurrection had taken place. Launched into the world by the risen Saviour, the Church was still just a single, largely isolated community of believers, mostly huddled together in Jerusalem. But, in Acts chapter two, we read that those early Christians met together in the temple. They gathered together in their homes. They ate together. They prayed together. Being together was something that they were committed to. They were devoted to fellowship, Acts says...
And the word that Acts uses to communicate this idea of fellowship is koinonia. It’s a Greek word that basically means “to share, or to have in common”. So, again, what we see is that when a group of people shares that experience of the grace of God that’s offered to us in Jesus, there’s a relationship that develops that involves sharing life as well.
And as you continue to follow the story of the early church through Acts, you see that. They were devoted to each other. They prayed for each other. They looked after each other. When trouble hit, their first impulse was to seek each other out, and to seek the Lord’s help together through prayer. Fellowship wasn’t something they were committed to just because it was right, but because that’s who they were. They were a community.
And that kind of community is a rare thing today. In spite of all the advanced communication technology we have today – or maybe because of it – modern life has become so much more isolated than it used to be… So much so that many people today would be hard pressed to say where they truly “belong”. Just this week I heard someone make the comment that it seems that so many people these days can have 500 friends on Facebook, but they don’t have anyone to eat dinner with, or they’re constantly texting this person or that person, but they don’t ever talk. Face to face, voice to voice. They share information, but they don’t share life.
And, honestly, I think that sense of really belonging is something that we’ve lost. Someone once put it this way: every morning, we emerge from our boxes, commute in our boxes, work in our boxes, return to our boxes, and then watch the box until we have to do the whole thing over again.
The Bible, though, says that we need each other. The very first fly in the ointment of the creation story appears, not when the old snake works his mischief, but when God says, “It is not good for the man to be alone.” It is not good for the man to be alone. In other words, we need other human beings. We need each other. Isolation is not what we were made for, and throughout the Old Testament, God shows himself to be a community-creating God... And then, as we move into the New Testament, we see the apostles putting this same strong emphasis on life together. Peter calls the church a chosen people, the flock of God. Others refer to it as God’s household, God’s family. And – as we’ve heard -- Paul, in one of the most powerful metaphors the Bible contains, repeatedly calls the church the body of Christ...
Each person who is in Christ, he says, is a part of that body. And just as the various parts of our bodies depend on one another, so the parts of the body of Christ depend on one another too.
There’s a story, which you’ve probably heard before, about how the various parts of the body once decided to teach the stomach a lesson. As far as they could see, the stomach didn’t do anything but enjoy the food that the rest of the body provided – that the hands prepared, that the mouth chewed, and so on… So, one day, they decided that they were going to cut the stomach off. No more food, no matter how much the stomach grumbled. Of course, what they quickly discovered was that far more than the stomach was affected by their little plot. The head started feeling dizzy. The knees wobbled. All the muscles started feeling weak. What they realized was that when something impacts one part of the body, it actually impacts the whole thing. All the parts are connected. They’re dependent on each other...
Max Lucado once put it this way: “When I was driving into my office this morning, my eye saw a traffic light. The sensors within my eye perceived that the colour of the light was red. My brain checked my memory bank, and announced the meaning of a red light to my right foot. My right foot responded by leaving the accelerator and pressing the brake... Now what if my body hadn’t functioned properly? What if my eye had decided not to be a part of the body because the nose had hurt its feelings? Or what if the foot was tired of being bossed around and decided to press the gas pedal instead of the brake? Or what if the right foot was in pain, but too proud to tell the left foot, so the left foot didn’t know to step in and help? In each of those instances, a wreck would occur.”
And the church functions in exactly the same way. We need each other. We depend on each other. And we need what each one of us brings to the whole. We need people who organize. We need people who sing. We need people whose gift is caring, and people whose gift is giving. We need pray-ers and teachers and coffee makers, and people who know which end of the hammer to hold. We’re all different, and we need those differences. Just like our physical bodies, we need eyes to see, and ears to hear, hands to do, and feet to carry us where we need to go....
And that sense of inter-dependence is a big part of what real fellowship means. And it’s a big part of what gave the early church such power and such life. In Ephesians, Paul explains that the church grows and matures as each part does its work – as each one uses his or her gifts, as each one contributes to the whole, as each one is there to support the others. Each one. No mere bench warm-ers or pew sitters. No 20% doing 80%. Real fellowship depends on all of us. On all of us praying. On all of us calling. On all of us doing. On all of us seeking each other out. And on all of us seeking out those who need to be invited in...
But can’t we manage on our own? Can’t we do this Christian thing in isolation? The answer is an unequivocal “No!”, and the Bible doesn’t even give us permission to try. Instead, it warns us not to give up meeting together, but rather to keep on encouraging one another as we see God’s Day approaching. It tells us that one of the last and most important instructions that Jesus left for us was that we were to love one another...
Now I’ve heard of people who love others from a distance. But whether that implies being someone’s “secret admirer “or being involved in one of those long-distance relationships that makes you wish for a better phone plan, I doubt that anyone would describe that kind of relationship as being the ideal. It’s merely scratching the surface. Love is meant to be returned. Communication through a fibre optic cable may be a necessity at times, but it can’t compare with being face to face. Simply being obedient to Jesus’ commandments requires us to be part of his community.
Now, down through the years, some people have tried to do it alone. C.S. Lewis, for instance, when he first became a Christian, thought it could be done “by retiring to my rooms and reading theology...” Now I’ll confess that that sometimes sounds rather delightful. But it doesn’t work. The life that Jesus gives is a life that is lived together. It is life aboard the fellow-ship.
Like a coal removed from the fire ceases to glow, a Christian that doesn’t meet with other Christians soon loses spiritual fire. Like a limb that is amputated from the body ceases to live, a Christian cut off from the fellowship slowly begins to die. Like a hungry man unable to locate food, a Christian who isn’t fed in community, and by community, stumbles and loses spiritual strength. They were together. They were devoted to the fellowship. That’s why the early church grew so dramatically. That’s why fellowship is still part of what the church needs today.
Now, was that fellowship the only reason the early church grew so rapidly? No, and I’d be foolish to suggest it was. Acts shows us that the life they shared together involved so much more than that. Simply being together is not enough for the church to succeed. But as any team of any description will tell you, you can have everything else going for you. You can have all the talent in the world. But if you’re not together, if you’re not united, if you don’t have that commitment in common, there’s no way you’re going to win. Being together isn’t enough, but it is essential...
And the Bible shows us that when you bring godly people together around godly priorities, in order to accomplish a godly purpose, the Church can indeed have a godly impact in the world. May that continue to happen here as we experience Christ’s life together – life aboard the fellow-ship. Amen.