Living Stones – Friday, November 3, 2017

Fellowship

Hebrews 10:25

“… not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another …”

There is a lot of dead routine in church.

People come to church with low to no expectations, for the liturgy or ritual is familiar, the programme and sequence has little or no variation, the quality of the entertainment is poor, there is hardly any inspiration, and often we hear nothing new.

But the scriptures speak to a vitality of life, living, relationship, and fellowship in the house of God, among the people of God, and between the people and God.

So why is there this big gap between what the scripture describes and what we experience? Why is the product different from the promotion?

I believe that one of the reasons for this is that we have failed to properly develop and maintain all of the aspects of the life of the church. We have placed disproportionate emphasis on the preaching and the teaching; some would say that we have placed the emphasis on the preacher and the teacher.

A lot of church activity now involves focus on the “Man of God,” whom ever he may be, attention to the star singer, then the dance; and what we call worship is mostly the congregation in a sing-a-long, dance-a-long to the high-energy worshippers on stage.

The scripture places emphasis on the need for teaching and preaching. Preaching that encourages and teaching that pays attention to sound doctrine. Jesus emphasised to Peter that if he loved Him he must feed His sheep.

However, as important and as primary as this preaching and teaching is, it is not the only aspect of church. Church is for fellowship. However, we have separated worship from fellowship and focus on what worship has now evolved into. Fellowship is neglected.

Fellowship, as described in today’s passage Hebrews 10:24-25, requires that churches make room for an engagement among the believers. Believers have been passed over for a church experience made up of looking towards those at the front.

For this to happen we have to radically reform how we organise the activities of the service. There must be a central place for preaching and teaching but there must be a place for the gathered believers to “stir up love and good works” in one another. There must be space for us to “exhort one another.”

All dimensions of the Christian’s new relationships must be given room for expression when we have an “assembling of ourselves together.” We must be able to worship God with whom we have the primary relationship, and I mean worship, not an experience of the entertainment of the professionals.

When we come to Christ our relationship with God is restored but our relationship with others is also restored, especially with those in the household of faith. On that basis, there must be room made for those relationships to develop and flourish too.

The writer to the Hebrews makes it very clear that Christians shouldn’t stay home from church. And when we come together we must ensure that, given the urgency of the coming of Christ, and the consequences, we should be using some of our time at church to encourage one another and to stir up each other.

There is encouragement we get from the Apostle James that, while it is not directly linked to the encouragement here from the writer to the Hebrews, it illustrates the need for genuine fellowship to be encouraged and enabled in the church.

James says, in 5:16, “Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed.” It is hardly likely that we would confess our faults to people with whom we have no relationship and experience of genuine fellowship. An absence of confession that fellowship facilitates could actually affect our healing.

Think on these things:

1. What do you think are the signs of genuine Christian fellowship?
2. How could greater fellowship be encouraged in your church?
3. Is there anything in your approach to church, and to others, that limits the opportunities for you to have true fellowship?

Prayer focus:

Let us pray today that we would develop opportunities for Christian fellowship in our church.

In His Grace

Pastor Alex