The Essential Nature of Love in Christian Fellowship

Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast, where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.

My name is Pastor Josh and I want to thank you for listening to this podcast.

I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen you in the word of God.

Now come along, let's look into the Bible and see what God has for us here today.

We're going to go ahead and continue on in our sermon series looking at the, the rhythms of up in and out.

You guys have been with us the last three weeks, have seen that we have a new theme for the year, a new vision for the year, and that's focusing on up in and out, our up relationship with God, our personal relationship with Him.

The end is that relationship with others within our church family.

And the out is our relationship with others in the community that need Jesus Christ as Savior.

And so last week, if you were with us in the live stream, we talked about the up relationship with God, the importance of growing in our personal walk with Him.

And that starts with faith, and that starts with trusting in him for his work that he offered for us on the cross and his work in the resurrection and the gift of grace that he extends to all of us.

And so that's the first and foremost priority for the believer is to have our relationship right with the Lord.

And so the second rhythm that we're going to be looking at here in this study is the rhythm of church culture inwardly.

So our church culture in the, in relationships that we have.

And when.

Anytime I use the word in, in this context, we're talking about relationships with other Christians, particularly in the church that we are in here at Middletown Baptist Church.

And so last week we looked at Colossians, chapter three, and we saw that those first four verses speak of this idea of, of the Christian, the believer, to commit themselves to a relationship with God, to seek those things which are above, to seek the things of the Lord.

And so our first priority must be an authentic growing relationship with the Lord.

But the Bible says that if we are in love with him, if we're growing in our love with him, it will manifest itself through love and devotion to others.

And so it looks like this, if I love God, I love others.

If I serve God, I serve others.

And so it starts with that relationship with God.

What happens often in our world today is that many people try to skip the part of their relationship with God.

And they say, you know what?

I'm just going to be a good person to other people.

And that's what's going to save me, I'm going to give to the poor.

I'm.

I'm going to help those in need.

And those are good things, but those are things that don't save us of for Christ.

So I serve others because I love God, and, and I.

And I serve others because God calls me to follow that path in my life.

And so ultimately, what we can see here in this case is that our love for God will be manifested through our love and devotion to others, especially for those that are believers.

And so there's a few passages of Scripture that we can look to when it comes to that teaching.

There's, There's a lot that we could look up to in the New Testament, but particularly In John chapter 13, we see Jesus speaking to his followers, and he gives us a few different thoughts.

Here In John chapter 13, he's already talked about sacrifice and service and servant leadership.

But then later on in John chapter 13, he says in verse number 34, a new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.

So Jesus says, I have shown you what it means to love one another.

And now this new commandment that's giving is to love one another, to love each other.

And then he says something very interesting in verse number 35, because oftentimes I do believe that sometimes as Christians, we feel like it's an optional thing to love others.

Well, I'll be a testimony for Christ in other ways.

But.

But what does it say in verse number 35?

He says, by this, by this love for others, by this, all men know that ye are my disciples if ye have love one to another.

So the mark of a disciple is one who cares and serves and takes care of other believers.

That's the idea.

And so the way that the world can see if we're authentic in our belief to the Lord is, is by the way that we treat others.

So the way that we treat others specifically within the church matters.

It matters to our testimony, it matters to our faith, it matters to our spiritual growth.

And so there's other passages of Scripture that speak to this.

In First John 1 John, chapter 4, the.

The apostle John is writing here, and he's speaking to the idea of love.

And he's speaking to the fact that God has manifested his love for us.

As we read this morning, that, that God demonstrated his love toward us.

Why, that he sent his only begotten Son into this world, that we might live through him.

But then later on in that passage, he says in verse number 16, 1st John 4.

16.

And we have known and believe the love that God hath to us.

God is love.

And he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.

Herein is our love made perfect or basically matured, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment.

Because as he is, so are we in this world.

So, meaning this, as Christians, we are to live our lives, to be more and more like Christ, because ultimately we will be like him one day.

Then it says in verse 18, there is no fear in love, but perfect love casteth out fear, because fear hath torment.

He that feareth is not made perfect in love.

We love him because he first loved us.

If a man say, I love God and hateth his brother, he is a liar.

For he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love whom he hath not seen?

And this commandment have we from him that he who loveth God, love his brother also.

So it can't be any more clear in the fact that if we say we love God, if we say we're devoted to him, if we're.

If we're growing as Christians, it's directly connected with how we deal with other people.

And he says, particularly with those that are fellow believers.

And so what does this look like?

What does this love look like?

Well, ultimately, it's shown in Matthew, chapter 22.

You remember the Pharisees are talking to Jesus, and.

And Jesus is being tested.

And we see a young lawyer who.

He's a professional in the law of God.

And he comes and he asks Jesus this question that is there basically to tempt him.

What's the greatest commandment?

And the greatest commandment Jesus gives him is to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart.

That's Matthew, chapter 22, verse 37.

So that's the up relationship.

He says the first and greatest commandment is to love God with everything, to believe in him, to trust in him, to allow him, to guide our lives.

And he says, thou shall love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

And so that speaks to the first priority of our relationship in.

In our Christian walk is our relationship with God.

But then secondly, he says this.

This is the first and great commandment.

And the second is like unto this, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.

And so right behind, loving God with everything that we have is to love our neighbor as ourself.

And then he says something very interesting in verse 40 on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets, meaning everything that you see in Scripture hangs on these two core principles.

To love God with everything and to love our neighbor as ourself.

And that speaks to both the up relationship and the inward relationship.

To love our neighbor.

And so even in the great commandment as this is called, Jesus calls us as Christians to love our neighbor as ourself.

And so we could go to many passages of Scripture in the New Testament that speak to the importance and the examples of Christian relationships.

I would encourage you at some point in time, we're not going to be able to have the time to do it here today, but I would encourage you to do an extensive study on the one another passages in Scripture.

To love one another, to forgive one another, to forbear one another.

There's so many passages of Scripture that speaks of our relationship with one another, but one that I'd like us to turn to, which picks up where we studied last week, is the book of Colossians, Colossians chapter three.

This is going to be our main text here this morning, and we will be digging deeper into what the Bible has to say about our relationships with others when it comes to the Christian walk.

And so here this morning, I'm going to ask you to pray with me right now as we get started.

That's a long Runway.

We're going to hit the ground running and we're going to look here in Colossians chapter three what it means to walk in this in rhythm when it comes to our relationship with others.

Lord, I pray that you be with us in this time.

I pray that you work in our lives.

I pray that you clear our minds and clear our hearts.

Allow us to see your word this morning not just as something that can help us, but but as your word says, that's it's profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction and righteousness that we can be spiritually mature Christians, that we can see the importance of not only loving you, but also loving others and serving others and fellowshipping with one another and growing in the truth of the word of God.

And so, Lord, I pray that you be in this time.

I pray that if there's someone here today that does not know you as personal Savior, that today can be the day of salvation, that we can all walk with the confidence of knowing that you are our God, that you are our Savior, that you are our king, and that we can live in light of that in our daily walk here.

And so, Lord, we thank you for your love and your grace.

And we ask all these things in Jesus name.

Amen.

Well, in Philippians chapter three, we looked at this last week.

The first four verses in Excuse me.

Colossians, chapter three, Colossians, chapter three, verses one through four, speak of this relationship that we have with God.

It says in verse number two, to set your affections on the things above, not on things on the earth.

And so the idea is not to get distracted, not to get pulled away from our priority of loving God and serving God and having that eternal perspective in everything that we do.

But then we see in verse number five that the way that we deal with God affects our life by the way that we respond, by the way that we live.

And he says in verse number five, mortify therefore your members.

Now, what does mortify mean?

Mortify means to kill, to slay, to remove.

So he says, remove, Kill therefore your members which are upon the earth.

Meaning this.

Don't allow yourself to be so materialistically focused, so fleshly focused, that we're directed by the things of this world.

He says, don't focus on the things of this world.

And he lists those things.

Fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence and covetousness, which is idolatry.

He says, these are things that the world is characterized by.

And if we live like the world, that's what we're going to look like.

And so if we want to have victory over these things, verses 1 through 4 says that the way that we fight that is by growing closer to God.

Verse 6.

For which things sake, the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience.

We want to.

We.

We want to be characterized by children of obedience, not disobedience.

And he says, this is the way that we used to walk, verse 7, in which ye also walk sometime when you lived in them.

But now he says, now that you are different, now that you are a child of God, now that you have been saved, now that you have been forgiven.

He says, now ye also put off all these things.

Anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth.

Lie not one to another.

And seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds.

And so one of the elements of the principle of spiritual growth is putting off the old ways, turning.

Turning away from those things which characterized us before we came to Christ.

And that starts with that relationship with God.

So we can't have this type of transformation unless we have that relationship with God, unless we're growing in his truth.

But Then what we also understand is that this is connected to our relationship with others.

If we don't handle these struggles in our life, if we don't deal with these fleshly things that are distracting us, we're not going to be able to have the relationships with others that we're called to have.

And so verses 5 through 9 speak of putting off the old man, putting off the old ways.

And then verse 10 talks about putting on the new.

And so anytime we see in scripture it talking about removing the old things.

It doesn't just say remove the old things.

It says, put on the new.

So it's like taking off a coat.

We take off the coat and we put a new one on.

Putting off the old ways and putting on the new.

So verse number 10, it says this.

And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him.

And so what's the new man?

The new man is the Holy Spirit guiding our lives, working in our lives, changing our hearts, changing our passions, changing our actions.

And so the Christian life is not just about avoiding bad things, even though that is part of it.

The Christian life's not just about stopping all of the sin in our life.

But on top of that, as we see in Ephesians chapter four and Colossians chapter three is, it's about putting in and infusing in the good that God has equipped us with.

Verse 11, where there is neither Greek nor Jew circumcision, nor uncircumcision, barbarian, cynthian bond, nor free.

But Christ is all and in all he says, how can you find this new man?

How can you find this new path?

How do you change your life?

Well, it's not through any of these other things that the world characterizes us by.

It's not about being from this tribe or this tribe, about being in this socioeconomic class or this one over here.

No, the answer is Christ.

He says that in verse number 11.

There's no more distinction as a believer in Jesus Christ.

We are now walking in his identity.

So it's Christ in us.

It's in Christ that we find this transformation.

And it's in Christ that we can live this way within the church culture.

Because it's not normal.

It's not typical for us to act the way that Colossians chapter three tells us to act.

That's not the way that we act in our humanity.

In our flesh, we don't want to be patient.

In our flesh, we don't want to be loving.

In our flesh, we don't want to be sacrificial.

But he says, the way that you can find this type of culture, the way that you can find this type of focus is by walking in this newness of life that we can only find in Jesus Christ.

So starting in verse number 12, he begins to talk about this relationship that we have not only with God, but with his family, with his children.

He says, verse 12, put on, therefore, as the elect of God, as.

As the family of God, as those that are chosen for a.

A path, a.

A purpose.

He says, holy and beloved.

And so I love that phrase, we're holy and beloved.

Holy means to be set aside for a specific purpose.

It doesn't mean completely sinless.

We can't be completely sinless on this side of heaven.

But that word holy means to be set aside for a specific use.

And that's what we are as Christians.

God has a purpose for us.

But then he says holy and beloved.

Beloved just means that we are.

We are loved.

And we know that as first John, chapter four, said that we love him because he first loved us.

And so he says, this is what you're supposed to do if you are a child of God.

And then he goes on and say, and says this.

Put on what?

Bowels of mercy.

Now, that's a strange phrase.

Vowels of mercy.

What does that mean?

Essentially, that's a way to say compassion.

We are to have compassion as Christians towards other believers within the family of God.

Now, now, I know that we're supposed to have compassion on the loss, but particularly in this case, this is specifically talking about the family of God looking at those around us.

And sometimes we're tempted to have compassion for the loss, but maybe not have compassion for those brothers and sisters that are around us.

And compassion essentially means this, that we can understand the pain that they're going through, that we can weep with those that are weeping, that we can laugh with those that are laughing, that we can be with them through the midst of their pain.

And the Bible says that the greatest act of compassion is Jesus Christ saying, look, I can identify with you.

I can understand your pain.

Even though he did not sin, the Bible says that he knew all those things that we have gone through, and yet he lived that perfect life.

And so Jesus showed compassion.

The Bible says in Matthew, chapter 9 that Jesus was moved with compassion, that his bowels were moved with compassion.

Anytime you see the word bowels in the text here, back then, the bowels, the stomach was the seat of emotions.

Today we use the heart, right?

We say, you know, My heart really broke for that person or my heart was moved for that person.

Back in this culture, they would say my bowels were moved.

And that speaks to that feeling that you have there in the pit of your stomach, that emotional feeling.

And so the idea here is to have compassion for those in need, to have bowels of mercies.

And so one element of how we should live with one another within the church is to have compassion on those that might be going through a struggle, might be not where we're at in our spiritual growth process.

By the way, that what we do need to understand is that within the church culture, they're going to be people that are different levels of maturity.

And with different levels of maturity comes different aspects of growth and pain and, and confusion and miscommunications.

And so as a Christian, we're challenged to live in light of that compassion.

But there's more.

He says kindness.

Now, kindness is kindness.

Kindness is basically showing that compassion, right?

It's one thing to have compassion for somebody, it's another thing to move on that compassion.

And that would be an act of kindness.

So the Bible says it's not just about the feeling of having compassion for somebody, but within the church, I identify something that I can do, and therefore acting in that kindness allows me to show my compassion, to show my love, to demonstrate my love.

The Bible speaks over and over again about, it's one thing to say something, it's another thing to do it right.

Demons.

God.

God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son.

God loved us so much that he demonstrated his love towards us.

And you've heard me say this over and over again.

I can say all day that I'm a loving husband, that I'm a loving father, but until I demonstrate that, until I show that I'm not a loving husband and a loving father.

And so to be a loving Christian means to act in kindness.

But, but, but there's more.

Again, this is a parallel to Ephesians chapter 4.

If you get a chance to read Ephesians 4 and Colossians 3 together, you're going to see how they're tied together.

You're going to see how they're so interrelated.

And I think it's important for us to see this within the church culture.

And so the next thing that we see after having kindness, he says, humbleness of mind.

That's humility.

We've talked about this before when we were talking about church culture.

One core element to our culture within the church must be a Spirit of humility, let no man think better of himself than he actually is.

Jesus gave us the perfect example.

In Philippians chapter two.

He humbled himself.

He took the form of a servant.

If all of us have the spirit of humility, we're all going to be able to put one another before ourselves.

And what's going to happen is we're going to see a community built upon this humbled spirit.

So he says, having humbleness of mind.

Meekness.

Meekness is strength under control.

Meekness is being able to identify where and when we can act with discernment and wisdom and.

And having discretion on how we do things within the church.

There are certain times within the church setting that, yes, we might be in the right, but it doesn't always mean that we act out in anger.

It doesn't always mean that we act out in judgment.

Jesus could have.

If you think about Jesus as he walked this earth, if we believe that Jesus is who he says he is, he knew everything about every person that he was walking by.

Jesus could have had every right to judge every single person as he was walking by them.

He knew every thought, he knew every action.

But he picked those opportunities to minister at the right place in the right time.

That's what we would consider discernment.

And Jesus showed love, he showed compassion.

Jesus showed judgment.

Jesus showed, in many cases, strength.

And so meekness is essentially allowing God to control us and not our emotions to control us.

Moving further here, he says there is long suffering.

That's patience, to have patience with one another.

Now, in a few moments, we're going to look at how these can practically live out.

But I want you to see these character traits that we should be striving for within the ministry.

So we see patience more.

Verse 13, forbearing one another.

Forbearance is again looking to this idea of putting others before ourselves, being patient with other people, offering forgiveness, offering mercy, offering grace.

More forbearing one another and forgiving one another.

Why?

If any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.

This is exactly what we see in Ephesians 4:32, forgiving one another.

Why?

Because God has forgiven you.

The Bible very clearly teaches that within the church culture, within our setting of Christianity, we should be ready to forgive.

We should be excited to forgive.

Why?

Because we have been forgiven for so much in our life.

Think about the great forgiveness that you can find in Jesus Christ.

Think about all the sin in our life and think about how when we come to Christ in repentance, and in faith that he wipes that away.

Think about how much, how.

How bad it really is when we as Christians aren't willing to forgive.

When someone comes up to us in repentance, well, I'm never forgiving them, I'm never releasing them.

Who are we to do that if our great Savior has released us from the guilt and condemnation that we have faced?

And so the Spirit is forgiveness.

Now, again, I think biblical forgiveness needs to be discussed because a lot of times people think that you have to forgive in any situation.

And we know that Jesus doesn't forgive everybody.

He offers forgiveness for all.

That's forbearance.

Forgiveness is the restoration process in which a person comes in repentance, and then there's that forbearance and there's grace and there's that restoration.

And so what I would tell you is that again, I think that sometimes people think that forgiveness means that I have to overlook somebody's sin.

No, God never overlooks our sin.

But what it is, it's that repentant heart that comes back and there's that extension of forbearing gift of grace that can ultimately be found.

And so at the end of forgiveness is always restoration.

And that's what we can find within the church.

And so furthermore, he says that there's.

There's more to this.

Verse 14.

And above all these things, put on charity.

Charity is love.

Charity is sacrificial love.

We know that within the church that the motivation must be love.

If I'm serving other people out of anger, that's eventually gonna hit the roof, it's gonna be a problem, it's gonna be an issue.

If I'm serving out of any other motivation other than love, I'm going to get to a place where I don't have the desire to serve and to care for one another.

Again, so he says here at the end, basically, have a heart of love, which is the bond of perfectness, which, which essentially brings this place of peace.

Verse 15.

And let the peace of God rule in your hearts.

Peace is only found.

And we can see this in Philippians chapter 4.

Let the Peace of God which passeth all understanding, rule your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

This type of peace can only be found with the unity found in a relationship with Jesus Christ within the church.

There's a lot of people looking for peace, and they try to find peace in all the wrong places.

And the only way that we can find peace within the church, the only find we can place, we can find peace within this world.

Is finding it in the unity of Jesus Christ.

Verse 15, he says, and let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you're called in one body.

This speaks to unity.

One body and be thankful.

Thankfulness.

And so within the church there's unity.

You'll hear me over and over explain that unity is not uniformity.

Uniformity would be that we all need to look the same.

We all need to agree.

We on every single point.

We all need to essentially be robots, Baptist robots.

That's not what the Bible is teaching.

The Bible is teaching that uniformity is not necessarily what God calls us to be in.

God actually calls us to be diverse.

But in the diversity comes the unity.

Not all of us can serve it the same capacity.

Not all of us are gifted in the same ways, and that's a good thing.

But the Bible says that, that we can come together with our distinct differences in our makeup and come together with one purpose, and that is unity.

And what does that bring us?

That brings us thankfulness, he says, and be thankful.

One of the things within the church that we forget about is just the opportunity to thank the Lord and to thank others for what is happening in our lives.

We often live in such a very critical environment.

Many times within our life we have a lack of gratitude.

And essentially we're living in bitterness because we're not thankful for anything that we have in our lives.

We can never be satiated.

We always want more, right?

If we, we get five things, we want six things, okay, if someone was nice to me for a week, I want them to be nice to me for two weeks, then.

Then I can love them.

We're never satisfied in our human nature.

We're never satisfied in our flesh.

And so what the Bible says is there's a point that we say, lord, I am so thankful.

I'm so thankful for what you've given me.

And that thankfulness should spill out to thankfulness for other people.

And the way that we show our thanks for other people is by telling them, by demonstrating our thankfulness, and by reciprocating that love to them that God has called us to, to show.

And so verse 16, after he says being thankful, he says, this is what it's supposed to look like.

Verse 16.

Let the word of Christ.

Let the word of God dwell in you richly in all wisdom.

One core element to the inward relationship is that it's all based on the Word of God.

We talk about the Word of God.

We meditate upon the Word of God.

We share the Word of God.

We we testify of the Word of God, folks.

The Bible should be the core element to our conversation.

I know for me, the, the tendency is to be so comfortable talking about the weather, talking about sports, talking about the things of this world, and we just kind of miss the point of.

The conversations that we should be having are predominantly based around the truths of God's word and his wisdom.

And then it goes on to say, teaching and admonishing one another.

The idea here would be that we're to teach one another in classroom settings, in settings in private, in settings in public, on one, on one relationships.

All of this could be explained with the idea of teaching.

And then he goes on to say, exhorting, we're teaching and admonishing.

Admonishing is another word for exhorting.

Exhorting just means to challenge one another, to encourage one another.

And then it's manifested in what it says in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.

So it's corporate worship.

That's why we get together and worship together.

You could worship God from home, you can worship God from your car, you can worship God from anywhere individually.

But corporate worship is unique.

And the Bible calls us to come together, to do this together, so that we can encourage one another, so that we can teach one another.

In verse 17, he says, and whatsoever ye do in word or deed, so the Bible says we're to do things in our words and what we say and in deeds, and what we do, whatsoever we say in word and deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.

And so the Bible tells us that what we do within the church should be in what we say, it should be in what we do.

But it's all wrapped around what?

Not around myself, not around money, not around a program, not around a building.

But he says, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.

And so we essentially see the marching orders for how the relationships that we're supposed to have should look like within the church.

And so again, like I mentioned, this is a parallel to Ephesians, chapter 4.

Both of those passages speak of how we should live our lives in Christ.

And so it starts in Colossians, chapter three, verse one, with that up relationship with God, which changes what we believe in, it changes how we act in our personal life, and it changes how we act when it deals with other people, when it comes to other Christians.

And so how will this look practically for the next few Minutes.

I just want us to look at biblically speaking, how does this practically live out within the church?

Well, it looks like this.

It looks like edification.

What is edification?

Edification is building up one another.

We saw in Colossians chapter 3 this idea of building one another up in the truth, building one another up in love, building one another up in forgiveness.

And so with patience, with meekness, with kindness, with thankfulness, all these character traits, it's done so that we can build one another up in Christ.

The idea of edification would be this picture of not just building them up, but leaning on them and actually holding somebody up.

There's times in our life where we need to hold up others in the truth of Jesus Christ.

How we do that is through those character traits that are listed there in Colossians chapter three.

One of our goals should be, when we come into the church, is to edify other Christians.

I often hear within the church setting, what is going to be done for me today?

Okay, I'm coming in.

What is the church going to do for me?

And I understand what we mean by that because we live in a culture that's about us.

But what if we came into the church setting, the church culture and said, what can I bring to other people?

How could I build someone else up today?

How could I intentionally today look to strengthen another Christian?

And I think it would change the way that our churches responded and reacted and fellowshiped and served and had classes.

All of these things would change if we came in saying, how can I build another Christian up in Christ today?

So edification, there's another word.

It's a biblical word, but I've already mentioned it this, this morning and other settings.

Exhortation.

Exhortation is.

Is simply challenging, encouraging, and ultimately coming alongside of someone and pulling them through and lifting them up in the midst of difficulty.

So edification is more about building that person up.

Exhortation is about spurring them forward.

There's a time and a place to edify somebody because they might be needing that strength in the Lord, but there's that time and a place to move someone forward.

Because a lot of us have gotten comfortable with where we are in church.

A lot of us have gotten comfortable where we are in our Christian walk.

A lot of us have gotten very comfortable in our marriages and our homes and our workplaces.

And the Bible says there is a time and a place for us to be spurred forward for the cause of the kingdom, a passage of Scripture that speaks directly to that.

And you're going to hear Me talk about it a lot this year when it comes to our church culture, that it's found in Hebrews chapter 10.

Hebrews chapter 10, verse 24 speaks specifically about this very thing about exhortation.

Now, now, oftentimes exhortation is taken in the wrong setting, either for two, two reasons.

One, people don't exhort in love.

Or number two, people don't receive exhortation with the right spirit.

It's received in the spirit of pride.

So Hebrews chapter 10, verse 24 says, and let us consider one another, let us think about one another to provoke unto love and to good works.

Meaning this.

I need to think about my fellow brother or sister in Christ.

I need to care for them, I needed to have compassion for them.

I need to have love for them.

And in doing so, what will I do?

It says, and provoke unto love, unto good works.

Now, provoke literally means to stir up, to poke, to, to turn over.

And it doesn't mean, in a negative sense, provoking someone to sin.

That's actually what we often do within our lives.

We, for knowing it or not knowing it, we provoke other people to sin.

The Bible says exhortation is to exhort one another in love and in good works.

Sometimes exhortation is done with the wrong spirit, like, hey, what's wrong with you?

Why aren't you in church?

What's your unrepentant sin that you need to deal with today?

And it comes from a very judgmental spirit.

We've got to, again, when we're exhorting, do it with the spirit of love, a spirit of restoration, a spirit of building one another up.

And so what I would encourage you to do is think about ways in which you could come into the church and say, I want to exhort others.

I want to provoke others to love and good works.

That might mean just serving as an example.

It might mean to share with someone something that you're going through in your life by way of testimony.

It might mean that you need to call someone or text someone or encourage someone.

If you haven't seen them in church for three or four weeks.

Hey, how you doing?

What's going on?

How can I pray for you?

And the idea for us in exhortation is to come alongside and push people forward.

And then verse 25, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is, but exhorting, there's our word, exhorting one another.

And so much the more, as you see the day approaching, some people ask, pastor, why do we Meet so much at our church.

Why do we have Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night?

Why do we have something almost every night of the week?

The reality is, is I take.

I take this verse as.

As something that's important.

I want to meet all the more as we see the day approaching.

I know that not everyone can be at every single situation, every single day, every single opportunity.

But what I will say is I want you to have as many opportunities as you can at this church to fellowship and to assemble with other Christians so that you can be provoked and to provoke others to love and to good works.

And so we see edification, exhortation.

We see fellowship.

Koinonia, that's the Greek word for it.

We need to fellowship more.

We need to be around each other.

But that word fellowship is so much more than just getting together physically.

Fellowship means getting together with a purpose.

The purpose of exhortation, the purpose of edification, the purpose of education, the purpose of all of these things that we've been talking about.

We fellowship so that we can strengthen one another.

Proverbs tells us that iron sharpens iron.

So.

So does a man sharpen the countenance of his friend.

We need each other.

God does not want us to be alone.

God does not want us to be isolated.

God does not want us to try to figure out this path on our own.

Yes, you have God, but also God says that it's a gift to have other fellow brothers and sisters in Christ coming alongside of us.

Some of us typically have more of an inclination either to be around people or not to be around people.

I would encourage you, whether you're introverted or extroverted, find.

Find connections within the church.

Find connections with other brothers and sisters in Christ.

We're going to be offering as a church multiple ways in which you can get involved.

We're going to be talking a lot about small groups this year.

Small groups are essentially smaller groups than what you see right here, right now.

This is, depending on your perspective, this could be considered a small church or a big church.

It depends on where you come from.

But this is definitely more than who you could be personal with at one point.

Okay, I've tried it.

I've tried to sit at the front door as everyone leaves and tried to make a personal connection with every person.

It's completely impossible to do every single Sunday.

But what I can say is that there is a time and there is a way in which all of us can make some personal connections with a few people.

And I would encourage you to do that.

I would Encourage you to find a small group.

We're going to be starting many small groups within our church.

Want you to be involved with one.

We're going to have some in the morning, we're going to have some in the evening.

We're going to have some on Sundays.

We're going to have some every night of the week.

Every.

And I want you to try to find those.

But what I would say is I want you to pray about three different options for you to get involved with.

Okay?

There's three different ways that you can get involved with a small group within our church.

Number one, which is probably the most difficult at the beginning is, Is leading a small group.

Maybe some of you, God is pressing on your heart to lead a small group.

You might say, I have no clue how to do that.

Well, you're not going to be alone.

We're going to help you, we're going to train you.

But ultimately, it's going to take leadership.

It's going to take commitment, it's going to take planning.

Maybe some of you could lead a small group within your home, within the church, within the community.

Also.

I'd say number two, though, another thing that you can get involved with is if you don't know how to lead a small group, you can be what's called an apprentice there.

We have multiple small group leaders within the church that would love to sit with you and show you what they do in their small group.

And maybe eventually you could get to a place of leading a small group.

That would be a wonderful thing.

But then thirdly, if you don't want to lead and you don't want to be an apprentice, to be a member, to be a part of one.

And so for the next few months, you're going to be seeing various small groups popping up within our church.

I would encourage you to get involved with one in one of those three ways.

Then we see another thing.

Within fellowship, we see service.

The Galatians, chapter 6, verse 10.

I want you guys to see this with me because I love the way that it's worded here.

Galatians, chapter 6, verse 10.

He talks about this idea of doing good to others, specifically those that are in the household of faith.

Now, we're called to do good to others, whether they're saved or unsaved.

But the Bible says to particularly be more careful to serve others that are inside of the household of faith.

Galatians, chapter 6, verse 10 says, as we have, therefore, opportunity, meaning you can't do good for everybody.

It's just not Possible.

I can't.

I can't do everybody do.

Everyone's like, for example, let's say someone was like, hey, Pastor, I really need you to help me out with this today, okay?

Need you to come over, maybe my car.

You wouldn't want me working on your car, but let's just pretend in a perfect world that I know how to work on your car, okay?

And I want to come help, but I can't do everybody's car.

I don't have the capabilities.

I don't have the time.

But at the end of the day, some of us might say, you know what?

As the opportunity arises, as the door opens, so.

So a lot of times people get so overwhelmed with this idea of how can I serve other people, I can't keep up with everybody.

They.

It doesn't ever ask us to do that.

It says, as the opportunity arises.

And so verse 10 says, as we therefore have the opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith.

The idea would be, is God opens doors for you to find service opportunities and projects in which you can help others do it.

Find that as the outlet to show your love for other people.

And so that's another aspect of how this looks practically.

Then we see teaching.

2nd Timothy 2.

2.

2nd Timothy 22 tells us that there is this.

Paul says to Timothy, timothy, as I have taught you, you teach others so that they can teach others.

I wouldn't.

I would encourage you to think about how you can be in some element of teaching, whether it's in a classroom setting or whether it's just by the way that you live your life.

You know, some of the greatest lessons I've learned have been from people that weren't teaching me in a classroom setting.

It's by a lesson that they taught me in a real life principle, a real life scenario.

And so I would ask you to pray about maybe how you could allow yourself to teach others or be taught by others within the church.

Teaching is such a huge aspect that we need to be thinking about within the church.

And so if we took all those things, edification, exhortation, fellowship, service, teaching, what does that look like?

Well, that essentially encapsulates what we talk about when we talk about the word discipleship.

So our goal for the UP relationship is faith growth and ultimately confidence in Jesus Christ as your savior.

But then what's our goal in the inward relationship?

Our inward relationships within the church is a relationship of discipleship.

So if you hear me say the word discipleship now, you Know what I mean?

It's, it's the edification, it's the exhortation, it's the teaching, it's the service, it's the fellowship, it's the loving, it's the caring, it's the compassion.

It's showing people essentially what it means to be a follower of Christ, to be a disciple maker, I must be a disciple myself.

So that's how we work it up in and then eventually we're going to talk next week about out.

But I want you to pray about your inward relationships, your relationships with other Christians and in this context within the church.

Do you know anybody?

You say, well, Pastor, I've been coming to this church for 20 years and I don't know anybody.

Well, I'm going to say, I'm going to try to say a few things that are kind in that regard.

Number one, I understand that maybe you're shy, maybe you haven't come out of your comfort zone yet.

But I would encourage you to do is find a relationship with someone.

Sometimes it takes to get out of our comfort zone and introduce ourselves to somebody.

If you say, well, Pastor, I don't know if that's something that I can do.

Come to me and I promise you I'll go introduce you to somebody, I'll get you involved in those.

I got a small group, I got like four small groups this week that you can come to and you can come and you can be my special guest.

I would love for you to meet people.

And so it's a matter of not just the opportunity, but also the willingness to be involved with somebody, be involved with a community and be involved with a relationship, friendships.

You're not going to be able to be personal friends with every single person within the church.

But what I would encourage you to do is really think about those one another relationships.

Think about those character traits that are laid out there and don't just think about those character traits.

Well, I hope that people are loving to me.

I hope that people are kind to me.

I hope that people are going to be forgiving to me.

Well, yeah, we hope that too.

But at the end of the day, I want to take the initiative to be the change that I want to see within the culture.

You know, if I want to be friendly, you know, the best thing, you know, if I want people to be friendly to me, the biblically speaking, the best thing for me to do is to be friendly to others.

If I want to experience forgiveness, the best thing to do is extend forgiveness to others.

Why?

Because Jesus has given Us that demonstration in our life, to take the initiative to start that motion, to, to move forward and to not let my decisions be predicated upon other people's decisions in the church, but allow my decisions to be predicated upon what Jesus Christ has done for me.

And so, folks, none of us are going to get this perfectly.

I, I'm, I'm not perfect in this, but one of my prayers for 2026 and for the rest of my Christian walk is that I find the value in those inward relationships within the church culture.

That, that we need to build each other up, that we need to pray for one another, that, that, that we need to share with one another, that we need to help one another.

And the way that we do that is, yes, corporate worship is, is amazing.

We need to get together in corporately worship.

Sunday mornings are the highlight of my week.

I think about this, I pray for this, I get excited for this.

I wish church could.

I wish it was like the old days where we could just do church all day.

But I understand that we don't live in that culture anymore.

But what I will say is this, on top of corporate worship, we should also find a secondary connection within the church, within the families, that we can find those personal relationships that, that we can grow together and that we can do life together.

And it might be someone that's similar to your demographic, it might be someone that's similar in your age group, it might be someone similar to your lifestyle.

But at the end of the day, I do believe that there's value in seeing difference ages and different maturity levels meeting together.

Right?

That's the.

What the Bible talks about in the book of Titus, that the mature folks pass along those things to the younger folks.

So I would really challenge our church to say this.

Hey, hey.

How about some of the older folks connect with some of the younger folks and see that connection there.

It might be a little uncomfortable at first, but through that process, we can see amazing things happening the way that God ordained it to be.

Maybe someone from a different culture meet someone from a different culture and we come together and we talk about Jesus and how Jesus changed our life and how he works in our life today.

So I would have you pray.

I'm going to be praying about how God can work in our lives to see the spiritual growth happen with the inward relationships here at our church.

Well, we're going to go ahead and have a time of invitation now.

What I'm going to ask you to do, if you can stand with me, every head bowed, every eye closed as the music plays, we're going to have a time of reflection, we're going to have a time of response.

And here this morning, what I'd like you to do is I'd like you to inspect your life on your.

Not only your relationship with God, even though that's the first and foremost, biggest priority that you should have is your relationship with the Lord.

But secondly, speaking, I would say this, where's your relationship with others within the church?

Remember those verses that we read at the very beginning?

If we love God, we love others.

If, if we want people to see that we're disciples of Jesus Christ, what do we do?

We love one another.

And so I would encourage you and challenge you to think about what that means for you within the church setting.

Maybe you say, I, I haven't gotten involved with anything for a long time.

My life has just been busy, been difficult.

I understand that.

But it's never too late to just get that right right now.

It's never too late just to come forward and say, you know what, I need to get my life straight.

When it comes to the area of, of discipleship.

Either I want to be someone that's leading or I want to be someone that's following.

I want to be someone that's growing in the truth of who Jesus Christ is and what he has done for me and for others.

So I'm going to pray now.

If you need Jesus as your personal savior, maybe you haven't even started that upward relationship.

What I would say now is initially start with that.

Start with faith in Jesus Christ.

Start with knowing that he alone can save.

Jesus died on the cross for your sins.

He resurrected from the dead on the third day and he gives us new life.

And so if we just believe and trust, he can give us salvation.

Lord, I pray that you be in this time of invitation, work in hearts and lives.

I pray that you can challenge us to grow in those inward relationships that you've called us to live in.

We ask all these things in Jesus name.

Amen.

As the music plays, follow as the Lord leads here this morning.

Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast.

I hope that this sermon has been a blessing for you.

If you would like to find out more information about our church or this sermon, you can find us at middletownbaptistchurch.org or find us on Facebook or YouTube.

You can also email me directly at Josh Massaroiddletownbaptistchurch dot com if you've enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and follow along for future podcast and updates.

Thank you so much.

God bless.

Have a wonderful day.