Churches That Give Life

Life Giving Fellowship

In Gen 2 v 24Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. we have a marriage. Marriage is simply a man and a woman committed to bless each other. Because of that commitment there arises around them a host of activities and possessions, some are essential and some are voluntary. No matter how prolific the possessions and activities become the essence of the marriage is the commitment of the people to each other. Everything else that the people get involved in should build and enhance the central relationships. If the couple lose all the externals of their relationship it is still a marriage because the activities do not make the marriage. Unfortunately what so easily happens is that the externals become central and the marriage becomes dependent on them to function. The resultant whirl of activity begins to drive the partners apart. When the wife wants the husband’s attention it’s a nuisance, when the husband wants the wife’s attention it’s a nuisance and if there are children, their demands can easily overwhelm them and set them against each other. A skirmish breaks out about whose turn it is to transport the kids to or from their activity. Why should a rise in unemployment cause more divorce? Because people who spend most of their time apart are suddenly thrown together and they can’t handle it

The Church Family

Church life is a commitment to people. You can’t go to church because you are the church. The word means ‘a called out people’. The church is God’s family and as it is in the natural family so it is in the church. The essence of church life is our commitment to each other. Church membership is primarily a commitment to God and the people in the particular family you have decided to join. Now this will involve activity, a real hive of activity, but the purpose of the activities is to ‘build us up in our most holy faith’ not set us at war with each other.

The essence of Christian commitment is revealed to us through the words of Ruth to Naomi when Naomi decided to return to her own land Ruth 1:16 – 17. But Ruth said: “Entreat me not to leave you, Or to turn back from following after you; For wherever you go, I will go; And wherever you lodge, I will lodge; Your people shall be my people, And your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, And there will I be buried. The LORD do so to me, and more also, If anything but death parts you and me”. A commitment to people was an integral part of Ruth’s conversion to God and as we read the story all the activities she was later involved in were to support her relationship with Naomi. God’s great method of reaching, teaching and changing people is working through other people. When man wants to do something he looks for methods and plans but God first looks for people who are committed first to Him and then His people Romans 12:1 – 2. Revivals come by God moving through people not from some great programme of activities. The best picture of church life is found in Eph 4 v 15-16 but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head–Christ– from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love. It is this sort of church in which God lives and moves and has His being. Jesus lived and died for people and the Holy Spirit has been given so that the resurrected Christ may go on ministering to people as He ministered while He was on earth.

The Activity Problem

Sadly what we have seen that can happen to a family can happen to the church. The activities take centre stage and drive a wedge between the people. There is great emphasis today in the church to get everybody involved in the activities to get away from just a few people doing eighty-percent of the work. This is commendable but there can be a negative side-effect to this because when new members come in we tend to quickly start thinking, what can they do? We tend to see people as Sunday school teachers, elders, deacons or someone to look after the flowers or do the cleaning or whatever else makes up that part of the programme where we have a vacancy. We pray people in for a specific job that needs to be done with a bias to be more interested in their abilities than who they really are. Church relationships so easily become work centered. If we leave the work we very often lose the relationship with the people we have been working with or we can fall out with each other because of the work. What can be worse is that when workers have problems and it causes them to be less productive we can be tempted to look on them with some irritation. If someone wants to give something up the cry is, who will do your job? With the result that some can be persuaded, beyond their better judgment and God’s will, to carry on.

When activity becomes the centre then it becomes the arbitrator of who is spiritual and who is not, the church becomes divided into two groups, those who are committed to the programme and those who are not. The Mary/Martha syndrome easily rears itself Luke 10:38 – 42. Jesus gently rebukes Martha because the real arbitrator of who is spiritual is devotion to Christ because all calls to discipleship are calls to devotion to Jesus and his people. It can be said that the first murder between Cain and Able was over religious activity and how many Christians have ‘murdered’ their brothers and sisters with their mouths filled with criticism and condemnation over some part of the church programme? How many pastors and other leaders become depressed and disillusioned because they cannot keep the programme going.

God’s Church Programme

I wouldn’t want you to think that the church should be non-active and introspective. A church that is truly devoted to Jesus and each other will be a place of great activity and that activity will be healthy and up-building to the people involved. This is what it will look like:

• Romans 12:10 Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another
• Romans 14:19 Therefore let us pursue the things which make for peace and the things by which one may edify another.
• Romans 15:7 Therefore receive one another, just as Christ also received us, to the glory of God.
• Romans 15:14 Now I myself am confident concerning you, my brethren, that you also are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, able also to admonish one another.
• Galatians 5:13 For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.
• Galatians 6:2 Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
• Ephesians 4:32 And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ forgave you.
• Ephesians 5:21 submitting to one another in the fear of God.
• Colossians 3:9 Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his deeds,
• Colossians 3:13 bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do.
• Hebrews 10:22-24 Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works,
• James 5:16 Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
• 1 Peter 4:9 Be hospitable to one another without grumbling.

This is the real church programme without which all the activity will get you little profit.

A Lesson from the Garden about Real Fellowship

When God made Adam in His image and placed him in the position of the sovereign ruler of earth, he was ruling it on behalf of God and by creation Adam knew the will of God for the earth and mankind. His sovereignty gave him full scope of initiative which is seen when he named the animals because it says that whatever Adam called them that was their name. This sovereignty was meant to be used only in harmony with God’s will. Before Eve was a separate person she was part of everything that Adam was involved in because they were two persons in one body. This is a common way of attributing the actions of the human race when looking at things from God’s perspective. Heb 7 v 9 – 10 Even Levi, who receives tithes, paid tithes through Abraham, so to speak, for he was still in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him. In this verse God is using, as His argument to justify why Levi should give tithes, the fact that he gave tithes when Abraham gave a tithe to Melchizedek even though Levi was not born till long after Abraham had died. So it is not unreasonable to say that Adam with Eve inside him was God’s helper to rule creation, so Eve who had already been created but not separated into her own body was already operating as Adam’s helper.

When God made Eve a separate being by taking her out of Adam she was also made in God’s image and became a sovereign being. Now she had an identity to be able manifest who she was in Adam. God made her a perfect helper for Adam so as God was making her to become woman He had Adam and his position in mind; Eve was made for Adam, Adam was not made for Eve. Just as Adam was supposed to use his sovereignty to rule the creation for God, so Eve was to use her sovereignty to rule jointly with Adam from her position a his helper. Adam’s sovereignty was for God, Eve’s sovereignty was for Adam; so that together they would be committed to the joint enterprise of ruling creation for God making their individual ability to walk with God available to each other. This harmony failed when they were conned into using their sovereignty to do their own thing. They followed the pathway of self-interest believing it would give them a better life. Instead all they got was death and the curse of sin. Here is a pattern for Christian churches and Christian businesses to get the best out of everyone and produce a Godly harmony in furthering the Kingdom of God. All people in an organization are to use their abilities and sovereignty to further the vision of the ‘Adams’ who are answering the call of God and need us to be their ‘help-meet Eves’ to bring it about. Harmony and unity is produced when all the individuals involved in the programme use their sovereignty within the limits that is appropriate to their position for the good of the vision. When we seek to appoint someone to fill a position in the church or organisation we first need to find out whether they have a ‘help-meet’ heart because, no matter how perfect their abilities, if they do not have a help-meet attitude they will bring trouble in the form of division created by their self-interest as they pursue their own hidden agenda.

To sum up activity is important to the people of God but it is there to support and build up the people doing it, not break up their marriages alienate their children and give us nervous breakdowns. Let the early church have the last word. Acts 2:42 – 47. They had a heart for each other so we conclude with the question we began with; what are you committed to?