Enjoy Jesus Through His People: Fellowship as a Means of Grace

0:00 Well, it is a great honor and joy to be with you, to be away from home and yet find a people who so quickly and a pastor so quickly that I resonate with and make me feel right at home. One of the downsides of doing the work that I do with the ministry of Desiring God is that I do travel and often on the weekends. An upside is that I love being in different churches, meeting new people, worshiping together, and being blessed in fresh ways by different congregations. The downside is on the Sundays I'm away, I miss being with my own people in the Twin Cities at Cities Church. I love our church. 11-year-old church plant from Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis. And I love being with them.

0:53 I got a special gift I did not expect yesterday afternoon. John mentioned the blizzard that is happening right now. The snow's coming down. There's strong winds. This is not typical in Twin Cities. I know it's all frozen tundra for us Southerners. I tell you, I'm from South Carolina. But we don't have blizzards all the time. This is the first blizzard in over three years. I think it was December 2022 since we had snow and wind conditions that would make it a blizzard. So this is unusual. And I had been planning to fly out last night, be here with you this morning. One of the sadnesses in that is being away from my own church. And yesterday we start talking as pastors. We see this blizzard coming and we decide, let's do church on Saturday. So our staff is amazing. They pulled this off at the last minute.

1:45 We made it happen. We gathered at 4 o'clock yesterday. So on the way to the airport, I was able to be with my own people at City's Church. So this is the first time it's ever happened that I could worship at City's Church with my own congregation and be away at another church on Sunday morning. And the reason I mention that is it very much has to do with what we're talking about this morning. one of the directors at Desiring God texted me last night as we're waiting on the flight and wondering if we can get out with the snow. And he said, how are you doing? And I said, I feel really good. My soul feels refreshed. Because on the way here, I got to be with my own brothers and sisters at City's Church. And it does something for the soul. In the anxiety of, are we going to get this plane off the ground?

2:38 what's brother John gonna do if I don't show up tomorrow morning in those anxieties there was a deep peace in my soul because I had been fed I had been nourished to be with my brothers and sisters yesterday at 4 o'clock on the way to the airport and this was a just a fresh experience of how the soul is refreshed through other people in Jesus and we typically think of the main means of God's Word and of prayer and a major category that God means to refresh our souls and grow us up in Jesus and help us to know Him is through this reality called fellowship got to experience that yesterday recently my wife and I were in Boise and we got to see some old friends we go way back hadn't seen them in many years they're doing amazing work there at the campus of Boise State where students are coming to Christ amazing to see these students no Christian background coming to faith in Jesus in the last one to three years to hear some of the questions they're asking and for my wife and I to get to sit down with our friends Andrew and Sarah are their names it was so deeply refreshing to our souls it was kind of like Christian therapeutic it's been a hard winter in the Twin Cities not because of the weather and to be with those friends and have our souls deeply refreshed was significant and it reminded me of something The Apostle Paul talks about this several times, about how other people, not just Bible, not just prayer, but other people refresh the soul.

4:19 I wonder if you've seen that or remember some of these texts. Like Romans chapter 15, verse 32. He says, I pray that by God's will I may come to you with joy and be refreshed in your company. Romans. So he's going to go visit Rome And not only is he going to bring ministry to them And hopefully they're fed and refreshed and helped But he himself will be refreshed, he says, by their company 1 Corinthians chapter 16 He says, I rejoice at the coming of Stephanas and Fortunatus and Achaicus Because they have made up for your absence So they came, sent by the Corinthian church For they refreshed my spirit as well as yours. So they came as delegates sent by the Corinthians to Paul and they refreshed his spirit, he says. 2 Corinthians 7, besides our own comfort, we rejoice still more at the joy of Titus because his spirit has been refreshed by you all.

5:21 So not only did the Corinthians send people to refresh Paul, but Titus went to the Corinthians and he was refreshed by them and his soul. And lastly, in the book of Philemon, Paul mentions twice about how Philemon has refreshed the souls of other Christians and how he might do that for Paul as well I have derived much joy and comfort from your love my brother because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you I want some benefit from you in the Lord refresh my heart in Christ and this language of refreshment is significant when one of the only places this language is used is in Matthew 11 28 famous passage if you know Matthew 11 28 where Jesus says come to me all who are burdened all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest same word refreshment come to me Jesus says I will give you refreshment.

6:32 And what I take this to mean is that one of the ways in which Jesus gives the rest, that Jesus gives the refreshment to our souls, one of those key ways is through other people. This can be surprising. Sometimes we take other Christians so for granted. Or we focus just on the hard parts of it. the quirks the idiosyncrasies the challenges of church life because we can be really different in the church we just got this thing in common Jesus it's such a good thing when really different people who wouldn't get together may not get along otherwise get together because of Jesus Jesus looks really good when that happens But we're different.

7:27 And sometimes we grate on each other. And it'd be really good to remember other people are appointed for our Christian lives, not just for our sanctification, because they're hard, and I need to lean on the Holy Spirit to endure them, not just for that, but also to be a means of God's grace to refresh your soul in Jesus in a way that your soul would not be refreshed otherwise. That He doesn't only mean to give you the rest of soul that He has for you through His Word, through prayer, but also through people. Other people who love Jesus and have Him. So my question for us this morning is, how significant is the refreshing? Is this just icing on the cake of Christianity? Or is this vital?

8:26 Is this an essential part of the recipe? You already know what I think. It's essential. And what I want to help with this morning is for you to be freshly reminded or newly convinced or have it freshly pressed upon your soul that you might cherish the dozens of gifts in this room of fellows in Jesus. If you look around this room, these are not just people to be endured. These are precious gifts of Jesus himself for you that you might know him and enjoy him more that they might be an essential means of grace for you in the Christian life. I know you're coming to the end here of a series on the spiritual disciplines or habits of grace, and I get the blessing this morning of celebrating one of the most overlooked of those disciplines.

9:30 I've seen many books over the years that focus on the spiritual disciplines in terms of God's Word and prayer. That's really good focus, great focus. They also focus on some other things, which sometimes really aren't means of grace in and of themselves. There can be kind of assistance, so that we engage with God's appointed grace for the Christian soul. But many overlook the dynamic of each other, the corporateness of the Christian life. And that term there, means of grace, that's the way Protestants have talked about spiritual disciplines for centuries. this language of spiritual disciplines that's a newer term in the last couple generations often focusing on Bible habits and prayer habits but people each other are precious means as well in Acts chapter 2 verse 42 we have this amazing statement of the ordinary Christian life that the early church was engaging in when the power of the Holy Spirit fell in extraordinary ways.

10:41 It was like this little honeymoon moment in the early church before the persecution comes. And what does Acts say they were doing? This is Acts 2, verse 42. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching. What's that? That's Word. That's what we have in the New Testament. The apostles' teaching. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, the Word, and the fellowship to the breaking of bread and prayers. So Acts 2 has four categories for us there. The apostles' teaching were the fellowship, that's our focus this morning, the breaking of the bread, which that happens as Christians eat together, share life together. That probably includes the Lord's Supper. There's that ceremonial celebration of Jesus' death in the Lord's Supper and then the prayers. Maybe my favorite quote outside the Bible on the means of grace is from this old British Bishop end of the 19th century named J.C. Ryle.

11:46 I love J.C. Ryle. He wrote very simply, he's still very accessible, surprisingly accessible today. Commend J.C. Ryle. Here's his quote on the means of grace that I find so helpful as we transition here to focus on fellowship. Paul says, the means of grace are such as Bible reading, private prayer, and regularly worshiping God in church, wherein one hears the word taught and participates in the Lord's Supper. So he's got his five ways. Acts chapter 2 at 4, he's got his five Bible reading, means private I guess, private prayer, regularly worshiping God in church, you hear the word taught there, participate in the He says, I lay it down as a simple matter of fact that no one who is careless about such things so these means of grace no one who is careless about such things must ever expect to make much progress in the Christian life I can find no record of any respectable saint who ever neglected them it's not a surprise when somebody matures in the faith God has given us his appointed means he goes on to say these means of grace they are appointed channels through which the Holy Spirit conveys fresh supplies of grace to the soul I wonder if anybody here wants that you want fresh supplies of grace to the soul I want that The Holy Spirit through these channels Conveys fresh supplies of grace to the soul And strengthens the work which he has begun in the inward man Our God is a God who works by means And he will never bless the soul of that man Who pretends to be so high and spiritual That he can get on without God's appointed means So the means of grace God's told us how he means to give us An ongoing flow in the Christian life And like Acts chapter 2, you can summarize it in four ways.

13:51 Ryle's got five here. I like to do three. I like to put Lord's Supper with fellowship and summarize these means of grace as hearing God's voice in His Word. His Word, His speaking that we have in Scripture is the first and foremost means of His grace. As Jonathan Edwards said, it's the chief and the soul. S-O-U-L. Not S-O-L-E. S-O-U-L. The soul of the means of grace is what proceeds from God himself to give grace to us. His word. Hear his voice in his word. Have his ear in prayer. Our God means to hear back from us. He stoops after being so communicative and talkative that he wants to hear from us. And then third, often overlooked, is belonging to his body in the fellowship of the local church, which is our focus here this morning.

14:47 Now what about this word fellowship? I know it gets thrown around. They're fellowship halls. We had a fellowship hall that we inherited in our city's church building. We had to go around during a renovation and replace the names. We had to do these name plaques. And so they came to us and said, what do you call in this room? Well, the church before us called Fellowship Hall. We said, you know what? Christians just use that language of fellowship sometimes so thinly, so easily it's like if you're just hanging out with non-believers it's a party, but if you're just hanging out with Christians, that's fellowship like nobody mentioned Jesus, there was no prayer together no intentional Godwardness, it was just Christians hanging out doing kind of normal human stuff, that's fellowship so I thought maybe we should call that room something else and try to preserve the preciousness of this word fellowship for its essential role in being a means of grace in the Christian life and we call it the chapel, we got the chapel now which is the old fellowship hall, we're trying to do that in our church, fellowship is not just Christians gathering to watch the Super Bowl and they happen to all be Christians, fellowship is much more like being the team on the field Because in a fellowship, what's implied is that there's a shared mission together.

16:14 You're doing something together. You're going to gain or lose together. If you start a company, everybody brings their starter resources. They're dipping from their savings to bring their resources. And if the company succeeds, the fellows succeed. If the company fails, the fellows fail. you got skin in the game and in Christianity there's not a sole proprietor option when you come to Jesus like well I became a Christian I'm just going to do a mom and pop shot Christianity is corporate when you come to Jesus you come into an organization an institution that he founded and Jesus didn't say you can have a sole proprietor option he says if you're in with me you're in the company you're in the fellowship you're part of something corporate and that's the nature of the of the Christian church when when J.R.R. Tolkien called it the fellowship of the ring he was using the term well they're not just sitting around Rivendell with their feet up and join the gaffer's ale.

17:39 They got a ring to get to Mount Doom. They got a mission. That's a fellowship. They're either going to succeed and gain together or fail and lose their lives. That's the sense of fellowship. That there is something at stake in the Christian life. We have something precious in common. And first and foremost, that's Jesus. He's the tie that binds very different people Who many of us would not be together otherwise Because Jesus has brought us together His blood is the tie that binds us And we live in different times socially Than they lived in 2,000 years ago In this text in Hebrews, we're getting there We're going to Hebrews 10 They lived in different times socially Without the technology without the various patterns there was far less encouragement to isolation in the first century their relationships were naturally much thicker they just leaned on each other more and many of us need some work on this in the 21st century because there are forces in modern life that are pulling us toward isolation the statistics on those who would self-report as lonely in our day is in epidemic proportions.

19:09 I remember when I was a political science major at Furman University in Greenville. A big bombshell back in those days was Robert Putnam's book, Bowling Alone. And this social scientist had tracked how many people, how Americans were joiners. What Alexis de Tocqueville had celebrated in the 1830s, or how Americans were joiners. The glory of this nation is all the stuff Americans did, they did it together, what made this nation so strong. And Robert Putnam was lamenting that Americans aren't joiners like they used to be. They used to bowl in leagues, and now they're bowling alone. Isn't that a terrible thing to do alone? Bowling works so well with somebody else. This is 25 years ago when the social scientists were going, why are we becoming so individualistic in this country?

20:04 there's going to be implication for that here we are a quarter century later it's true we talk about the expressive individualism and the forces in our society that are cultivating this individual reality rather than the community project of life and in particular of the Christian faith the Christian faith is a community project and our hearts harden and our faith fails when we distance ourselves from Christ's people. Some of us may have experienced this in especially memorable ways during COVID. I did. I saw people in my church where their faith became thin. They struggled. It was more difficult. There were some who coasted and haven't come back because they were missing that vital piece of fellow believers in their lives.

21:04 Just Bible and prayer didn't do it. God appointed that there be Bible and prayer and fellows. And that was a hard season for many. So I've got one main text here this morning. And I've got four brief exhortations related to this text. Four charges from this short text in Hebrews chapter 10. We had that read just a minute ago. the reason I had verse 23 read is because it gives us context on these two key fellowship verses. This might be the signature text in the New Testament on fellowship as a means of grace with one sister text I'll mention quickly verses 24 and 25 but 23 sets it up. There's context. There's this church in the first century of Hebrews that have come to Christ and they're being persecuted and pressured by friends and family who haven't received Jesus as Messiah.

22:06 If you'd get rid of the Jesus piece, we could all get along. Would you just come back to Judaism apart from Jesus? That's the pressure on these Hebrews. And so the letter is being written that they would hold fast. That's that language. Hold fast your confession. Your confession that Jesus is Lord. He's your hope. Hold fast in Him. Don't let Him go. there is no salvation in the retreat to Judaism you've got to have Jesus that's the thrust of the book of Hebrews and you might take that pretty individually you might say I'm holding fast I've got the strength, I've got the hand I'm holding and Hebrews' point is that's good, you hold by the power of the Spirit and he says here, him who promised is faithful he's going to help you God in you will help you and don't just look for your own needs can you help somebody else if it's well with your soul how might you look beyond your own nose to the needs of others and help somebody else that's the and of verse 24 so you hold on and the Holy Spirit is going to hold you on and why don't you help somebody else?

23:28 And in the meantime, you're going to be helped too because this is an essential means of grace in the Christian life. So here's my four brief charges from these two key verses on fellowship in Hebrews chapter 10. Number one, invest in particular people in this room.

23:49 It's worth it. it's a good investment it's essential for us and for others that we invest in our fellows in the mission at Midwood Baptist let us consider now there's a how here it's hard to translate this, it's really strange English if you don't do a how but the original is the object of the considering is not how, like let me think of different ways that I might move general humanity toward love and good deeds. The object of the considering is other people. Literally, it would be, let us consider one another unto the stirring up of love and good deeds. You consider particular people, which implies that you know them. You know some other particular Christians in your life.

24:44 You know their names. You know some of their story, their background. You can know them as Bob. Know her as Cindy. So you don't just give some generic charge to humanity, but you know him or her. And you can speak into their particular situation. And reciprocally, they can do the same for you.

25:09 That's what it means to consider, to contemplate, notice, ponder, think hard about other people. And if you don't know them, then that's an empty practice. You're just going to treat them like general humanity. So first, this is a call. It's implicit here in Hebrews. It's explicit for us 20 centuries later because we don't do this very well. It's first a call to us to seek relationships and community, pursue uncomfortably thick relationships, an inconvenient community. and then we're called to a deep considerateness as to how we might speak words of grace into each other's lives. Second then, learn to push those people. So invest in them, get to know them. Second, learn to push your fellows in Jesus.

26:06 I know push. That could sound bad, right? It wouldn't be good if I pushed someone off this high stage. You can do bad pushing. I say push because that's based on that word stir up. Or provoke. It's strong language. It's unusual. Usually you would say, I'd say this to my kids, my 15-year-old boys, don't provoke your sister. Or, the Apostle Paul would say to dads, do not provoke your children to anger. There's bad provocation. often provocation is bad this is bad stirring up usually but Hebrews wants to take a risk here to take a word that's often used in negative ways and say do that for good in somebody's life stir them up, provoke them to love and good deeds if the sediment of Christianity has settled down at the bottom of the glass provoke it having known them knowing their story, their background, being in their life how might you be an agent of grace in someone else's life that they might love others they might do good, how might you provoke stir up graces in their life through your own life in them So, invest in others, learn how to push them for good.

27:41 And third, major on the magic of words. Major on the magic of words. This is how you're going to provoke them. You don't provoke them with a sword or a gun. That's not Christian. What's amazing to Christian is how you provoke them with words. There is a special power of words in this passage. So this is the first part of verse 25. He says, Not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another.

28:23 There's two parts here. There's the negative, don't neglect. Don't neglect being together. and the positive, encouraging, which relates to the gathering, the meeting together, the assembly, what we're doing here. A word on that in just a moment. How do we not neglect meeting together? I do know that sometimes just showing up is half the battle. It may feel like it's the whole battle, especially when church life is not based on family of origin, it's not always based on neighborhood having the same job, having the same hobbies we got the same Jesus same spirit, same God and Father but if we don't just show up if we neglect the fellowship then we can't cultivate the regularity of relationship and get to know each other and push each other as particular people not just general humanity and then, that's what the emphasis here on words is we use helping words for their joy and their everlasting joy, everlasting good in Christ.

29:35 Christian fellowship is word-centered fellowship. It is good for us to do deeds for each other. So that's why I said major on words. Didn't say only words. Deeds are important. How we can serve each other, see each other's needs, meet those needs tangibly, that's critical. do good works for each other. And Christian fellowship is amazingly word-centered. So this is where I want to look at that sister passage just briefly. I'll read for you here Hebrews 3, verses 12 to 13. And I want you to hear the similarity with Hebrews 10, 24, and 25. This is Hebrews 3, 12 and 13. Look for the speaking grace on display here in Hebrews 3. He says, take care, brothers. Lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.

30:29 But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. That word exhort is the same word that we translate in courage in Hebrews chapter 10. I don't know why they're translated differently. That's okay. That word is often translated as encourage. The encouragement is with words or exhortation or helping somebody. But the help is a word help. That's what's linking these two passages together. So there's a power of words for Christian endurance and persistence in the Christian life. We exhort an evil, unbelieving heart. We try to preempt hardening through words. The reason I say magic is not actually magic.

31:24 It's just how God made the universe with His Word, His Son at the center and with words. Humans as speaking creatures having this amazing power of words. The way it works is we have these strange holes in the sides of our head. It's so odd. It would be so distracting if we thought about that often. and when you speak a word, it comes from your heart, it comes out, put it into the air with your breath, the word can be heard through this hole. It goes in the hole. And by the Holy Spirit, it can go down in the heart. And it can give strength to somebody. They can have an empty soul.

32:19 and you might have just a little fullness of soul enough to say something send it through the air into their ear and it might fill up their soul give them some strength give them some comfort give them some grace for their faith to endure it is amazing what words do in the Christian life and so at the center of what we do for each other is helping words. How might I say something that would feed the faith of my brother or sister's soul? And then how might I hear something that would feed and strengthen my own heart, my own knowing and enjoying of Jesus through this amazing power of words? In fellowship, we have this amazing opportunity of both being an instrument of God's grace to others and then having them be an instrument of his grace to us.

33:24 In Bible, we're on the receiving end of God's grace. In prayer, we're on the receiving end, even as we speak to him. We're not gracing him with our prayers. He's gracing us as we pray. And in fellowship, we are gracing fellow believers and having them give God's grace to us. All right, this last point then, number four. Hold even faster As you get older Hold even faster As you get older How does that relate to Christian relationships And I see this in the last part of verse 25 He says All the more As you see the day drawing near All the more means Increasing not decreasing as the end draws near be all the more and I'm adding I think the principle holds as you age all the more not all the less there's no all the less in the Christian life I say this at age 45 having experienced the friendship dip of middle age.

34:49 I don't know if you've heard that language before. The friendship dip. It's easiest to make new relationships in life when we're young, in your 20s, in a new job, a new situation, having kids together, being on the ball field together. And social scientists have observed the friendship dip of middle age. When you've made some friends that you've had for 10 years, or 15 years or 20 years and they move away you can't make a 20-year friendship the next week you can start over on one and maybe God would give you the grace of 20 years again but as you get older you lose precious friendships that you can't replace in a moment in my encouragement for you whatever age you are Don't let that be an excuse To rob you from the grace That God means to pour in your soul Through fellow brothers and sisters in Christ Don't say, hey I'm okay with the friendship dip That's happening to non-believers Que sera, sera, it's going to happen to me too And I don't have any friends anymore I would say lean in as you age Friendships are precious You will discover this as you grow older lean in all the more as you find yourself going through friendship dips in Christ let me end with this I said at the beginning that these are means of God's grace he has appointed his means of grace and some of you may have caught with a sharp ear means means there's some end a means is not an end a means is a means to something else that we call the end or the goal so what's the end of these means

36:55 what's the end of hearing God's voice in his word and having his ear in prayer and belonging to the body in the local church fellowship and investing in each other speaking helping words hearing helping words what's the end of our fellowship I want to close with two texts that I love rehearsing about the end of everything in the Christian life the goal of everything in the Christian life it's John 17 chapter 3 John 17 verse 3 I'm going to preach this on Easter Sunday I'm getting excited for John 17 1 to 5 John 17 this is eternal life Jesus says that they may know you the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent that's eternal life knowing God is the heart of eternal life that's the end he made you to know him he made you to enjoy him that's the end the goal and Jesus adds daringly and Jesus Christ who the father sent knowing Jesus enjoying Jesus Jesus is the goal of our fellowship, the goal of our helping words.

38:14 Which means you will not know Him like you should. You will not know Him like you can. Without brothers and sisters in this room that God has appointed to be God's means of grace to your life that you might know Jesus and enjoy Him. The other one is the way Paul says it. Philippians chapter 3. Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord. So, knowing and enjoying Jesus is the end. And the more strongly that we desire an end, the more carefully and diligently we will use the means. you were made to know Jesus and he's appointed people other people who love him as a vital means so let's pray together Father, we thank you first and foremost for your Son, the one for whom you made us.

39:31 We do want to know Him. We want to know the surpassing value that we find in knowing and communing with Jesus and enjoying Him. And Father, how amazing that you have given us your appointed means. You've spoken. And Jesus Himself is your word. and you've given us the message about him in the gospel as we've sung about. And you've appointed that we pray and you've given us each other. You've given us the fellows as an essential part of the means of the Christian life. So do pray for Midwood Baptist, Father. Would this be a place where the fellowship is appreciated, where the fellowship is invested in, where you would give great soul-sustaining, soul-thriving grace in this room through the gift of your people that we might know and enjoy your son more to his glory.

40:31 In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.