"Being A Good Church, Becoming A Great Church"

“Being A Good Church, Becoming A Great Church”

Text: Phil. 1:3-11 (ESV)

3 I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, 4 always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy, 5 because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. 6 And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. 7 It is right for me to feel this way about you all, because I hold you in my heart, for you are all partakers with me of grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. 8 For God is my witness, how I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus.

9 And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, 10 so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.

This is the best series of verses that I know that – DESCRIBE HOW I FEEL AS YOUR PASTOR in the first year of SonRise’s existence.

I love verses 7-8 : 7 It is right for me to feel this way about you all, because I hold you in my heart, for you are all partakers with me of grace,[d] both in my imprisonment [in our case @ SonRise – in my hospital and home recovery] and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. 8 For God is my witness, how I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus.

Being A Good Church, Becoming A Great Church…

Heart of the message this morning…………..

-We will be successful in the eyes of God as a church (and that is all that matters at the end of the day) because we become and stay the following:

#1 Be A loving church – love for God, one another (and that includes proper self-love) and for the lost of our community.

13 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.2 And if I have (A)prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith,(B)so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 (C)If I give away all I have, and (D)if I deliver up my body to be burned,[a] but have not love, I gain nothing. 13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Jesus spoke to his disciples in the closing hours of his life these words:

34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Jesus said to the crowds and his disciples………

43 (BZ)“You have heard that it was said, (CA)‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, (CB)Love your enemies and (CC)pray for those who persecute you, 45 (CD)so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and (CE)sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 (CF)For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers,[i] what more are you doing than others? Do not even (CG)the Gentiles do the same?

Matt. 22:34-40

34 But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. 35 And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” 37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

-A loving church – love for God, one another (and that includes proper self-love) and for the lost of our community.

Here’s the order of our “love life” according to Jesus in Matt. 22:

1st - LOVE GOD PROMINENTLY (Upward relationship)

2nd -LOVE YOURSELF PROPERLY (Inward relationship)

3rd - LOVE OTHERS PRAYERFULLY (Outward relationship)