HITTING THE MARK – WEEK 2
Hitting the Mark of Doing Life Together
Mark 3:13-18, Acts 2:42-47
INTRODUCTION:
Its true isn’t it? There are just some things we are not meant to do alone. And here at Northridge we believe the best pathway to spiritual growth is by intentionally being with a group of people who have similar spiritual values and goals so that we can make progress in our walk with Jesus and each other. We call it doing life together. You see Jesus knew that God actually hard wired into our beings the need to be accepted by others. He created in us all the desire to be in an environment where we feel valued, loved and accepted. All of us want and need that. Oh, I know every once in a while you’ll hear someone say, “I don’t care what people think of me.” “I don’t care whether people like me or not.” Yes you do! We all do. God created you in such a way that you care about how other people accept you and treat you. If you are working against that you are working against God and that’s a battle we generally lose! Another way to say that is: God created all of us to be acceptance magnets.
We’re drawn to acceptance. In fact, we’ll do some incredible things, some incredibly dumb things sometimes, in order to feel accepted. We’ll hang around people that aren’t good for us, we’ll get involved with a crowd or in a relationship that is hurtful because we feel accepted by that group or person. Well, Jesus comes along understanding this powerful urge and basically says, “I want you to leverage this God given need for acceptance for good. I want you to lean into this truth but I want you to make it work for you not against you.”
So, here’s the question we must ask: “How do I become intentional about leveraging this principle of wanting acceptance from others so it will benefit me?” We believe the answer is Life Groups. Being in a Life Group is not about gravitating toward a person or group for the sake of the relationship. I want to say that again. Life Groups are not about being drawn toward a group of people for the relationships they offer but rather you intentionally join because of the progress you can make as a result of those relationships. You partner with people not just to be around them but in order to make spiritual progress. No one understood that better than Jesus.
I. DOING LIFE TOGETHER: Lessons from Jesus’ appointment of the Apostles.
How do I know Jesus understood that? Because he did it! In fact he’s the first one to put this principle into practice. You know, if I had been God coming into the world I would’ve done something spectacular to make my presence known. I would’ve had some kind of divine bullhorn and rip apart the sky dramatically and say, “Ok, listen up. Here’s what I (God) am going to do for you.” I’d have done something to get everyone’s attention at once. But that’s not what God did. He sent Jesus, His one and only Son, quietly into the world through a servant girl, in a manager, and then he proceeded to go about announcing his presence and changing the world by appointing 12 guys and making them the first Life Group. He chooses 12 ordinary men, spends 3 ½ years with them, pours his life into them, and then depends on them to turn the world upside down! And it worked! Wouldn’t make sense to me but it did to him… 12 guys.
Let me introduce them to you starting in Mk 3:13. “Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to him those he wanted, and they came to him. 14 He appointed twelve that they might be with him and that he might send them out to preach 15 and to have authority to drive out demons. 16 These are the twelve he appointed: Simon (to whom he gave the name Peter), - common fisherman- 17 James son of Zebedee and his brother John (to them he gave the name Boanerges, (bone-er-jes) which means “sons of thunder”),-angry common fisherman, thus the nickname- 18 Andrew –yep, you guessed it, another fisherman-, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew – an IRS agent-, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot – a politician- 19 and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him.”
Why in the world would you do it this way? Because Jesus knew two things: 1. The best way to progress spiritually is in intentional relationships and 2. The best way to know Him is by being with those who want the same thing: to know Jesus. Don’t miss the phrase in vs14. It says he chose these that they might preach, that figures right? But, before that it says he chose them, “…that they might be with him…” That phrase denotes wanting more than just a casual friendship. Jesus wanted a relationship with these men. He wants to be with them. By the way, He still wants the same thing with you. He is not interested in your religion; he is all about having an honest, open relationship with you. He wants to be “with us” and have us “with him.” So, if you’ve been raised thinking that all God or Jesus wants to do is spoil your fun or put you down please understand nothing could be further from the truth. Jesus wants to be with you… around you, he wants you to discover just how much he loves and wants your best. And he showed that by choosing 12 and spending time with them, demonstrating that a relationship with him happens best when you do life with a group of people who want the same thing.
Now, that does not mean that there are no expectations on our part for doing this life together. All you’ve got to do is look at what it cost these guys to have a relationship with each other and Jesus to see that. So Jesus, as he spends 3 ½ years with this group teaches us that life together requires at least three things.
(1) First, it requires commitment. When Jesus called these guys to himself they left everything… everything in order to be with him. Now, if you want the benefits of doing life together, while you won’t have to give up everything, it does necessitate some commitment and choices. You make a commitment to the group to be with them if at all possible and let them know when you can’t. You make a commitment to speak the truth but speak it in love. Cultivating community in a Life Group means you choose reconciliation over resolution, humility over having our own way, being a grace-filled person where the mistakes of others aren’t rubbed in but are rubbed out.
(2) Doing life together requires courtesy. Courtesy is respecting our differences, being considerate of each other and being patient with people who irritate us. The Apostle Paul told Titus, “God’s people should be bighearted and courteous.” (Titus 3:2 LB) In group life courtesy is played out by making an honest attempt to try and understand where the other person is coming from, by not downplaying or putting someone down because of their doubts or fears and by not judging someone else’s motives.
(3) Doing life together requires cultivation. Life together in any relationship takes time, nurture and trust. So you’ve got to be willing to give it frequently, confidentially and authentically. This is why Jesus spent every day of 3 ½ years with these guys. Life together requires time.
II. DOING LIFE TOGETHER: Lessons from the application by the Apostles (Acts 2:42-47)
And apparently these 12 guys, by giving their commitment, courtesy and the time to cultivate a life together, understood what Jesus was trying to teach. Because they took their appointment as a life group and applied those lessons when they started the first Christian church. The book of Acts, which is the history of the early church, tells us that these guys understood that while they were to preach to large groups, they were also to make sure that smaller, life groups were established – go to Acts 2.
Act 2 describes a feast day when thousands of people are in Jerusalem. God uses this day to give special power to these men and they are able to preach a sermon in all the languages of all the people who were there that day at one time! But what is important is not so much how they preached but what they preached. They told the story of how Jesus Christ, God’s Son, had come to this earth and paid the penalty for their sin and they needed to put their trust in him. Look what happens in Act 2:37: “When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” And Peter answers that question this way: “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Which by the way, is exactly what we’re saying some of you need to do next week. If you want to know what God wants you to do and you haven’t been baptized as a believer well, listen to Peter. “Repent and be baptized…” how many of you? “…everyone of you.” And notice it’s not have your parents do it to you but you do it… you choose. That’s the pattern. And how many accepted his message and followed through? About 3000!
So the apostles have this huge group of baby Christ followers to deal with. What do they do? They put Jesus’ life group principles into practice. Let’s look how this new church did church. “All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer. 43A deep sense of awe came over them as the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders. 44All the believers met together and shared everything they had. 45They sold their property and things they owned and shared the money with those in need. 46They met together in the Temple courtyard and then met in homes, sharing their meals with great joy. 47 The believers were continually praising God. Everyone outside their group thought well of them. More and more people were being saved every day as the Lord added them to this first congregation.”(Acts: 2:42-47 SEV)
Now anytime you’re trying to figure out how something’s done it’s always best to go back to the source. Just as you go back to the architect’s plans to build a building correctly, we go back to the source of the beginning of the church. We learn here in Acts 2 that these first Christ followers met in a big group at the Temple but much of their spiritual growth and implementation of that growth was happening in smaller groups. The apostles were simply applying what they had learned from Jesus. So I want us to break down these verses to see what they were doing so we can see what happens in a healthy life group. But also for those of you that are not in a life group, my prayer is when you see what happens you will want to choose intentionally to get in one as your pathway to spiritual progress. What happened?
(1) Life groups learn together. The first groups “…devoted themselves to the apostles teaching…” The word used here for devoted means they adhered to it, they persisted obstinately in the apostles teaching.
Now, today the Apostles teaching is contained for us in the N.T. portion of the Bible. You see, it is not enough for our church to be a Bible believing church we must also be a Bible teaching church. That is why it is our intent to make the Bible the textbook for this Church and help you to learn it. That’s why while you will hear different communicator’s up here you won’t hear a different source book. That’s why we want you to read the Bible not just hear us talk about it. (Hope you’re doing your readings in Mark) And it’s why the main textbook for our Life Groups is the Bible. In fact, it’s why we most often use questions from the sermon as our study. So you will not just hear it preached but be able to discuss and apply it!
(2) Life groups fellowship together. They devoted themselves to “…the fellowship…” The NT Church was not just a classroom; it was a fraternity, a community. These people intentionally did life together. They met in the temple in the large group but they also met together in smaller groups in their homes. You see, Jesus always meant the church to be more than an audience. An audience is a set of unrelated people drawn together by a short lived attraction. A church is a Body, (the most used metaphor) under the headship of Christ and the members of that Body are to depend upon each other.
I remember taking our kids when they were younger to the county fair. Once when our daughter Marlo and our youngest son Zach were the brave age of 8 and 4, they decided, much to our surprise, that they wanted to go into the Haunted House. Now this was a children's version and the man in the booth said it wasn't real scary so we let them go. They got in this little car together that took them up into the house and they disappeared behind black doors. From the outside Deb & I could hear ghostly screams and wicked laughs, we knew it was not what they had expected. It was a short ride, perhaps 1 minute & 1/2. But when the doors opened on the other end of the ride their heads were buried deeply in each other’s arms and they were holding tightly to each other. I ran to them and I had to tell them they were out. Marlo looked at me and said, "Daddy it was scary! A mummy jumped out at us at the very first, and so we grabbed each other and we didn't see another thing." But then she added, "But as long as we held onto each other we weren't scared." That’s it. We need each other in order to get through the scary times of life. That’s what the early church did and why we still want to do life together in small groups.
(3) Life groups eat together. Ah, now we’re talking. But this “breaking of bread,” this sharing of meals was more than just BBQ or good southern eating. They ate together but they also took the Lord’s Supper together. Sometimes people who come here ask us, “Why do you take communion every week?” While there are biblical reasons that are for another sermon you know what the bottom line reason is? We want to. What Jesus did for us on the cross, paying the penalty for our sin, is so at the core of who we are that we want to carve out a few minutes every week to think about that and thank Him for doing it… every week! It looks like it was such a core element for the first church that they did it every day in their life groups. They learned, they had fellowship, they ate and then…
(4) Life groups pray together. They also devoted themselves to prayer. Jim Elliot, a missionary that was martyred by the Aucas Indians said, "The Church that advances on its knees never has to retreat." And the NT Church, as you trace it through the pages of Scripture, advanced on its knees in prayer. The pattern has been consistent down through the centuries. Whenever the Church has been a dynamic force in the world someone or someone's have been praying. I want you to make no mistake about this... God has forged a link between effective prayer and effective power!! James 5:16: “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” That’s why we ask each Life Group to ask two critical questions each time they meet and one of those is: “What can we pray about for you?”
(5) Life Groups share and care for each other. Look at what this first church did starting in v.44.
“All the believers met together and shared everything they had. 45They sold their property and things they owned and shared the money with those in need.” Two things here I want you to notice. (a) They were perceptive. In other words they leaned about needs and then helped. It’s why the other question beside prayer in each life group that we believe is critical to ask is: “Is there anything our group can help you with?” (b) They sacrificed for those in need. Now, that first church actually sold their possessions to those who were poor among them. Don’t misunderstand this for socialism. This was voluntary, not mandated by the Government and it was simply meeting the needs of others, it was not an equal distribution of the wealth. But these Christ followers were so excited about their faith and so concerned for each other that they sold what they to meet needs. And our Life Groups are still doing that today!
{Video Testimony of: Ann Jordan and Gerald and Jessica Bell – 5:00}
That’s it! And that’s the primary goal of our groups – to foster Christ centered relationships, to be known, accountable and care for one another. Gal. 6:10: “We should help people whenever we can, especially if they are followers of the Lord.” (CEV)
(6) Life Groups enjoy each other. The last of v.46 tells us that these first Christ followers were
“…sharing their meals with great joy.” I’ve only been here about 6 weeks but I already know that we are a church that enjoys each other and likes to laugh. That’s biblical. Solomon said, "A cheerful disposition is good for your health." (Prov.17:22 Msg) The late Paul Harvey related once that Doctors have concluded that 30 seconds of "belly laughter" is healthier exercise than 10 minutes of bicycle riding. There's the information some of you have been waiting to hear.
And do you know what one of the bi-products is of people who enjoy each other? Popularity. I think it was one of the reasons the scripture say in v.47 that “Everyone outside their group thought well of them.” You get a group of people together who sincerely believe in something (remember they were also continually praising God) and they enjoy being together… why, it's so attractive you can't people away.
(7) And the result of all this was that these groups, our Life Groups help the church to grow. It says of that early group: “More and more people were being saved every day as the Lord added them to this first congregation.” Notice that God adds you to the Church you DO NOT join it. We talk about joining Church like it is a country club or a college fraternity. Technically, you do not join the Church. It’s why here at Northridge we don’t call those who have committed themselves to this body of believers’ members. We call them partners. Because you don’t join… you are added when you put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ. But one of the bi-products of our groups learning, fellowshipping, eating, praying, caring and enjoying each other is that others are going to wonder, “What’s going on over there?” And when they find out many of them are going to want to be a part of this!
So, how can you get in a Life Group? Well, I want to give you three opportunities today!
(1) Wednesday NightLIFE. Good way to try it out. Come on a Wednesday night and we’ll either put you in a group or if we have enough interest we’ll start a new one. Right here at the church.
(2) Today we are announcing “Connect 2gether” groups. How would you like to try a group for 6 weeks? This will run from Oct. 7 – Nov. 18. You have two weeks to sign up for this starting today. These groups will use a little different format because we’ll spend time getting to know each other and learning why and how to do Life Together. You can sign up in the lobby today.
(3) If you look at your schedule and you think. “I want to do this but my schedule right now, the holidays are close I just can’t make the commitment.” We get that. That’s why today we are announcing that on Jan. 20 we will hold our first GroupLink. This is an event where everyone comes needing the same thing… acceptance. And you’ll leave Grouplink, linked together in a group. You’ll hear more about that very soon. 3 ways to intentionally do life together with others. Why get in a life group? Because we’re acceptance magnets – we need it. And because Jesus wants to be “with you” and knows the best way for that to happen is to do life together with others who want the same thing.
PRAY
