A loving community John 15:1.17 /Acts 4:32
Our Church statement is that we are a Church building community where everybody is somebody and Jesus Christ is Lord. That will only be a reality when reqal love is expressed to one another and others around us.
When Brandon Moody visited his uncles Church. There was a play being performed, it had reached the final scene. It was the ascension of Jesus . The actor was being pulled up when suddenly the pulleys snapped dropping the actor to the stage. With a great presence of mind the actor got up and said ¡"one more thing, love one another.¡¦
This is a true hallmark of a Christian Church?
Love for one another. What is love?
We live in a world where people fall in and out of love like changing a pair of socks....It rocks families when one says "I love you no more!" Were they ever loved?
Wayne Hudson in his book many a tear has to fall writes, "Since God is love and we must compare our love to him, we come short if we define it in any other way. You see love is a commitment with a beginning and no end."
Agape love draws us to the revelation of God in Christ, it cries out I love you and I can’t help loving you even though we are totally unworthy objects of his love. His love is not based on feelings but is demonstrated through actions.
Believers have received Gods love and it has to be the overriding evidence of a Christian Church:
Acts 4:32 All the believers were one in heart and mind
We see they had love for God in their worship v46, 47, breaking bread, prayer, praising God.
Love for one another in their fellowship v42,44 fellowship and sharing,
Love for the wider community v47 And the Lord added to their number.
So a true hallmark of the Christian Church is a loving community, with this supernatural love, which can only be manifested because he first loved us and laid down his life for us which has brought us into His community.
Mother Teresa was once asked by an interviewer: "What’s the biggest problem in the world today? she replied, "we draw the circle of our family to small we need to draw it larger everyday."
Jesus commands us to be known by some call the 11th commandment; Jhn13: 34,35 Read.
The Vine and the branches
He reiterates the same command in Jhn.15:12,17 love each other as I loved you. In Chapter 15 its in the context of him earlier speaking about himself as a Vine and that genuine disciples will bear fruit. To understand this parable embraces all Christian profession whether real or not.
1.A loving community will remain in Christ
Jesus referring to himself as the vine (Church) v1, God the Father as the Gardner who cares for the branches v1 and you and I as the branches v2,3
Two types of pruning
V2 the Fruitless: They are cut off to prevent disease from the rest of the plant. These are people who profess to be Christians, they are in the vine (The Church) and yet don’t bear fruit for God or who continually try to block the efforts of Gods followers. All who are fruitless will ultimatly be cut off from his life giving power.
V3 the Fruitful he cuts them back, to promote more growth and bear more fruit. In other words God must sometimes discipline us to strengthen our character and our faith. So that we begin to bear more Christian fruit.
V4, the only way we become attached to Christ is through faith, repenting of sin (turning around) and receiving him as Saviour and Lord. And then we will be able to remain in him and bear fruit v5 apart from me you can do nothing.
v8 The fruits of the Spirit. The Lords desire for us is that we remain attached to Christ so as the Father prunes (cuts away the old) new shoots will sprout with new fruit. Because we attached to Christ we will be rightly nourished from the vine.v7 In this way we will show ourselves to be His disciples v8.
What is that nourishment? V9 Remain in my love (Love is the key fruit in which all the others are wrapped up in: Gal5:22-24 2Pet1:5-8.
The Clause V10 If you obey my commands you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love
2. A loving community will obey Christ v12
We live in a society where there are many dysfunctional people from adults to children. Recently there has been a lot of media attention about hoodies od ASBO youths who go around in large groups causing a lot of trouble for others (south Wigston). John Prescott the labour MP was recently provoked by hoddies.
There was recently a news item about a family in Holland who have caused so much trouble in their community that they have been recently moved and re-housed into a special metal cased home because they have been so anti social in their community.
Disobedience
Disobedience should no longer be a trait within the Church, it is to be a loving community. When disobedience is manifested it is either a sign of immaturity or total unbelief and will either be pruned or cut off from the vine.
Have you heard the parody of footprints in the sand? Its called "Butt prints in the sand." Let me read it to you:
One night, I had a wondrous dream;
One set of footprints there was seen.
The footprints of my precious Lord,
But mine were not along the shore.
But then some stranger prints appeared,
And I asked the Lord, "What have we here?"
"Those prints are large and round and neat,
But, Lord, they are too big for feet."
"My child," He said in somber tones.
"For miles I carried you alone.
I challenged you to walk in faith,
But you refused and made me wait.
You disobeyed, you would not grow,
The walk of-faith you would not know.
So I got tired and fed up,
And there I dropped you on your butt,
Because in life, there comes a time,
When one must fight, and one must climb,
When one must rise and take a stand,
Or leave their butt prints in the sand."
courtesy of story Bin.
Love is demonstrated by obedience
Love is demonstrated by obedience to Christ and we see this clear obedience in Jesus as he obeyed his Fathers will. Isaiah 53:10 (His obedient life)
V10 if you obey my commands you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father¡¦s commands and remain in his love
His commands are of a higher standard
V10 Jesus is requiring us to obey Him as he obeyed his Father.
In fact Jesus commands us to obey him v12 my command is this¡K Love each other as I have loved you. In John 13:34 calls this standard a new command.
OT law was summed up by two commands love God and you¡¦re neighbour.
So what is the difference here Jesus calling his a new command new?
1 It was given by our Lord to his Church, not to Israel.
2 It is directed toward the disciples and their relationship with each other, so also it relates to all believers to love one another.
Christian obedience stems from love not duty
How should we love one another? Just as I have loved you.
It’s one thing to love one another as we love and care for ourselves. It’s a vastly greater love which gives up its own life for another, that sacrifices self interest to promote the interests of another
15:13 Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. The sacrificial work upon the cross is the new standard, which we are to emulate in loving one another. We should not be loving another out of duty but it should be demonstrated by a sacrificial nature Phil.2:1-4.
Sermon on the mount: Matt.5:17 Fulfil (The cake and icing it finishing it off.) 21,27, You have heard it said, but I say to you....
The scribes and pharisees prided themselves in keeping the law, they taught and thought that if they did not commit murder they had kept the law. Jesus took the law a great deal further all the way to its origins the heart, saying that murder begins with hate in ones heart, Adultery begins with lust and so on in ones heart.
So Jesus is teaching that hate was as much a sin as murder that lust was as much a sin as adultery. So Jesus here is brining the OT law up to a new standard, His standard! v17-19
So this new command is not new in its originality or novelty, but in its extent, in its scope, it far reaching. It derives from heart and not duty.
3.A loving community is a growing community.
Which in turn will be a bright witness to unbelievers. The practice of love demonstrated amongst Gods people will show this world that we are genuine disciples and as a result people will be added being grafted into the vine.
V8.This is my father¡¦s glory that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
This idea is reinforced in Jhn 13:35 By this all men will know you are my disciples, if you love one another.
1.. Devoted to the Apostles teaching v42 (centred on Christ the vine) 15:7 my words
2. Devoted to fellowship v42 (4:32 loving each other) 15:17 love each other
3.Devoted to others v47. The Lord added to their number. (Bearing fruit v8,16)
But it was through them as they bore the fruit of Christian love towards God one another and others! Another fruit was developed Christian growth
Jhn.15:16 You did not chose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit ¡V fruit that will last.
I love this time of year as all the plants are growing given the right conditions, tender care and the the right nutrients we will have a strong healthy plant. And its the dame with real loving Christians growth is inevitable.
A loving Christian community cannot but help attract people to Christ, Christian love is contagious it brings others to Christ. Because this love is a supernatural and has been received from God. Showing Christian love is not an option notice what it says To love one another. What attracted you to Christ? A great expository sermon, the details of the end times, the no1 vehicle which attracts people to Christ is sseeing God people LOVE ONE ANOTHER AND OTHERS. (a loving community)
Let’s examine ourselves as a Church, are we genuinely bearing this fruit of love?
The cost to growth
Christian community cannot help but grow numerically and spiritually, but theirs a cost. The world is watching? (People talk! Media, journalists even in the village.
Often it’s the unbeliever who often accuses the Church of petty bickering amongst themselves, of hardness, of indulging in criticism of one another of back biting, of intolerance, jealousy and division in a Church. Sadly often these criticisms are true!
Ultimately these practices will be eradicated either they will be pruned by God so that new shoots which come as a result of pruning. Or they will be completely cut off.
1Jhn.4:19. We love because he first loved us. If anyone says ¡§I love God,¡¨ yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.
(We are blood bought) We are family, brothers and sisters we cannot determine who our brothers and sisters will be in our own families it just happens and in the same way God determines who our other family members will be. We are just called to accept them and love them.
Love costs....
Its easy to say we love God when that love doesn¡¦t cost us anything more than weekly attendance at religious services. But the real test of our love for God is how we treat one another, when we are rubbing shoulders together! We cannot truly love God when we neglect those who are made in his image.
Growth will involve being pruned by God, this will involve our relationships changing.
Jesus calls his disciples friends, we too should be friends, loving one another attracting others to Christ. If we are to remain in him, we must obey him, and grow in him this is really demonstrating the extent of our love for him when we show that love to one another.
"Lets demonstrate to each other and this community around us that we are a loving community wher everybody is somebody and Jesus Christ is Lord."
