We Are In This Together Series

A PEOPLE WITH PURPOSE:

WE ARE IN THIS TOGETHER

Acts 2:42-47

S: Church

C: Purpose of the Community

Th: A People with Purpose

Pr: WE ARE TO BE DEVOTED TO COMMUNITY.

?: How? How is it observed?

KW: Practices

TS: We will find in our study of Scripture four practices that demonstrate how we are to be devoted to the community known as the church.

Type: Propositional

The ____ practice is…

I. Encouragement

II. Guidance

III. Forgiveness

IV. Love

PA: How is the change to be observed?

• Make being with other believes a priority.

• Make every effort to keep unity.

Version: ESV

RMBC 15 January 06 AM

INTRODUCTION:

Many of you know that my favorite comic strip of all time is Calvin and Hobbes…

ILL Community: C & H

On one Sunday edition, Calvin (the boy) and Hobbes (the tiger) are in the tree house…

First Frame

And Calvin announces…

C: This meeting of the top secret club G.R.O.S.S. (Get Rid of Slimy Girls) will come to order. Today, this august assembly will decide whether to demote President Hobbes on charges of heresy!

H: HERESY?!

Second Frame

C: Let the record show that the defendant made an undisparaging comment about the possible membership of Susie Derkins, an admitted girl, and enemy of this club.

Third Frame

Hobbes responds…

H: Let the record also show that supreme dictator-for-life Calvin is a nincompoop.

C: OK, just for that you’re also charged with insubordination! This court finds you guilty on both counts and strips you of your title!

Fourth Frame

H: Ha! As court stenographer I refuse to enter the verdict! In fact, I’m promoting myself to “El Tigre Numero Uno”!

C: Oh yeah! Well then, I promote myself to “Most Highest Grandest, Exalted, um, Supreme, um…”

And after a few more jibes at each other, a fight breaks out between the two until they mutually call a truce.

Ninth Frame

The truce declared, the final frame sees them recovering form their injuries, standing where they started in the tree house. Calvin says…

C: What a great club. Too bad we don’t have more members.

H: Maybe we should allow Susie to join.

Leaving us to wonder if the fight won’t start all over again!

One thing for sure, in the comic strip, regardless of the fight, they are tremendous friends.

What do you think?

Do you need friends?

Do you need people in your life?

Do you need someone to share your life with?

ILL Community: failure to thrive

I have not recently been updated about this situation, but when Communism fell in the 1990s, the West discovered that there were a lot of orphanages.

In fact, in Romania, and in many Eastern European countries, there were so many orphans institutionalized that there wasn’t enough food or medical supplies or staff members to take care of them. The babies, often past toddler age, were still kept in diapers and placed in cribs because there was no other way to take care of them. They were lifted out to be fed and they infrequently had their diapers changed. There was no real physical contact with other humans, especially any of the cuddling and holding that babies need to develop normally.

Most of these children, without intervention, ended up in semi-catatonic states and often died from a lack of human contact. This condition is called “failure to thrive syndrome.”

TRANSITION:

“Failure to thrive syndrome” happens because…

1. We are wired for relationships.

We need to understand that “failure to thrive syndrome” can happen to us.

And it can happen to us in the context of our spiritual lives.

But, know this…

It can be avoided and it can be cured.

First, let us understand that…

2. We are placed into the body of Christ (I Corinthians 12:13).

For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body — Jews or Greeks, slaves or free — and all were made to drink of one Spirit.

When we become Christians, the Holy Spirit places us into the body of Christ.

We have no choice.

It is what happens.

We are set into it.

And when we become a part of the body of Christ, we are joined together with innumerable others.

We are bound together.

We belong to each other.

This means that…

3. WE ARE TO BE DEVOTED TO COMMUNITY.

Our theme verse for the year is Acts 2:42.

In describing the early church, it says…

And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

The early church devoted themselves to the fellowship.

They did so because it isn’t always easy to follow Christ.

Times can be rough.

Discouragement comes.

Apathy sets in.

Doubts occur.

Materialism distracts.

But if…

4. We are to be a people with purpose.