A Time of Reflection

Last Sunday, rather than deliver a message, I broke the gathering up into groups to reflect on several questions that came out of the message I had delivered the week before, including” Why are we at church on Sunday morning?” and, “If this was our last 52 weeks on earth and we only had 52 Sunday together, what would those Sundays look like?” among others. Here are some of the answers that came from each small group discussion:

I should note, one group did not answer any of the questions. Instead, they focused on each other. They spent the time getting to know one another and finding out how they could pray for and support one another. This was a great result and helped underscore an important message.

Whether the questions were answered or not, one message came through loud and clear: we need to make more time for loving one another during our Sunday morning gatherings.

Worship is vital. Receiving a biblical message is appreciated and necessary. Clearly, no church service should pass without praying. However, the cry of the heart of God as expressed through the people who attended our gathering last Sunday is that we make time to connect with one another in meaningful and substantive ways.

What we do and why we do what we do? 

The most important purpose of “ministry” – whatever the ministry – is to express Jesus Christ. Christ is all. Anything less than Christ is a waste of time.  In our church, we work to:

• Express Christ to one another in our families
• Express Christ to one another in the church
• Express Christ to those he has given us as friends, coworkers, in the community and/or wherever he sends us to whoever he sends us.  

We don’t want to build an organization as much as we want to see an organism grow.  

We believe God created men and women to live in community.  Stated another way, the natural habitat of the life of Christ within us is within the community of saints sharing that life with one another.   If you take a fish out of water, the fish will die. If you take a polar bear out of its habitat, the polar bear will stop reproducing.  If you take a palm tree out of its natural habitat, the palm tree will not thrive. 

Likewise, if you take a person who has the life of Jesus Christ out of community, the Christian will not not reproduce Christ in others, will not thrive, and eventually die.

A church building is not the habitat of a believer.   The community of saints within the building is the habitat for the life of Christ in a believer. to be sure, church buildings can facilitate various aspects of community life. We can celebrate and love God together through worship. We can pray for one another. We can give to the ministries operating out of the building and see love and life multiple through our giving. We can be equipped by the Pastor through preaching and teaching.

However, if the beginning and the end of our life in Christ is coming to a building once or twice a week, singing a song, and listening to a message, we are not likely to grow, reproduce and thrive in Christ.  Why? Community is more than a one or two hour meeting were we passively participate and listen. Community is a commitment to relationships.  

Learning and living the ministry of “One another – ing”

“One another” is two words in English, but it’s only one word in Greek: ἀλλήλων (ah-LAY-loan).  It’s used in 100 times in 94 New Testament verses. 47 of those verses give instructions to the church, and 60% of those instructions come from Paul. When you examine these verses, a few more common themes show up.

Unity. One third of the one-another commands deal with the unity of the church. For example:

• Be at peace with one another (Mk 9:50)
• Don’t grumble among one another (Jn 6:43)
• Be of the same mind with one another (Ro 12:16, 15:5)
• Accept one another (Ro 15:7)
• Wait for one another before beginning the Eucharist (1 Co 11:33)
• Don’t bite, devour, and consume one another (Ga 5:15)
• Don’t boastfully challenge or envy one another (Ga 5:26).
• Gently, patiently tolerate one another (Ep 4:2)
• Be kind, tender-hearted, and forgiving to one another (Ep 4:32)
• Bear with and forgive one another (Co 3:13)
• Seek good for one another, and don’t repay evil for evil (1 Th 5:15)
• Don’t complain against one another (Jas 4:11, 5:9)
• Confess sins to one another (Jas 5:16)

Love. One third of them instruct Christians to love one another. For example:

• Love one another (Jn 13:34, 15:12, 17; Ro 13:8; 1 Th 3:12, 4:9; 1 Pe 1:22; 1 Jn 3:11, 4:7, 11; 2 Jn 5)
• Through love, serve one another (Ga 5:13)
• Tolerate one another in love (Ep 4:2)
• Greet one another with a kiss of love (1 Pe 5:14)
• Be devoted to one another in love (Ro 12:10)

Humility. About 15% stress an attitude of humility and deference among believers.

• Give preference to one another in honor (Ro 12:10)
• Regard one another as more important than yourselves (Php 2:3)
• Serve one another (Ga 5:13)
• Wash one another’s feet (Jn 13:14)
• Don’t be haughty: be of the same mind (Ro 12:16)
• Be subject to one another (Ep 5:21)
• Clothe yourselves in humility toward one another (1 Pe 5:5)

Outside of those three categories, here are the rest of the one another texts:

• Do not judge one another, and don’t put a stumbling block in a brother’s way (Ro 14:13)
• Greet one another with a kiss (Ro 16:16; 1 Co 16:20; 2 Co 13:12)
• Husbands and wives: don’t deprive one another of physical intimacy (1 Co 7:5)
• Bear one another’s burdens (Ga 6:2)
• Speak truth to one another (Ep 4:25)
• Don’t lie to one another (Co 3:9)
• Comfort one another concerning the resurrection (1 Th 4:18)
• Encourage and build up one another (1 Th 5:11)
• Stimulate one another to love and good deeds (He 10:24)
• Pray for one another (Jas 5:16)
• Be hospitable to one another (1 Pe 4:9)

The “one another” exhortations are behaviors we may do out of an overflow of our relationship with Jesus, but they are not things that we do solely unto Jesus. Other people must be involved in order to fulfill them. Many of one anothering activities be taught by the church in the Sunday pulpit, but few of them are lived out by believers within the context of most church programming.

“The primary activity of the church was one-anothering one another.” – Andy Stanley

Take a moment and run that through your filter of Biblical knowledge… Consider the veracity of that statement and then consider how intentional we can be at strategies that don’t include this primary activity. We can be intentional about getting people stationed at posts, plugged into programs and delivering curriculum but where are we intentional about one-anothering?

“When everyone is sitting in rows…you can’t do any one anothers.” – Andy Stanley

If the majority of the church’s focus is herding people into rows we will not have an abundance of opportunities to “be the church.” When we’re intentional about guiding the church towards Biblical community we create more space for the one anothers. It’s so much easier to do one-anothering in circles than rows.

“By this all men will know . . .”

John 13:34-35, “A new commandment I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so also you must love one another.  By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another.” 

What is the “this” that Jesus is speaking about?

Not by the way we preach.

Not by the way we worship.

Not by the way we evangelize.

Not by our apologetics.  

Not by feeding the poor or our other charities.

Not by our church programs.

Not by our tithes and offerings.

Not by our victories and successes.  

There are a lot of things we substitute for the “this,” but He did not include anything else other than, “love one another.”

1 John 3:14, “We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers. The one who does not love remains in death.”

1 John 4:20, “If anyone says, “I love God,” but 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.”

2 John 1:5, “And now I urge you, dear one–not as a new commandment to you, but one we have had from the beginning–that we love one another.”

1 John 4:7-10 , “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. 8 He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. 9 In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

Therefore, in accordance with the clear direction we have received as a gathering of people who love Jesus Christ and desire to grow in our love for one another, over the coming weeks we are going to be making time in our Sunday morning gatherings to “one another” one another. This may look different from week to week, but it will be a integral part of what we do when we get together on Sunday mornings.