Great End #2: Youth Group Info

First Presbyterian Youth Group

July 22^nd, 2008

Great Ends of the Church Bible Study

The Shelter, Nurture and Spiritual Fellowship of the Children of God.

‘Fellowship’

Scripture Reading:

1 John 1.1-4

Deuteronomy 6.4-9

Acts 2.42-47

We were not intended to live alone. Again, we were not intended to live alone. No, God intended for man to be with someone, to have a partner. Beginning at the very beginning in the story of God, we see that God tried having man live alone. After letting Adam name animals, God noticed that none of these would do. So God put Adam into a deep sleep, removed a rib, and created a partner, a woman, Eve. From there, “This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.” Genesis 2.24 It is not good for man to live alone.

As children of God, it is encouraging to know that we are called to live as a community, a holy people. We are to get life from each other, while giving life to each other. Community then can only be experienced through Christ and in Christ. We belong to each other through Jesus Christ. We then gain community in Christ by living wholly by the Word of God. It is through this, which gives us Breath, the Word of Jesus Christ that we can gain insight, redemption, righteousness, innocence and blessedness. Christ then becomes present in our lives and we then demonstrate Christ’s love to our brothers and sisters. We then, when all dwell in the Word and live out the Word, become an authentic community. Thus to see Christ alive and God at work in our lives, we need each other to show these things, to live these things and to be Christ to one another. Community can only be authentic and real when we Christ is the center of our community.

We’ve established then that Christ is that which gives Breath to our lives together. We also have gotten an understanding that we are not intended to be alone in the world. That we are not rugged individuals, rather, we are children of God called to be the body of Christ for the world, called to be, the church. Often times the gathering of people together outside of worship is labeled as fellowship. It is where we all go to share our common stories and we learn how to love each other. In these moments, we can put into practice meeting people where they are at the same way God has met us. Where we have missed the mark, God has showed us the way back. Where we have been judgmental, God has forgiven us. Dietrich Bonhoeffer says it best, “What God did to us, we then owed to others,” (Life Together, 25). True fellowship happens when students are known, cared for, held accountable, and encouraged in their spiritual journey. It is in these moments then that we can be sheltered, nurtured and cared for, all the while being in spiritual fellowship with each other. Much like our own bodies, if we do not take care of it, if we do not stop to nourish it, we will become weak and no longer be able to function properly.

Jack Rogers said, ““The primary functions of this church are to bring people to salvation—a right relationship with God—and to guide them in living the Christian life,: (Claiming the Center, 52). As the body of Christ, the church, we can provide such a life together by recognizing that we are called to care for one another, demonstrating what Paul calls, “a ministry of reconciliation with God,” and to reconcile the world to God by overcoming those bridges that separate us from God. This is the driving force of the Gospel message, to make disciples and take the message of Christ to all worlds, yet allowing space and time for its members to rest and be in fellowship with each other. To bring people to a right relationship with God, salvation and providing this place of sanctuary, is what the church exists for. Being one unified church, longing and striving to allow salvation to take place and helps reconcile our relationship with God.

Unity must take place then if community is to exist. Thankfully we have the Companion that Christ promised us, the Holy Spirit. Joseph Smalls says, “We are called to live God’s difference in the world, building community, ministering to others, and praying for God’s gracious presence,” (Great Ends of the Church, slide 45). Church is to be a place where all are welcomed and all are greeted with love and in the manor of Christ. We are to be a place where we can discover how we can live out our faith and not simply talk about it. It is a place where we come and find out how we can make a difference in the world for God and take that with us we travel this journey. Through fellowship with each other, we can communicate the Word of God to each other, which is put there by God, dwells in us through the Holy Spirit and we come together to gain a better understand of the this story and how God is restoring the world and how he is using us to do it.

Coming together, living life together as a community allows us to see God’s story unfolding around us and having one another help us be more attentive to God’s presence in our life. Through spiritual exercises and disciplines, our faith formation and direction in our lives, begin to unfold too before us as we learn how our story intertwines with the story of God. We discover the ways that we can live out our faith rather than simply talking about it. Kendra Dean says, “Arguing whether information or experiences of formation come first is a chicken and egg argument; it really doesn’t matter, since both are essential to Christian discipleship…Orthodoxy and orthopraxy—faithful belief and faithful practice—are the two lungs of Christian discipleship,” (A New Kind of Youth Ministry, 51). Our times together worshipping, praying and using other spiritual practices, give shape and life to our body, the church. Our spiritual formation that occurs defines and show the way God has transformed our lives, helps us realize the new life that lies within Christ, and helps us down our discipleship journey that calls us towards holiness and imitating Christ. Through the shelter, nurture, and spiritual fellowship of the children of God, this is made more available to us.

Why then do we do what we do? Why then do we gather together in the name of Christ? Why then do we come together outside of Sunday school and worship on Sunday mornings? To give life to each other. To breath the breath of God to one another that comes through Christ, the living Word. “For we proclaim to you what we ourselves have actually seen and heard so that you may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the father, and with his Son, Jesus Christ.” These words from John in his first letter set up can define our Great End, for nurture, fellowship and for salvation. Knowing that titles to selections in our Bibles were not written that way, I must say that I do love the title the New Living Translation gives to Acts. 2.42, “The Believers Form a community”. So it reads then Acts 2.42, “All the believers devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer.” This is what the early community of believers rooted themselves in, these aspects of community is what we must too root ourselves in. Exploring the worship spectrum both on Sundays and when we gather together in the name of Christ. In order for community and this Great End to happen, we must devote ourselves to the teachings of the Apostle’s, the breaking of bread and fellowship with each other!

May it be so that we devote ourselves to one another. Recognizing that we share in a common story with many authors who have gone before us to write previous chapters, we are dipping in the same ink with those around us and that our chapters will then be handed on to those after us. May we pledge our allegiance to Christ alone, coming together as often as we can, being in holy fellowship with one another. “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I, in the midst of them,” Matthew 18.20. May we live by the Shema Yisrael, the great prayer of our Hebrew brothers and sisters, stemming from Deuteronomy 6.4-9

“4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone.^{* 5}You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. ⁶Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. ⁷Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. ⁸Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem^* on your forehead, ⁹and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”

May it be so. Amen.