Connecting – Part 1
This newest series of messages on Internet Pastor is called “Connecting”.
Because of cell phones and the Internet and satellites the world has never been more connected. No matter what happens in the world we hear about it now within minutes, and because of the video cameras in cell phones, we can watch virtually every event as it unfolds.
In spite of the connectedness, a lot of people feel disconnected. There is a lot of lonely people in our world today. We don’t see a lot of extended families in our country any more. Not all that long ago it was normal for generations of families to live in the same community. Fear has caused many people to withdraw and isolate. The days of knowing everyone in your neighborhood are for the most part gone. People are driven and busy and don’t stop as often as they should and the result is often a very lonely very busy person.
This causes a sadness because what we all long for is to be known. It is like the theme song from cheers, “Sometimes you want go where everybody know your name, and there always glad you came”…
You were made for relationship, to be connected. We need to be connected to God and to other people in order to experience the life God intends for us. We were not made for isolation. We were made for connection. Why? Because we were created in the image of God. The Bible says God is love and in order to love you’ve got to have somebody to love. There has to be loving relationships in your life. What matters is that you have some healthy relationships in your life. And, as messed up an institution as it is sometimes, God created the “church” to be a safe place to connect with Him and with other people. It isn’t always safe, but it is supposed to be.
We are going to talk about connecting in the weeks ahead, and we will be using the Lord’s Prayer as our guide for the process. But, by way of introduction, I want to talk about some pictures God gives us of what connecting looks like and how it relates to the church.
1. Connected like a building
Ephesians 2:19-22 (NIV)
19 Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. 21 In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. 22 And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.
For a building to be safe and functional, all of the parts have to fit. The beams have to be the right length, the doors have to be the right width, etc. It only functions when all the parts fit. To be safe and to be stable in any building you have to connect things just right.
You are a part of the building and we are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by His spirit. The church is not this building, together, we are the church that God dwells in.
2. Connected like the parts of a body
Romans 12:4-5 (NIV)
4 Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5 so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.
One of the most common descriptions of the church in the Bible is the body of Christ. We are the body of Christ. What Jesus Christ did when he was here in his physical body – walking around and doing all those things – he wants us to continue to do today. We are the body of Christ on the earth.
We are Christ’s hands, feet, ears, eyes. We are his heart to the world today. The church is the body of Christ. Each of us needs to be doing what we were designed and gifted to do. If you are a toe, then be the best toe you can be for the Lord. The problems come when as a toe, you decide your job stinks and that you would rather be a finger. As the old saying goes, the grass is always greener on the other body part?
3. Connected like a vine and a branch
John 15:1-5 (NIV)
1 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.
These are the verses that Jesus gives His disciples just before He goes to the cross. They are His last minute instructions and that tells us that they were very important.
If we are going to produce any fruit in our lives, we have to be connected to God and to others. Unconnected lives are unfruitful lives.
4. Connected like a family
1 Timothy 3:15 (NIV)
15 if I am delayed, you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth.
We are God’s family. There are only two ways to get into a family. You can either be born into it or you can be adopted into it. Those are the two ways you get into a family. In the Bible God does both for you. It’s called being born again and it’s called being adopted into the family of God. God does them both.
We are the family of God. You’re welded into the building, you’re joined into the body, you’re grafted into the vine and you’re born again and adopted into the family of God. These word pictures all describe being connected to Him and to each other.
One of the most important things you need to learn is how to love. It is in learning and experiencing live that we begin to understand God, who is love. This is learned in the context of relationships.
1 Corinthians 1:10 (NCV)
10 I beg you, brothers and sisters, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that all of you agree with each other and not be split into groups. I beg that you be completely joined together by having the same kind of thinking and the same purpose.
The word to describe what we have been talking about today is the greek word koinonia. Koinonia is the word for fellowship. It means being as committed to each other as we are to Jesus Christ.
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