Welcome to the podcast of the White Church in Adelaide, South
Australia. All right, so I'm going to be
talking about gathering together this week.
Fellowship. God's will is for us to be
together. Hebrews 10/25 says not forsaking
the assembling of ourselves together as in the manner of
some, but exhorting one another. And so much the more as you see
the day approaching, so much the more as you see the day of the
Lord approaching. And so we would want to be found
together a whole lot more as more like more as we see the day
approaching. I think the day is approaching.
I think we can see that the day is approaching.
You know, the early believers had this heart.
They believed that the day was approaching and they wanted to
be together. And we too want to be together
because we see the day approaching and like, do we want
to be together? Just, you know, I read this
scripture, it talks about, you know, have this desire to be
together. Do we want to be together just
because the word of God says to be together or do we actually
want to be together? I think like sometimes it starts
with just trusting and having faith in what God says for these
things. When God says you, you should be
together. It's good for you to be
together. Sometimes it's, it's hard to, to
step out and be together. You don't really want to, you
know, I want to be isolated. I want to be on my own, but
God's calling me to be with his family and be together.
So it might take some effort on my part to push through that, to
take a hold of the truth and then walk it out.
And so this is just another one of these reasons why we just
can't rely on our own feelings and our own emotions and our
flesh. We we need to rely solely on
God's lead and the things that he's calling us to do.
So we're called to be together. And so desire to be together
grows when you step out in faith and take a hold of what God's
called you to do, like you will begin to want to be together if
you don't already, because you'll see that it's good
because God is good. His word is good.
His direction is always good. When you walk in God's ways,
you, you see the fruit of walking in God's ways and you
realize, yeah, this is good. And that's for all things.
Anything that you lay down and say, look, I, I will do, I will
do this your way, Lord, over time, you will see that that was
the right thing to do. You will, you will have this
desire in you to, to walk further into the things of God.
God's never wrong, like when God gives us direction and leading
and tells us to stay away from this thing and and push into
this thing. God's never wrong because God's
desire is good for us. He's never wrong.
And so when you step out in faith and just trust him, you
will realize that God was right always.
He's never wrong. But we're going to look at the
example of Jesus here today when it comes to fellowship and
gathering together. Jesus gathered together in the
synagogues, in these corporate gatherings.
Jesus was there for those. Jesus preached to a lot of
people on mountains and stuff like that where there was
corporate gatherings that Jesus was a part of.
Did Jesus pray? Yeah.
Did he pray on his own or did he pray with others?
Both. Jesus prayed a lot on his own,
but he also prayed a lot with his disciples.
He taught them how to pray. They asked him, how do we pray?
This is how you pray. When you read Jesus's words,
quite often he is praying and you sort of don't realize it,
but when, when you look at it and he says Amen and, and like
he is praying, but there's a lot of times when it's very clear
that Jesus is praying. You know, he says, I pray to the
Father for you. You know, he says to Peter, I've
been praying for you and these things.
So, so prayer is a big part of, of following Christ.
We gather together to pray. We're called to be a House of
prayer for the nations. So you're praying together
corporately and and on your own is a call that we have in Christ
and it's exampled by Jesus. Did Jesus meet in homes?
Yes. How often did Jesus meet in
homes? All the time, A lot.
It seems like Jesus didn't even have his own home.
He was just sort of just going from home to home, which is
interesting when you think about what we're called to do.
How often was food involved when Jesus was ministering and
meeting like you? You almost say all the time,
don't you? It's like food is just like, I
love food. I love being together and you're
around the table and eating together.
Jesus loved it too, it would seem eating together is a very
special thing. Our culture has kicked out the
dining table for a for a couch and ATV.
Do you think that's by accident? Do you think that the the
enemies had a hand in doing that in in setting up something to
take our attention away so that we wouldn't be fellowshipping
with each other the way that Jesus did?
Of course. And so we as the called out
believers need to get back to what Jesus did.
Back to Jesus example, we just point all of our furniture at
this TV like it's some sort of shrine.
It's not. It's weird when you think about
it, you know, like my friends would come over and have, you
know, hang out. We didn't call it fellowship
then, but your friends would come over and hang out and you
just point all your bodies at the TV and just ignore each
other. We do this with our phones.
We do this with, you know, laptops and stuff like that.
We come together to hang out. Hey, do you want to come hang
out? Yeah, sure.
Then we sit around on our phones and we ignore each other all
night. This is not by accident, guys.
This is like the enemies designed to keep us out of
fellowship with with each other and to keep us from walking in
the example that Christ set for us.
And so we got to push back. We really have to push back on
this because out there, this is just the way that it is.
So anywhere, anywhere you go out here, you're just going to be
sucked into this the way of the world, right?
But we as believers, as followers of Christ, as set
apart, you know, covenantal family of God, we need to look
very different. So when people come into our
home, we're not just going to like sit in front of the TV and
hope that, you know, we have the opportunity to share Christ with
them. We're going to sit at the table.
We're going to eat food together.
We're going to make it very clear who we are and what we
believe. And so this is the this is the
culture that we're building as a local church here, a family
community, one that gathers together and follows Jesus
example. Think about the Old Testament
feasts, which is very important in the scripture.
What are they doing, eating? They're coming together and, and
setting their hearts and their minds and everything towards
God. They're and, and you know, these
feasts, when you actually look at them, they, they all point to
Jesus. And so, you know, the Old
Testament believers were, were looking to, to Jesus without
even really knowing it. But they're coming together in
fellowship and they're eating together and they're celebrating
and they're, it's all about God. It's a celebration of who God is
and what God's done and what God's going to do.
These are the feasts. You know, I said this before,
like many, many months ago now, when I don't think we'd been
planted for too long, but I said that Jesus was either on his
way. He's either at a meal, on his
way to a meal, or planning a meal.
And it's funny because you can, you, can you make a case for
that in the Scripture? Jesus's first miracle was at a
feast. He turned water to wine.
What are they doing with the wine?
Drinking it, the eating, drinking.
There's one of the miracles. I think there's only one, maybe
2. I mean, the resurrection is
there, but the, one of the miracles that's in all of the
Gospels is the feeding of the 5000.
Is there any food involved with that?
It's feeding people. It's just interesting when you
when you start to look at these things, right?
What about the Last Supper? What were they doing eating?
You know, Jesus takes the bread and the wine off of a table of
fellowship and off of out of a meal.
He didn't say to to his guys, Hey, Peter, just run into the
into the cupboard there, grab the wine, grab the bread out
there. We're going to have communion,
you know, just say hey, hey, guys, just run to Audi so we can
grab some bread and some wine because we're going to have
communion this morning. They're having a meal.
Jesus grabs a takes from the table, the bread and the wine.
It's interesting, isn't it? What about when Jesus is
resurrected? Luke 24 verse 30, it says this.
Now it came to pass as he sat at the table with them that he took
the bread and he blessed and he broke it and he gave it to them
and their eyes were opened and they knew him and then he
vanished out of his sight. Jesus sitting at a table again,
Jesus gets resurrected, has this light walks along with them and
teaches them, you know, the, the Scripture and they don't know
who he is. And then he goes back and they,
they, they convince him to stay and come to the table.
Jesus is breaking bread. He's eating again, you know, and
then what about John 29 verse 15?
Again, this is after the resurrection.
So when he had eaten breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter,
Simon, son of Judah, do you, do you love me?
Do you love me, Peter? Jesus is cooking some fish and
they're out fishing and then he calls them in for what?
For breakfast. He's going to feed them.
Jesus is going to talk to them. Jesus is going to speak the word
of God, but he's feeding them food at the same time.
There's this cool prophecy in Isaiah, Isaiah 25.
This is not the whole, whole whole thing, but listen to what
it says here. It says, I think it's verse 6,
it says, and in this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for
all people a feast of choice pieces, a feast of wine on the
leas, of fat things full of marrow, of well refined wines on
the leas. And we would we and he will
destroy on this mountain the surface of the covering, cast
over all people and the veil that is spread over all nations.
He will swallow up death forever.
And the Lord God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.
It's talking about a feast. And you know, this is echoing
the the words that come later in Revelation where it talks about
death being swallowed up, talks about every tear being washed
away. Do you think that we're going to
be feasting with the Lord in eternity?
I think we are. You know, there's a the wedding
supper of the Lamb. Jesus is all about it.
And so we need to be about the things that Jesus is about,
right? This is a powerful thing for us
to grasp, guys. God has given us something very
powerful for us to fellowship with one another and reach the
lost around us. When Jesus appoints the 70
without looking like, I'm not even going to tell you where it
is, but it's in Luke, right? When Jesus appoints them go and
do these things, what does he tell them to do?
Can someone just call out something?
This is when he he gets the 70 together and he sends them out.
What's one thing that he says that for them to do?
Go into homes. You guys are cheating.
I wouldn't just say all the other stuff.
You're not cheating, no, but that this is this is it.
Because like when I think about that, you guys are just smarter
than me. Clearly when I think about what
Jesus told them to do, it was like go.
Therefore, I think of the Great Commission.
It's like healing the sick and casting out demons and going in
pairs and all of these things. But this is what it says.
It says Luke, Luke 10 verse one. Now after these things, the Lord
appointed the 70 others. I'm just going to skip down to
to verse 5. It says, and into whatsoever
house you shall enter first say peace be to this house.
And if the son of peace is there, the peace shall rest upon
it upon him. But if not, it shall return to
you. And in that same house remain
eating and drinking such things as they give.
Jesus is sending them out to to reach people and because the
thing that he says to them to tell them and tell them the
Kingdom of God is at hand and he sends them before himself.
So he says going to the places that I'm going to go and tell
them that the Kingdom of God is at hand and go into their houses
and eat and drink whatever they give you.
You know, obviously there's a lot of emphasis here, but my
emphasis is go into their houses, eat and drink, tell them
that the king is coming. And so we are called in the same
way we are sent once, you know, the Great Commission, When,
when, when Jesus says go therefore and go into the
nations and and baptize them and teach them all the things that
I've commanded and all these things how go into their homes.
Do the thing that he's exampled. Jesus did this over and over and
over again. And so they knew how Jesus did
it. And so even when he sends them
out, he tells them how to do it, Get into their homes.
And if they don't, if they're not willing to hear, and if they
don't want you in their homes, blow the dust off your feet and
move on. Go to someone who's willing to
hear. It's interesting, isn't it?
And so when you think about this, what sort of people should
we as the white church or as believers, as followers of
Jesus, what sort of people should be at the table with us,
saved or unsaved? Both.
Jesus ate with his disciples. Jesus ate with the sinners and
the tax collectors. And he says, like people that
don't need, you know, saving, they have no use for me.
I'm, I'm butchering what he actually said.
He said that those that are well don't need a physician.
It's like don't spend all your time with believers.
They don't need to hear the gospel, right?
We need to be at our tables with unbelievers.
Otherwise we're just, we're, we're isolated.
We're just doing our own thing and we're not following the
example of Jesus and we're not doing what he's called us to do.
It's very hard to share the gospel with an unbeliever if
you're never around unbelievers, right?
And that's at their place and your place and my place and your
place. Like it's just, we're going to
get in each other's homes. We're going to get in other
people's homes. Jesus invited himself to
people's homes. It's pretty bold, isn't it?
I'm coming to your house tonight, buddy.
Come down that tree. I'm coming to yours.
Well, he's pretty stoked. Well, these guys were were
wanting to hear what Jesus had had to say and he sends them in
twos as well. This is interesting.
Jesus always sends them in in pairs.
He never sends anyone on their own.
So I would suggest that like when we're at the table with
unbelievers, there should be more than one believer.
If we're going to share the gospel, there should be a couple
of us. And so it might just mean that
when you invite your unsaved friends or when you have a a
feast with people that don't know Christ, invite some of the
people from the church, bring some of the believers around,
follow Jesus example, go in pairs, strengthen one another,
help each other. Don't try to do this alone.
When I think about some of the things that's hold us back from
having our neighbors and stuff in our house, it's just like
there's no support. It's just me.
Invite, invite Justin. Justin will come here.
Justin loves eating and, and, and, and drinking.
He doesn't drink. He doesn't drink wine.
I'm going to put it out there, but he will have some coffee.
He will happily have some coffee, right?
Invite someone along, get some support.
If he, if you know, sharing the gospel is hard for you, invite
Daniel. Invite someone.
That's that not that is comfortable in doing this.
We don't have to do this alone. We're not called to do this
alone. So we've we've all been meeting
as a as a group in one group. And you know, we'd felt stirred
and many, many of the sort of helped us to say that we needed
to expand, that we needed to multiply, that we need to have
multiple groups going. We need to make space.
These guys have got a big house, but it's not big enough.
And we found that like when it came to inviting others along to
that, there's not a whole lot of space.
You know, when you walk into a room, there's no space for you.
It doesn't feel very comfortable, does it?
You feel like you're sort of just like an inconvenience.
And so these are just practical things.
We want, we want to make space for people to come.
And so last Friday was our first night where where we met in our
home. Actually, we're going to be
meeting in Daniel and Chantelle's home.
These guys are opening up their home.
And so some of us are going to be going to these, to Daniel, to
Justin and Bianca's house and, and others are going to be going
to Daniel and Chantel's house. And so, but we had the first,
first group in our house and it was really cool because, you
know, it wasn't really cool at the time because I was, we
invited some people and it was like we got to 6:00 and there's
just no one there. And it was just like, Oh my
gosh, like I knew that one of us was going to be there.
So I was like, oh, what are we going to do here?
Maybe we just go out and eat somewhere else.
But luckily some people came along.
We had some people come and they weren't people from our usual
group, which I think is amazing, right?
When we when we step out and we go, you know, God's calling us
to multiply, all of a sudden now there's a different group here.
Isn't that amazing? And so this is this is the
season that we find ourselves in multiplication opening up, you
know, more space for people to come.
We had our we've been having, we've had two men's gatherings
now. So we had our second one.
I missed the first one because, you know, I was with Hillary at
the hospital. But that's OK.
It was wonderful. I'm glad I was there.
But but we had our second men's gathering and we were having
this in where Colin lives in the village there.
And it's really cool. They've got like space for us to
meet. There's a pool table and stuff
like that. So we had some fellowship there.
We had a couple of people that weren't a part of our church
there. Isn't that cool?
We open up another space and there's people there that that
aren't a part of us. And so this is just highlighting
to us that when we, when we step out and we and we seek to do
things God's way, God breathes life on it.
And so be excited about that, guys, there's there's things
that we can invite our friends into Now.
I would, I would encourage you ladies.
Yeah, you ladies. I'm not going to do it for you,
You ladies. You know, if you want to get
together and have some fellowship and invite your
friends and stuff like that, you're going to have to organise
that between yourselves. I think you should.
I think there's definitely an opportunity.
You like ladies love getting together.
I'm sure something will come of this, but yeah, this is just
another opportunity for us to come together, have fellowship,
eat together, welcoming others, you know, have people at our
table. Just remember, we want to invite
people that don't know him to the table.
And so that means that, you know, just be on the lookout for
people to come. I find that when I invite people
to church, you know, we invite people at the hampers and stuff
like that. And hampers is on Tuesday night,
we would invite people, hey, we should come to church.
Yeah, yeah, maybe I will. Whatever.
But it's like then you've got like, Wednesday, Thursday,
Friday, Saturday, Sunday. There's just too many
opportunities. Like, you even forget that you
were even invited into in that time.
And so I've just realized that, like, we need to make it easy
for people. You know, it's like invite
someone to dinner tonight, invite someone to dinner
tomorrow. And Jesus did this.
Jesus said I'm coming to your house tonight.
It was like it it, it means that they have to respond to you in
the moment. It means that they have to
either commit or say no. If I say to someone, would you
come to my house tonight, they're either going to say yes
or no. If they say yes, very likely
that they're going to be there. If I invite them a week down the
track, maybe not. Do you see my point?
Let's just make it easy for people to come.
God is leading us into a space of fellowship with one another.
God's wanting us to walk this thing out in community.
God has called us to be a a church that is the family of
God, that is a a safe place, that is a healthy family.
This is the, the church that God's building here.
And as we operate in this healthy family, taking care of
one another, being real with one another, helping us walk through
the challenges and the things that we're facing, we can grow
up in him into maturity. And not only that, God wants to
add to us. God wants to bring people into
this fellowship that need him, that need us.
You know, we love God and we love each other.
God wants to bring people in here that he could be known and
that he could be loved by us. And so this is where we are.
And so I just want to encourage all of us to get around the
table, eat some food together. I shouldn't have to encourage us
to do this. We love food, right?
Eat some food together and be intentional about our
conversation. Jesus sent them into the homes
and into the houses to to eat with them, but he didn't just do
that. He told them to be intentional
about they had a purpose. So our purpose is to share
Christ, share the coming King. And that's going to take some
some intentionality. We're going to have to go to
these dinners and go to each other's houses prayerfully and
asking that God would give us the words Amen.
And I believe that when we do this and when we follow Christ's
example and we will see the the fruit following, we'll see
people come tonight. Thank you for joining us for
today's message. For more information about The
Way Church, please visit ourwebsite@thewaychurch.com dot
AU. Have a blessed day.