Tag Archives: church

Putting the “Christian” in Christian Friendship

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Is there anything distinctive about Christian friendship? What’s different about how two fellow followers of Jesus relate to each other, compared with two friends who don’t identify with Christ? Romans 15:2 helps us consider one essential component of what puts the Christian into Christian relationships.

“Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, to build him up.”

Who Is Our “Neighbor”?

“Neighbor” can be used very broadly (as Jesus does in Luke 10:29), but in this case, Paul is plainly talking about fellow believers (as he does in Ephesians 4:25). This is confirmed in the verb “to build up” — a word which Paul reserves exclusively for the church. We’re talking about Christians here in Romans 15:2 — Christian neighbors, fellow followers of Jesus with whom we share some proximity. So we could say this text carries significance for Christian friendship.

And the imperative is to “please” them, to accommodate them, to make their welfare of higher interest than our own. To please our Christian neighbor is to serve them. Undoubtedly, this will be for our own joy — no one is really served when it’s done in stiff reluctance. But it being for our joy doesn’t mean it’s always (or often!) comfortable. Pleasing our neighbor will take sacrifice. It’s not typically easy — it’s “not to please ourselves.” We’re giving something up for something better and that better is the building up of our brother or sister.

Sacrificially Build Up One Another

The sacrificial building up of one another — this is what makes Christian friendship, well, Christian. It’s Christian both in the adjective (sacrificial) and in the verb (building up).

Sacrificial building up (“not to please ourselves”) means it’s Christian in its manner. The foundation to our serving, our sacrificial edifying of others, is rooted in the example of Jesus. We’re to have the Philippians 6:6–8 mind among ourselves. He didn’t give prominence to his own comfort when he “left glory.” Nor when he prayed in the Garden. It wasn’t easy when he bore our sins and suffered the wrath we deserved. Yet even in the midst of the pain, there was a joy set before him. It wasn’t easy, but it was glorious. And when we walk in that example, it works the same way (1 Peter 2:21). It shocks the world — for the glory of God.

But this sacrificial building up is not only Christian in its manner. It’s also Christian in its goal. The friendship goes beyond discussing the latest scores (though it may involve that), or the newest app (though that may be a part, too), or the best book we’ve read (another good one). The purpose is to build them up. This is what the pleasing is about, for their good. It’s about their conformity to Jesus. Our little place in their life is to serve the goal to which God has elected them, Jesus has died, and the Spirit is working. We want to build them up.

For Your Friends

Now then, let each of us, by grace, please our neighbor for their good — count them more significant than ourselves, and their needs more pertinent than our own; to build them up — play the God-ordained role of a means of grace in their lives, investing in their transformation into the likeness of Jesus. Let’s stir this Christian intentionality in our relationships — that we not seek to please ourselves, but that we pursue the pleasing of our neighbor for their good in Jesus.

Read the original post at DG.

Believe, Sent, Speak, Heard, Believed, Sent…

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Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord, Paul tells us, will be saved (Romans 10:13).

This is good news.

And then comes the best possible question, and subsequent questions, that could be asked.

How then will they call of him in whom they have not believed? There’s not going to be a confession of the mouth if there’s not a believing of the heart. Okay, okay, next question. How are they going to believe in him of whom they have never heard? There’s not going to be any believing unless they hear about the one worthy of their faith.We’re tracking with him now. Another question: how are they to hear without someone preaching? There’s not going to be any hearing about Jesus unless someone tells about Jesus. Last question: And how are they going to preach unless they are sent? Those who tell others about Jesus have to go forth, leaving one spot and traveling to another.

So the good news of salvation to everyone who calls on Jesus is coupled with a glorious mandate: tell this good news to others. No Uncle Sam posters here. No long, skinny finger is pointing at you. This is a call more amazing than we can imagine.

There is good news! This is good news that’s meant to be told. And we’re the ones, you and me, us, we’re the ones who get to tell it.

Let us be sent. Let us go speak. Let them hear. Let them believe and call on Jesus. Then let them be sent. . . . This is how it works.

Read the original post at Fighterverses.com.

“The gates of Hades will prevail against every institution but one…”

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Nice find by Josh Etter in the Piper archives.

Pastor John writes,

The church of Jesus Christ is the most important institution in the world. The assembly of the redeemed, the company of the saints, the children of God are more significant in world history than any other group, organization, or nation. The United States of America compares to the church of Jesus Christ like a speck of dust compares to the sun. The drama of international relations compares to the mission of the church like a kindergarten riddle compares to Hamlet or King Lear. And all pomp of May Day in Red Square and the pageantry of New Year’s in Pasadena fade into a formless grey against the splendor of the bride of Christ.

Take heed how you judge. Things are not what they seem. “All flesh is like grass. And all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord (and all his family) abide forever” (1 Peter 1:24–25). The media and all the powers, and authorities, and rulers, and stars that they present are a mirage. “For what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God” (Luke 16:15). The gates of Hades, the powers of death, will prevail against every institution but one, the church.

Excerpted from The Cosmic Church (1981).

It’s Good to Sing Together

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I think the weekly corporate gathering of the church, i.e., the church service, has been overemphasized. For many, at least in the American South [my majority experience], the Sunday gathering is the totality of the Christian life. Sunday and Wednesday nights are bonus points. And even for those who would check the right answer when asked, the church service can still be an event that drains energy, subtly eases the conscience about Christian activity, and inadvertently distracts from mission to our neighbors.

The simple adjustment (at least in words) is to make the corporate gathering a sabbath. Make it the weekly culmination and commissioning of the church’s calling to the world. It’s very important, just not the be-all, end-all of Christian existence.

With this qualifier in place, I love what Bifrost Arts are saying and doing. . .

(HT: JT on the video)

Africa Starts Across the Street

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Doug Wilson:

If the motive force for a church’s evangelism is excitement over the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, then that evangelism will be in evidence both locally and in foreign missions. But if 98% of the evangelism done by a church is overseas, they are trying to export something they do not have. And because the appropriate motive force is missing, and the mission work still needs to be sustained, there is a distinct drift in how the work is maintained. We suddenly find ourselves in the world of guilt manipulation and blood on the envelope appeals.

The first step in foreign missions is domestic mission. The first step toward Africa is right across the street.

Read the entire article.

Luther’s Counsel to the Sick and Dying

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Luther’s Letters of Spiritual Counsel, ed. and trans. Theodore G. Tappert, 1960, (Vancouver, BC: Regent College Publishing, 2003)

The strength of Luther’s counsel is his blending of personal sincerity and Christ-centered encouragement. This ethos of gospel ministry follows the example of the Apostle Paul in 1 Thessalonians 2:8, “… we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves.” This Apostolic example is seen in the interweaving of Luther’s sincere, personal concern for the sick and his robust articulation of Jesus’ work on the behalf of the sick. I think that this strength gives way to contemporary application.

We learn from Luther, who follows the example of Paul (cf. Phil. 3:17), that a mere theological mind is insufficient in pastoral care. We must share “not only the gospel but also our own selves.” What the sick need more than anything is to be reminded of Jesus’ victory, yet the exposition of that victory should be packaged in the demeanor of a forgiven sinner who is bound in love for his neighbor (Matt. 22:39). And more than our neighbor, we love those in the household of faith (Gal. 6:10), and we love the message of the gospel. Our love for the gospel is translated into a burden for it to be known and believed. It’s content is so precious to us that we sincerely (and personally) commend it to others. We are compelled by these affections to honor both the person and the message they need to hear. We come to the sick and dying in an authenticity that says, “I am your brother. I love you very much and I have good news for you.”

It is hard to assess weaknesses in Luther’s letters per se, or in his counseling approach. In every counseling circumstance there are always more and less of what we could say. The cultural mindset towards sickness and physical suffering has changed since Luther’s day because of the advancement of medicine. Sickness was part of their reality and therefore didn’t require a robust theodicy. Due to his context, I think Luther’s theodicy is underdeveloped. He made mention of life’s fragility: “None of us is, or should be, sure of his life at any time” (30). And he mentions the curse of sin: “This life, cursed by sin, is nothing but a vale of tears” (32). Also, God’s will: “[Luther] acknowledges that the illness, sent upon him by the will of God…” (36). Contemporary counsel would seem to require more of an explanation about God’s goodness and sovereignty in the midst of sickness. The question is simply more prevalent today than it was in Luther’s.

Personal sincerity and Christ-centered encouragement are the major themes of Luther’s counsel to the sick and dying. Contemporary pastors would do well to follow his example as he as followed the Apostle Paul.

Mission Is a Communal Project

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Chester and Timmis:

Imagine a jigsaw puzzle showing a cityscape. Each piece is vital, but no piece on its own can give anything like the full picture. As you build up some clusters of pieces to make, say, a few streets, you start to get a better feel of the whole. Ultimately as those clusters are joined together, you get the full picture. So it is with the church and mission. God’s wisdom is displayed through the church.

Each Christian is integral, but each church reveals far more of God’s glory than on Christian ever could. And churches connected together show that God’s wisdom is far greater and richer than one church’s little corner of the kingdom could ever reveal. Understood in this way, mission is a communal project in which a number of gospel communities are involved together as they speak to extend the reign of Jesus through planting more churches.

Total Church: A Radical Reshaping Around Gospel and Community, 106.

‘Go and Tell’ in 1988

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The distinction between the Church’s mission as ‘go and tell’ rather than ‘come and see’ has implications for how we live.

The ‘go and tell’ is essentially what the missional movement in the West has recovered about the nature of the Church. I embrace this. I think it is good. I think it is biblical. But it’s current popularity can become a point of criticism. Popularity has a way of doing that because we don’t know if it’s only a fad “all the kids are doing these days,” or if it is a legitimate revival that will propel the Church’s witness in the coming generations. It’s hard to see (and sometimes we’d rather not) its biblical faithfulness through the shrubs of coolness. But I believe it’s there.

And this made me glad to stumble across a fascinating find in Desiring God’s Resource Library last week. In a sermon on evangelism in 1988, John Piper encourages Bethlehem to adopt a missional mindset. In 1988. 1988, when all it had going for it was biblical faithfulness, not coolness.

Read the excerpt, The Church Has a ‘Go and Tell’ Mission.