When it comes to our collective witness as God’s people, God has designed our gatherings to be a redeemed platform for preaching the results of God’s grace as evidenced in how we conduct ourselves with one anther. This is intended by God to be most evident of all whenever we celebrate the Lord’s Supper.
Observations & Conclusions:
- The community speaks through consistency
- The community’s witness must be modeled by the character of Jesus
- The community’s character preaches
- The community’s unity displays the cost of our family
- The community must evidence familial love until Jesus returns
Application:
– Encourage the interdependence and appreciation of the body
– What are you thankful for?
1 Corinthians 9:14
“In the same way, the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should receive their living from the gospel.”
Acts 13:5
“When they arrived at Salamis, they proclaimed the word of God in the Jewish synagogues. John was with them as their helper.”
Acts 4:2
“They were greatly disturbed because the apostles were teaching the people, proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection of the dead.”
Philippians 1:17
“The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains.”
2 Corinthians 3:1-3
“Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, like some people, letters of recommendation to you or from you? You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everyone. You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.”
1 Corinthians 3:4-7
“For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere human beings? What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.”