Christian Maturity

Often we think of Christianity as giving up things.  I suppose it is a viewpoint often promoted by the church either directly or by misunderstanding.

It is true that God asks us to follow Jesus and to leave many old ways behind.  But Christianity is never so much about what we give up as what we gain.

The prize of fellowship with God.  Christianity is not understood until it is understood as joy.

Not simply joy delayed, but present joy.  We have a faith which encourages and promotes true joy.

The world and forces of darkness wish to present to us the false notion that we give up so much and receive so little.  Really we receive so much and give up so little.

True Respect

True respect between people requires an ability for them to disagree without damaging the relationship. We can have fellowship with people who we do not agree with on every point.

There are many essentials in the Christian faith, but there are many non-essentials where we may have liberty. In relationships with respect we can have fellowship with those whom with we disagree in non-essentials.

Too often we find we or others cannot have respectful dialogue or fellowship with those who disagree with us in non-essentials. Often an over zealousness to defend the Christian faith on non-essential issues is a sign of a weak faith.

A weak faith often cannot distinguish what is important or not important in faith. It cannot grasp that not all truth is worth fighting over. Too often we see minor debates over the small meaning of this or that verse become overblown issues.

There are certain over arching essential principles where there must be unity, but there are a massive number of important but minor key ideas in Christianity where we can respectfully disagree with others whom we have complete fellowship because the issues are minor and of not much consequence.

Christianity is about finding what God finds important. If God finds the poor, justice in the public sphere, missions, heaven and hell important then we must find these things important important (and God does find all of these things important).

God Seeks Fellowship

Many critics of Christianity make it seem that God is standoffish and does not wish for the good of mankind. The bible shows that the Christian God far from being standoffish is constantly active in pursuing fallen mankind with the offer of reconciliation.

God is not disinterested in the problems of mankind. God has constant and active interest bringing people into true joy. The true joy of mankind can only be found in right relation to God.

God actively offers salvation to all. He is active with the offer. It is we who are standoffish.

The charges of ill will that mankind often levels against God are baseless. The only base of the charges is that it is true that there is ill will, but the ill will comes from the accusers who do not wish to see the true nature of God.

The gospel shows that the son of God laid down his life for his enemies. That is the nature of God.

Our Importance in Christ

Often it is easy to feel we are not important. It is actually in part a good realization, because it has an element of truth. We are important, but not in and of ourselves.

We are important because we are children of the living God. We as people may be children living in obedience to God or children estranged from God, but all mankind is God's children.

For those in Christ we find our importance through being in active fellowship with our Father in heaven through faith in his son Jesus.

For those estranged from God or rejecting God the offer of fellowship is always open. God beckons all who will to draw near and accept the offer of grace offered through Jesus.

Man is great because man bears the image of God and are beckoned by God into eternal fellowship. God wishes for us to enjoy eternity in fellowship with God.

Fellowship and Community

I've been in a number of places that stress "fellowship" or "community." The words are meant to signify spending quality time together. More often than not, it simply plays out as a bunch of activities.

Unfortunately, it often ends up feeling empty, like words thrown around only for marketing purposes, or to make people feel like they are accomplishing these things.

The problem is true fellowship, if we mean getting to know others, doesn't happen only by spending more time with a person or group of people. Truly getting to know someone requires a heart that humbly desires to know others.

That's why the sermon and teaching at church are so important. The Word of God is powerful and helps us to see ourselves humbly, Christ's work for us, and the Holy Spirit's help in our lives to truly want to love others.

Pastors and churches prioritize what they will focus most on. For some, the sermon might drop to the lowest in the list, because they sense that is what people expect: more community time, which means less of one person talking. But the problem with this is that it's missing what helps create a true, warm community.

Also, often in situations where community is strongly stressed, people start to expect everyone has the same likes and thoughts, because any differences might hurt the "community" from always being a solid group. However, this is actually hurting community because loving someone requires respecting them and their thoughts and lives, even if those are different than yours.

Faith (Poem)

Faith.
Trusting in God.
Whatever comes our way.
Finding joy in fellowship with God.
Trusting always that God is for us always.
Looking to the eternal whatever today brings.
Or does not bring.

Expectation of Fellowship with God

We should live our lives in view of fellowship with God. The bible says that God is high and lifted up and completely different from us. The gulf between God and sinful man is immense.

But through his Son Jesus, God has bridged the gap and beckons us to draw near. It is God's pleasure for us to come to him in faith and enter into eternal fellowship with Himself. People often make a caricature of the Christian God as someone aloof who does not seem to have a concern for people. Nothing could be farther from the case. God entered time and time again into history because of his concern for people.

God offers the solution to the issue between God and man. Of course maybe mankind thinks of God as aloof because God offers the solution on his terms. This is often the issue: man does not like God's solution.

God's solution is too hard, people say. Of course again this is nonsense. God's solution is only so hard because we simply need to take God at his word and accept his Son. You see the Gospel is difficult because we are not allowed to do anything to earn it.

It is a gift. As prideful people it is easy to scoff at the gift as hard because we are proud and earn our way. Of course the solution is a mirror of the the initial break apart from God and man.

Man thought he knew better than God and wanted things on his terms. God was not taken at his word and was believed to be holding something back. The solution is simply to take God at his word. There is a great parallel between the problem and the solution.

The spirit of Christianity

Christianity is not a religion which promotes isolation. It promotes fellowship and unity.

Often in life we find there are goods which the value of is diminished when there are many examples. If there were a thousand Mona Lisa paintings each an exact replica painted by the same artist each painting would be of little interest.

Rarity often heightens the value of things in the world. Christianity it is the opposite. It is fellowship and sharing which heightens the value.

The nature of grace is that it is free and infinite. You cannot hide it in isolation if you have it. It must be shared.

Grace which is hidden is lessened because in hiding the grace we lose track of its meaning. You see we don't simply believe things because we believe them; we believe things because we do them.

If we hide grace and act as if it is not important to share eventually our understanding of grace will weaken and we will be the poorer for it. Grace which we do not have some desire to share is not grace which is properly understood.

Grace is most glorious when shared and sharing grace increases its worth, not diminishes it.

Fellowship and Adiaphora

An understanding of Adiaphora and acceptance of it is key to fellowship. Adiaphora are things which are indifferent or areas where there is truth but not of a significance to divide over.

You see Paul using the concept in several cases where he gives his opinion but says that unity is more important than everyone accepting the truth on the issue.

The existence of Adiaphora indicates that some things are worth fighting over. You see Paul for example confronts certain apostles because they were clearly in the wrong on an issue. And some things are of small importance and unity is more important than this or that tiny detail.

We always need wisdom as we approach scripture. God thinks differently than we do many times. We tend to think as people in either of two ways: in completely black and white terms or completely in shades of gray.

God's thought does not fit neatly into this mold. At some points God's thought as recorded in scripture is completely black and white. In some areas he thinks in shades of gray.

You see God looks at the big picture and that is what wisdom is. It is a call to apply the truth of scripture uniquely to each situation.

There are absolutes but also there are many unique situations with great complexity. There is black and white and there is gray all in life and ethics.

Love for Others

Loving others includes caring about what they care about. We need not care about what others care about in the same way they care about things but we should care.

We often see divisions in people for the most strange reasons. You see divisions because people refuse to respect others' hobbies, others' preference in style, others' views on sports or views and interests on many things with no moral aspects.

Interests many times are simply preferences. In many contexts preferences are non-moral in nature. It is human nature to frequently place moral aspects on things which have no moral value.

In the ideal sense what interests others should interest ourselves. Obviously this is very difficult. There is a great diversity of human interest.

Specifically we should at minimum not put down or disrespect what others like. You will see very frequently people dismiss things which they do not care about as boring or stupid.

This is of great disrespect to people. You see fellowship is very difficult when people act as if others are odd for what they like.

You see many people enjoy things which we find quite dull. But it is respect to not view them as odd or unusual for those interests.

It is the nature of the sinful nature of the human heart to judge for the wrong reasons. It is very strange the things people judge others for.

God calls us to judge rightly. And to see things as he does. You see Jesus judge people very differently than the world.

Many people viewed as beyond hope Jesus saw hope in. Many people judged as righteous Jesus saw as mired in sin.

You see righteousness is a response to Jesus as the son of God who entered the world to defeat sin. We need to learn to view the world though faith and see things as God sees them.

Charity in Communication

Charity in communication is an essential element of love. We must first understand what we disagree with before we can critique their position.

You see it is easy to misunderstand others and nothing is so quick to kill fellowship than getting someone's views wrong.

You often see prolonged discussions or arguments that could be avoided by simply explaining what we mean by a term. Other times people cause arguments by demanding that certain positions are incoherent.

You see a position can be coherent and wrong. We need not claim that people we disagree with have incoherent positions.

We certainly do not need to view those we disagree with as lacking intelligence. You see charity in communication is an essential element of love.

Getting others views right is a part of love. Disagreeing in the proper spirit is Christian.

Disagreeing in the improper spirit is not Christian even if we are correct. You see truth and love must go together. Truth without love is not Christian.