Fellowship part -2

Companionship: The Method of Fellowship

Fellowship With God: the Vertical Dimension
Companionship, as suggested previously, involves communion or communication, interchange, intimacy, sharing and receiving. If there is going to be fellowship with God, we must first draw on the Lord’s resources as we listen to Him in His Word, as we allow the Spirit of God to talk to us through Scripture and through the various providential events of life (trials, blessings, etc.) and through the lives of others around us. We need to be open to Him, receptive, teachable. In our communion with the Lord, we need to listen to His voice and respond in obedience.
Note this emphasis in these words from the Psalms and Proverbs:
Psalm 78:1 Listen, O my people, to my instruction; Incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
Psalm 81:8 Hear, O My people, and I will admonish you; O Israel, if you would listen to Me! … 11 But My people did not listen to My voice; And Israel did not obey Me. …13 Oh that My people would listen to Me, That Israel would walk in My ways!
Psalm 106:25 But grumbled in their tents; They did not listen to the voice of the LORD.
Proverbs 8:32 Now therefore, O sons, listen to me, For blessed are they who keep my ways. 33 Heed instruction and be wise, And do not neglect {it}. 34 Blessed is the man who listens to me, Watching daily at my gates, Waiting at my doorposts.
In communion, we also talk to God in prayer and pour out our needs and burdens to Him as is seen, for instance, in the Psalms.
Psalm 4:1 Answer me when I call, O God of my righteousness! Thou hast relieved me in my distress; Be gracious to me and hear my prayer.
Psalm 34:15 The eyes of the LORD are toward the righteous, And His ears are open to their cry.
Psalm 39:12 Hear my prayer, O LORD, and give ear to my cry; Do not be silent at my tears; For I am a stranger with Thee, A sojourner like all my fathers.
Psalm 54:2 Hear my prayer, O God; Give ear to the words of my mouth.
Psalm 84:8 O LORD God of hosts, hear my prayer; Give ear, O God of Jacob!
Psalm 102:1 A Prayer of the Afflicted, when he is faint, and pours out his complaint before the LORD. Hear my prayer, O LORD! And let my cry for help come to Thee.
Psalm 143:1 A Psalm of David. Hear my prayer, O LORD, Give ear to my supplications! Answer me in Thy faithfulness, in Thy righteousness!

In communion we give as we make our requests to Lord and we receive as we listen and He answers and directs our paths.
But this is only part of the communion or fellowship aspect of our relationship with God. There is another aspect as seen in some of the verses quoted above and in a number of verses in the New Testament on fellowship. This actually involves a result, but nevertheless, a vital part of communion or fellowship. It is the aspect of loving obedience. Obedience becomes one of the proofs of our communion and fellowship with the Lord. Listen to these words of our Lord.
John 14:23, Jesus answered and said to him, ‘If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and make Our abode with him.’
“Abode” is monh, the noun form of menw, “to abide, remain, live with.” In essence the Lord said, we will come and make our ‘abiding place’ with him. In the upper room the Lord taught the disciples, and as such He teaches us, that obedience to his commands would bring with it the continued experience of His Father and Himself in deep communion with one another. Now, this is not to be understood as a condition by which we merit fellowship by the good deeds of obedience. He had just finished discussing the promise of the Holy Spirit whom He called the Helper, the Enabler, the One given to us to enable us to live obediently and victoriously through the process of fellowship (cf. John 14:16-17). Failure to walk obediently hinders fellowship without deep seated confession. As we saw in Amos 3:3, two can’t walk together unless they be agreed.
Scripture gives us a number of illustrations of fellowship and communion.

Illustrations of the Vertical Dimension of Fellowship
Abiding in the Vine
The first illustration of communion or of maintaining a right relationship with the Lord in the sense of fellowship is that of the vine in John 15. In essence this forms a discourse on fellowship in the key relationships of life. In this passage we see three areas of relationships: (a) the relationship of believers to Jesus (vss. 1-11); (b) the relationship of believers to each other (vss. 12-17); and (c) the relationship of believers to the world (vss. 18-27).
The first thing this passage demonstrates is the concept of priorities. The most important of all relationships which must be maintained is our relationship with Jesus Christ. This is the foundation and source of all our other relationships and our capacity for fellowship. To enforce this truth, the Lord used the analogy of the vine and the branches, one not unfamiliar to the disciples because of their culture.
The passage stresses:

The Right Stock Verse 1 “I am the true vine”
The Right Vinedresser Verse 1 “My Father is the husbandman”
The Right Cultivation Verses 2, 6 “He prunes”
The Right Connection Verses 4 “Abide in me, and I in you”
The Right Fruitage Verses 5, 8 “That you bear much fruit”

There are four ways people seek to have fellowship and try to live the Christian life.
(1) By their own ability, effort, and will power. But Christ said, “apart from me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). While we have a responsibility to appropriate our new life in the Lord, while diligence on our part is called for (1 Tim. 4:7), the fact remains that in and of ourselves we are totally incapable.
(2) Do nothing at all, just let go and let God. But the Lord said, “abide in the vine” (John 15:4). This means we have the responsibility to abide, to depend on Him, to do the things abiding requires. Note the emphasis of Scripture:
Ephesians 6:13 Therefore, take up the full armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm.
Philippians 2:12-13 … work out (appropriate, put to work) your salvation with fear and trembling,
1 Timothy 4:7b … Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness.
2 Peter 1:5 Now for this very reason also (the reason of God’s abundant supply of everything we need for life and godliness), applying (bringing alongside of God’s grace) all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence

(3) The partial approach (“Lord, help me to do it”). In this approach, “there is the assumption—unconsciously perhaps, but still very real—that there is a certain reservoir of goodness, wisdom, and spiritual strength within my own character that I should draw on for the ordinary duties of life, but that beyond that, I need the Lord’s help.”10
(4) The abiding approach (John 15). This is the approach that results in and describes true fellowship. The relationship that believers are to have with the Lord is illustrated in the visual image of the vine/branch analogy.
The vine/branch analogy does not in any way illustrate the picture of salvation. Rather, the text and context suggests that it is related to the discipleship relationship, the relationship of those who are believers in Christ. Only the disciples are present and Christ is talking directly to them about their relationship to Him and their responsibility of fruitfulness. Judas had already departed to do his dirty work. Further, the Lord’s final words about this vine/branch relationship are related to fruitfulness and discipleship (cf. vs. 8, “and so prove to be My disciples,” i.e., become what disciples ought to be).
The subject of the passage is the vine/branch relationship for the purpose of maximum fruitfulness for the glory of God. Our Lord is showing the need for maintaining a proper connection with Him for fruitfulness: from fruit to more fruit to much fruit so that God is glorified in the believer’s life. The means of this fruitfulness is the work of the Vinedresser (vs. 2). Abiding is the duty of the branches (vss. 3-5, 7), but it is also promoted by God’s loving discipline (cf. vs. 6 with Heb. 12:5-11).
In John’s writings, the phrase “in Me” (used in some 24 verses) refers not to a common essence or organic connection as the phrase “in Christ” does in the writings of Paul, i.e., position. Instead, it refers to fellowship, to a commonality of purpose and commitment. Because of this, a branch “in Me” is not a branch organically connected to Him as a literal branch is organically connected to a vine. Instead, it pictures a branch that is deriving its sustenance from a literal vine by which it is able to bear fruit.
The analogy of the vine and the branches depicts a relationship that mature and growing Christians sustain with Christ because of remaining in close fellowship to him, rather than a relationship that all Christians have because of salvation (Pauline theology). Fellowship rather than organic union or spiritual position is the picture. To be “in Me” means to be in fellowship, living obediently through having communion with the Lord, and this is evident from the command “abide in me.”
The Greek word for “abide” is menw which means “to stay in a sphere, to stand against opposition, to endure, to hold fast.”11 It means to continue in a place and, when a place is involved, it can be close to the idea of living in that place or sphere.

When we do not abide we lose our fellowship with the Lord, we are severed from fellowship with the vine. Because of John’s use of the term, it has nothing to do with salvation. It means we are no longer drawing upon His life as the means of our sustenance and fruitfulness. If we continue in this state, we come under the discipline of the Lord (vs. 6). But how are we to understand this verse? The statement of verse 6 has caused needless perplexity. Hodges writes:
The main reason for that is the strong impulse many readers have to identify the reference to fire with hell. But this is an unjustified interpretive leap. There is no reason at all to think of the fire as literal, just as we are not dealing with a literal vine, literal branches, or literal fruit. “Fire” here is simply another figurative element in the horticultural metaphor.
What happened, therefore, in vineyards all over Palestine, could happen to the disciples as well. If they failed to “abide” in Jesus, they would be separated from their experience of fellowship with Him: they would be “cast out as [or, like] a branch.” Intimate contact with the True Vine would be lost. But more, this loss of vital communion with the True Vine would result in the “drying up” of their spiritual experience: they would be “withered.” And finally, they would be cast into the “fire” of trial and divine chastisement: “they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned.”14

Dining With Christ
Revelation 3:20 Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him, and will dine with him, and he with Me.
Our Lord is addressing a Christian church here and, while there may have been some professing Christians there, the passage is addressed to the church as a whole. He is talking to believers who had become spiritually destitute, who were materially rich, but spiritually poor in their spiritual independence and failure to have real fellowship with the Lord. It was a lukewarm congregation. Though they had works, they were like lukewarm water that the Lord said he would vomit out of His mouth to show His displeasure with their spiritual condition.

Walking in the Light
1 John 1:5-9 And this is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth; 7 but if we walk in the light as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin. 8 If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Amos 3:3 Do two men walk together unless they have made an appointment (have agreed)?
As these passage show, another picture of communion or personal fellowship with the Lord is that of walking in the light. Walking in the light means to walk in an open, honest-to-God fashion, so one is open to what His light reveals with a willingness to confess and deal with sin and apathy and self-dependent ways.
Quite clearly John teaches us that regardless of our verbal claims or our religious actions, if we are not walking in the light, honestly dealing with our attitudes and actions in the light of the Word through confession and the filling of the Spirit, we are not having true fellowship. Without God’s means, we can’t have fellowship with the Lord or with one another. As seen in these illustrations, fellowship with God means we are walking with God, dining with Him, abiding in the Vine, but this is done through the control and in the energy of the Holy Spirit (Gal. 5:16; Phil. 3:1-3). Known sin grieves the Spirit’s person (Eph. 4:30) and quenches His power; it short circuits His ministries in one’s life and hampers one’s capacity for true fellowship (1 Thess. 5:19, cf. Amos 3:3 and Isa. 59:1-2 with 1 John 1:5-9). This results in carnality, the control of the flesh rather than the Spirit (1 Cor. 3:3; Rom. 8:2-4). This means we are operating by our resources, using the weapons of the flesh (2 Cor. 10:3) not God’s (Eph. 6:10f; Phil. 3:3). As a result, we become controlled by our desires, our opinions, by our wisdom, by our own methods for meeting our needs, by our everything.
We can all appear to be having fellowship when we go through the motions of churchianity. We can appear to be in fellowship by our presence in a worship service, by our involvement in various religious activities, or when we find those who happen to agree with our viewpoint, but if the Holy Spirit is not in control, if we are not abiding, if we are not walking in obedience, then, there is no fellowship. This is why differences among carnal people cause divisions, rather than growth and the sharpening of character (Prov. 27:17).



Fellowship With Christians: the Horizontal Dimension
The Basic Principle
God has created us to be dependent people—dependent on Him and on one another. His judgment in Genesis 2:18, “it is not good for the man to be alone,” is a principle that speaks not only to marriage, but to all of life and especially to the spiritual fellowship of all believers. Marriage is a miniature cosmos of relationships which forms the foundation and soil for other relationships of community life.
No man is an island. None of us has the ability to go it alone. We need the communion or companionship of one another. Spiritual fellowship both on the vertical and horizontal planes are absolute necessities. They are not options nor are they luxuries we can do without.
We should not … think of our fellowship with other Christians as a spiritual luxury, an optional addition to the exercises of private devotion. We should recognize rather that such fellowship is a spiritual necessity; for God has made us in such a way that our fellowship with himself is fed by our fellowship with fellow-Christians, and requires to be so fed constantly for its own deepening and enrichment.16

The Basic Principle
God has created us to be dependent people—dependent on Him and on one another. His judgment in Genesis 2:18, “it is not good for the man to be alone,” is a principle that speaks not only to marriage, but to all of life and especially to the spiritual fellowship of all believers. Marriage is a miniature cosmos of relationships which forms the foundation and soil for other relationships of community life.
No man is an island. None of us has the ability to go it alone. We need the communion or companionship of one another. Spiritual fellowship both on the vertical and horizontal planes are absolute necessities. They are not options nor are they luxuries we can do without.
We should not … think of our fellowship with other Christians as a spiritual luxury, an optional addition to the exercises of private devotion. We should recognize rather that such fellowship is a spiritual necessity; for God has made us in such a way that our fellowship with himself is fed by our fellowship with fellow-Christians, and requires to be so fed constantly for its own deepening and enrichment.16

The Basic Problem
But this is not easy for us to grasp particularly in our country today because of the negative impact society , culture and the church. Believers are supposed to be a people who avoid conformity to the world by the habitual renewal of their minds in the Word. But society always influences believers to some degree as we see so clearly in the letters to the seven churches in Revelation 2-3. And to the degree this happens, we obscure the teachings of the Word or eclipse the light of the Word of God on our lives.
The church is allowing our culture to eclipse the light of Scripture. We are being affected by a number of the forces of this world’s darkness which, as a part of the New-age Movement and Satan’s strategies for the last days, are moving us into a kind of neo-paganism. Three of these forces have definite negative affects on fellowship.

The first force is relativism. Relativism maintains there are no absolutes of truth, of good and evil, or of values and priorities. It is just as Isaiah warned Israel:
Isaiah 5:20-21: Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, And clever in their own sight!
The second force is privatization. Describing this force, Peterson says:
The second force, privatization, accommodates relativism. It says, ‘What I believe and do is my private business. Since it doesn’t really matter if you believe in God and I believe in Mother earth (pantheism, another influence), let’s agree to keep our beliefs to ourselves.’ The church is no longer able to function as a public conscience; its role has been reduced to serving the private spheres of its members. (emphasis mine)
But the problem is further aggravated by the fact that this influence has even influenced the private life of the church and its fellowship as outlined in the New Testament. Believers too often don’t want to be involved in the lives of others and they especially don’t want anyone getting too close to them.
The third force is individualism. When the third force, individualism—which is at the very core of culture—is mixed with relativism and privatization, the cocktail becomes deadly. A way of life emerges in which self is at the center. The all-consuming pursuit of self-fulfillment that characterizes this brand of individualism inevitably leaves wreckage in its wake.18 (emphasis mine)
As Christians, we may realize the Word is our authority, at least intellectually, but many do not live with it as their authority. Tradition, personal aspirations, expedience, personal preference, and other forces too often eclipse the authority of Scripture. We allow the viewpoint of our culture to invade and take control of our lives and actions. This is not to suggest there is no place for privacy and individualism in the Christian life. We are each believer priests with the privilege of going directly into God’s presence in prayer and we are warned against being busy bodies (1 Thess. 4:9-11; 2 Thess. 3:11; 1 Tim. 5:13).
The Bible does not stamp out all aspects of individualism. It teaches we are each individual people with gifts and talents given to us by God for His glory, but these gifts are for the blessing, encouragement, help, and edification of the body of Christ. We are members of the body who need each other and who have specific responsibilities to each other. It is the Bible that guides us in the how and what of these responsibilities.
The Word does provide for privacy and warns against becoming busybodies, but this does not eliminate the need for intimacy in the body of Christ, dependence on the body, and the ‘one another’ commands of Scripture. It does not in any way eliminate our need to be responsible to and for the body of Christ. The problem is, because of culture and nature, we are prone to be so caught up in our own individual pursuits and concerns, that we have no time or concern for others—especially the body of Christ.
Because of these cultural influences and our natural tendencies to take the spirit of individualism and privatization to the extreme, let’s consider the scriptural foundation for the horizontal aspect of fellowship to further stress its importance.


Scriptural Foundations for Fellowship on the Horizontal Plane
Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor. 10 For if either of them falls, the one will lift up his companion. But woe to the one who falls when there is not another to lift him up.
This passage shows how man, through his natural limitations, needs the help of others. Bridges writes:
Solomon intended more than simply a literal application of these truths to physical situations. In his rather picturesque way, he was emphasizing the importance of fellowship. Two are better than one, first because of the synergistic effect; Two together can produce more than each of them working alone … two people together can help each other up when they fall or even when they are in danger of falling. One of the many advantages of fellowship is the mutual admonishing or encouraging of one another in the face of a temptation or an attack of Satan.19
Proverbs 27:17 Iron sharpens iron, So one man sharpens another.
This passage shows us how our relationship and contacts with one another stimulate and sharpen us in our walk with God and life in general. We are able to grow and be sharpened and aided by the insights, gifts, and God’s workings in the lives of others.
1 Corinthians 12:12-18 For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. 13 For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. 14 For the body is not one member, but many. 15 If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body,” it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body. 16 And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body,” it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? 18 But now God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body, just as He desired.
These verses emphasize the fact we are members of the body of Christ and, as these verses show, this necessitates our fellowship.
Ephesians 4:11-16 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fulness of Christ. 14 As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves, and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; 15 but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him, who is the head, even Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by that which every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.
This passage stresses the importance of every believer working and serving in the fellowship of the body.
Romans 1:12 … that I may be encouraged together with you while among you, each of us by the other’s faith, both yours and mine.
This verse shows how our mutual faith, through God’s working in each of our lives, becomes an important ingredient to our mutual encouragement.
I Thessalonians 5:11-12 Therefore encourage one another, and build up one another, just as you also are doing. 12 But we request of you, brethren, that you appreciate those who diligently labor among you, and have charge over you in the Lord and give you instruction,
Here we see how the deceitfulness of sin and temptations of life necessitates our fellowship together, not only in the worship service but in more intimate ways. Compare also Hebrews 3:13 and 10:22-25 for this same emphasis.
Malachi 3:16 Then those who feared the LORD spoke to one another, and the LORD gave attention and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for those who fear the LORD and who esteem His name.
“Those who feared the Lord” were those who had not been wrongly influenced by their society and who had not given way to doubts and the cynicism of the rest of the nation. Various translations of this text are, “spoke to one another” (NASB), “talked with each other” (NIV), “talked often one to another” (Amplified), “spoke often one to another” (KJV). The Hebrew has the imperfect tense of continual action or frequent action.
In the face of the widespread complaining against God and the apostasy of the day, a remnant sought encouragement and strength in frequent fellowship. It is obvious that this fellowship is what promoted their faithfulness against the widespread complaining. This fellowship then, along with their faithfulness, was so important to God that a scroll of remembrance of their response was written and is kept in heaven.
Stewardship: The Overflow of Fellowship
Persecution of the believers in Jerusalem, which had led to extreme conditions of poverty, caused the Apostle Paul to encourage the church, especially Gentile assemblies, to give to their need. This would not only demonstrate the oneness of Jew and Gentile in Christ, but gave the body of Christ to share with others in the body as partners Christ’s enterprise on earth. In writing to the Corinthian church to be a part of this ministry, the Apostle Paul used the Macedonian believers as an example. Regarding their giving Paul wrote:
2 Corinthians 8:1-12. And now, brothers, we want you to know about the grace that God has given the Macedonian churches. 3 Out of the most severe trial, their overflowing joy and even beyond their ability. Entirely on their own, 4 they urgently pleaded with us for the privilege of sharing in this service their extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity. (Italics mine)

In Short

Fellowship in the body of Christ is certainly no side issue. It was one of the four things the early church devoted itself to, and from this brief study, we can see why. It is a means of support and encouragement to others and of ministry in the Savior’s enterprise on earth.
We have seen four words (relationship, partnership, companionship, and stewardship)20 that describe the general emphasis of this New Testament concept, but how does this carry over into specifics? How do we have the kind of fellowship that encourages, edifies (builds) and serves one another? How do we find the strength, the wisdom, and the courage to have true fellowship?
At least part of the answer comes through obedience to the many ‘one another’ commands of the New Testament. Over and over again, we are exhorted in various ways to be involved with and caring for one another. For instance, we are told to admonish one another (Rom. 15:14), to comfort and encourage one another (1 Thess. 4:18; 5:11; Heb. 3:13), to worship with one another (Eph. 5:19; Col. 3:16; Heb. 10:25), to bear one another’s burdens (Gal. 6:2), to always seek the good of one another (1 Thess. 5:15), to be honest with one another (Col. 3:9), to show hospitality to one another (1 Pet. 4:9), and to be at peace with one another (Mark 9:50). There are many others, some fifteen categories in all, but this illustrates the point.
The expression ‘one another’ is a translation of a reciprocal pronoun in the Greek New Testament. Reciprocal means mutual, shared, shown or felt alike by both sides, united in feelings, actions, responsibilities, and attitudes. Synonyms include: common, mutual, fellowship, and shared—ideas that are at the heart of the doctrine of fellowship. In usage, this pronoun is used in statements and injunctions to believers regarding shared and mutual responsibilities. In emphasis, it focuses us on our need of the ministry and aid of others, of our duty to care for others as partners in the body of Christ, and of how we can experience true fellowship. Therefore, a study of the ‘one another’ commands of Scripture would be tremendously helpful in the matter of New Testament fellowship The Psalmist wrote: “Look to the right and see; For there is no one who regards me; There is no escape for me; No one cares for my soul” (Ps. 142:4).

What is Fellowship

English Definition of Fellowship
Before we begin , let’s get a glimpse of our word “fellowship” from the English dictionary to see what it might add to our understanding. An English dictionary can shed a lot of light on the Bible if we would use it in our Bible study. The translators chose English words according to their real and exact meanings. When we study our Bibles we assume we understand the full significance of a word, but often our ideas are very incomplete. This is particularly true of the word “fellowship.”

According to Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary it means: (a) companionship, company, associate (vb.); (b) the community of interest, activity, feeling or experience, i.e., a unified body of people of equal rank sharing in common interests, goals, and characteristics, etc.; (c) partnership, membership (an obsolete usage but an important one. It shows what has happened to our ideas of fellowship).

There are three key ideas that come out of this:

(1) Fellowship means being a part of a group, a body of people. It is opposed to isolation, solitude, loneliness, and our present-day independent kind of individualism. Of course, it does not stop there because we can be in a crowd of people and even share certain things in common, but still not have fellowship.

(2) Fellowship means having or sharing with others certain things in common such as interest, goals, feelings, beliefs, activities, labor, privileges and responsibilities, experiences, and concerns.

(3) Fellowship can mean a partnership that involves working together and caring for one another as a company of people, like a company of soldiers or members of a family.
When Do We Fellowship?
1. We are having fellowship when we sing with a congregation with or without instrumental music.
2. We are having fellowship when we pray with a congregation of a church of Christ or a denomination.
3. We are having fellowship when we invite a preacher to come and preach for us. He may be a faithful preacher of the gospel. He may be an unfaithful preacher of the gospel. He may be a denominational preacher.
4. We are fellowshipping when we appear on a program with a faithful preacher of the gospel, an unfaithful preacher, or a denominational preacher. God's faithful servants must speak out against false teachers and false doctrine if they appear on a lectureship program with them (Eph. 5:11). It is a sin to be on a lectureship with false teachers and know them to be so but refuse to speak out against them and their false doctrine (II John 9-11).
5. We are fellowshipping when we announce and encourage people to attend a gospel meeting. Would a faithful church of Christ announce a revival for the Baptist church, the Methodist church, the Catholic church, or any other denomination? This would be a sin (Rom. 16:17-18). How then could a faithful church of Christ announce and encourage people to attend a meeting with an unfaithful congregation or a congregation using an unfaithful preacher?
6. We are fellowshipping when we encourage people to attend a vacaction Bible school whether it is with a faithful church of Christ, and unfaithful church of Christ, a Baptist church, a Methodist church, a Catholic church, or any other church. What faithful church of Christ would encourage peole to attend a vacation Bible school at any denomination? What faithful preacher of the gospel would go preach for a denomination in their vacation Bible school without letting them know of their denominational wrong?
7. We are having fellowship when we announce the homecoming of a faithful church of Christ, an unfaithful church of Christ, or any denomination. What faithful church of Christ would announce the homecoming services of a denomination?
8. We are having fellowship when we go and participate in a homecoming of a faithful church of Christ, an unfaithful church of Christ, or any denomination. If we worship with them in any way—in congregational singing, quartet singing, small-group singing—then we are fellowshipping with them. If a denominational church or an unfaithful church of Christ has a fellowship meal and we participate in it, then we are fellowshipping with them.
9. We are fellowshipping when we ask a person to pray at a religious gathering. No faithful congregation would ask a person living in adultery to lead in prayer. No faithful church of Christ would ask a Baptist preacher to lead a prayer in the worship services. No faithful church of Christ would ask any denominational preacher to lead in prayer.
10. We are having fellowship when we ask a person to teach a Bible class. This is why faithful Christians are used to teach. No faithful congregation would think of asking a Catholic priest to teach a Bible class. How can brethren think they are doing right when they ask an unfaithful preacher in the church of Christ to teach or preach at any gathering of the church?
11. We are having fellowship when we ask a person to pass the Lord's Supper or to wait on the Lord's table. This is why brethren will not use unfaithful members to serve at the table. What faithful church would ask a Baptist, Methodist, Mormon, Presbyterian, or any other member of a denomination to serve at the Lord's table? How then can we use any member of the church that will not obey the Lord's command relative to Christian fellowship (Eph. 5:11; II John 9-11; Rom. 16:17-18)?
12. We are having fellowship when we support radio and television programs and announce them. Churches and individuals should make sure the preacher on these programs is sound in the faith as well as the congregations that oversee these programs.

But what about Christian fellowship according to the Word of God and the words for fellowship as they are used in the New Testament



Concepts of Fellowship in the New Testament
A. Relationship
In the New Testament, what is shared in common is shared first of all because of a common relationship that we all have together in Christ. Koinwnia was an important word to both John and Paul, but it was never used in merely a secular sense. It always had a spiritual significance and base. The idea of an earthly fellowship founded upon just common interests, human nature, physical ties like in a family, or from church affiliation was really rather foreign to the apostles.
In the New Testament, believers can have fellowship and share together because they first of all have a relationship with Christ and share Him in common (1 Cor. 1:9; 1 John 1:3). The New English Bible translates 1 John 1:3 as follows: “what we have seen and heard we declare to you, so that you and we together may share in a common life, that life which we share with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.”
Fellowship is first the sharing together in a common life with other believers through relationship with God through Jesus Christ. Fellowship is first and foremost a relationship, rather than an activity. The principle is that any activity that follows, should come out of the relationship.
In Acts 2:42 the early church was not merely devoting itself to activities, but to a relationship. It was this relationship that produced an active sharing in other ways. It is so important that we grasp this. Fellowship means we belong to each other in a relationship because we share together the common life and enabling grace of Jesus Christ.
There is also, however, a negative aspect. Because of our relationship with Christ, there can be no legitimate fellowship with the world, demonism, idolatry, or anything that is contrary to Christ and our relationship with Him (cf. 2 Cor. 6:14f).

B. Partnership
Whereas the word relationship describes believers as a community, partnership describes them as the principals of an enterprise. A business partnership is always formed in order to attain an objective, such as providing a service to the public at a profit for the partners. In the same way, the concept of a spiritual partnership implies that it is created with the objective of glorifying God. Just as all believers are united together in a community relationship, so we are all united together in a partnership formed to glorify God …
… Biblical fellowship, then, incorporates this idea of an active partnership in the promotion of the gospel and the building up of believers.3
This element is strongly brought out in the argument of the author of Hebrews who shows us that believers are both partakers of and partners with Christ in His salvation, kingdom, and purposes for earth and man.
In Hebrews 1:14 this “salvation” which believers are to inherit, within the context of the passage, includes the believer’s share in the Son’s triumphant dominion in which He has partners, those who belong to Him and are involved with Him in His kingdom and reign (1:9; 2:10,13; 3:1). This partnership, however, begins here on earth, and this forms the foundation for what believers will share with Him in the future kingdom. We are responsible to share with Him in the work He is now doing on earth so we can share in the blessings of the future by way of rewards (cf. Luke 19:11f; 1 Cor. 3:12f). A steadfast confidence in Christ is vital or we will defect and fail to carry our responsibilities as His companions. As those who share in His life through faith, we are also partners with Him in His enterprise and purposes here on earth. We are His representatives on earth (cf. 1 Pet. 2:5f).
Note Hebrews 3:14 which may be rendered, “… we have become partners with Christ.” It can mean “sharer, partaker.” “Of Christ” then becomes what we share in: we partake of His life. This is true, but I don’t believe this is the point here. As in Hebrews 1:9, the author is saying we become companions, partners of the Christ, the Messianic King, but to share in what He is doing now and in the future, we need fidelity and confidence in Him (cf. Rev. 2:26-27).

Distinction Between Relationship and Partnership
Relationship describes what we are: a community of people bound together by our common life and blessings that we share together through our relationship with Christ. Partnership describes how we are related to each other in that relationship: we are partners in an enterprise and calling in which we are to work together in a common purpose to obtain common objectives for the glory of God and the gospel of Jesus Christ (cf. Phil 1:27).
Later, as we look at the foundation for fellowship, we will see that our relationship with Christ is like a coin, it has two sides, union and communion, or relationship (the positional side) and fellowship (the experiential side).

C. Companionship
Companionship is the interchange or communication (communion) that exists among companions, those associated together through a relationship they hold in common. The key ingredient in companionship is communication. Key words that describe companionship are “interchange, communion, sharing.” Communication is the sharing of concepts, feelings, ideas, information, needs, etc. through words or other symbols like body language and actions so that all members of the relationship hold these things in common.
In the Christian community, companionship includes communicating on a spiritual level through a mutual sharing of the things of Christ: the Word, the filling of the Holy Spirit, and the ministries and gifts of the various members of the body of Christ.
Companionship through communication would include:


(1) The Vertical: This is our communion and fellowship with the Lord through the Word, prayer, the filling of the Holy Spirit, and the abiding life.
(2) The Horizontal: This is our communion and fellowship with the body of Christ, other believers. This includes: (a) assembling together as a whole body (Acts. 2:42; Heb. 10:25); (b) assembling in smaller groups (2 Tim. 2:2); (c) meeting together one-on-one (1 Thess. 5:11); (d) sharing and communicating truth together and building up one another (Rom. 1:11-12; 2 Tim. 2:2; 1 Thess 5:11; Philem. 6); (e) sharing together in worship, i.e., the Lord’s supper (1 Cor. 10:16), the singing of hymns, psalms, and spiritual songs (Eph. 5:19; Col. 3:16), prayer (1 Cor. 14:16-17), the ministry of the Word (Acts 20:20; 2 Tim. 2:2; 1 Pet. 4:10-11); (f) sharing together as partners in the needs, burdens, concerns, joys, and blessings for the purpose of encouragement, comfort, challenge or exhortation, praise, prayer and physical help according to the needs and ability (cf. Phil. 1:5 with 1:19; and 2:4 with 1:27; also 4:3; Rom. 12:15; and 1 Thess. 5:11,14,15; Heb. 10:33).
This means we must develop the loving art of communication. We need to be willing to share our own burdens and aspirations and be available to hear what others are saying so we may minister to needs according to the directives of the Word. The ultimate goal is to build up and enrich others in the things of Christ that we may all together experience the sufficiency of His life and tune our lives into His. We need others for that. As the early church was first devoted to the apostles’ teaching, they were also devoted to caring for one another and to sharing with one another what they were learning and what Christ was meaning to them (Acts. 2:42; Heb. 3:12-14).

D. Stewardship
A steward is one who manages the property of another. A steward is not an owner; he is a manager. As stewards we must recognize that all we have belongs to the Lord and has been given to us as trusts from God to invest for His purposes. Believers need to be willing to share their material possessions for the promotion of the gospel and to help those in need. Good stewardship stems from recognizing our relationship to Jesus Christ, but it also means recognizing our partnership in Christ’s enterprise on earth.
In any good partnership, the partners share equally in both the privileges and responsibilities, the assets and liabilities, and the blessings and burdens. What kind of partnership would it be if one partner took all the income and enjoyed all the privileges while the other partner did all the work and paid all the bills? Would you enter a partnership like that? No, of course not! Partners are to share and share alike in all the aspects of their enterprise. They may not do the same things. In fact, they will be much more successful in their enterprise if they work and share according to their abilities, expertise, and training, but still share the load.
It is interesting that one of the most prominent uses of the koinwnia group of words is its use in connection with sharing material blessings—giving money to meet financial needs. Of the 36 usages of these words, they are used 9 times specifically in connection with giving, and in a couple of other passages giving would be included among other aspects of fellowship (Acts 2:42; Phil. 1:5; Heb. 10:33).
The concept and application of this partnership/stewardship combination is seen clearly in 2 Corinthians 8:12-15. “Paul envisioned a continual flow of believers’ possessions toward those who have needs. This is an outworking of koinwnia, and an important expression of true fellowship.”6
What was happening here? What was Paul wanting to see done? Paul was asking the Corinthian believers to have fellowship as partners, as fellow sharers in Christ and laborers together in the gospel. As partners, they were to give out of their abundance to other partners, to other believers, even though they had never met. Why? Out of love, certainly , but also because they were partners in the Savior’s enterprise on earth.

Relationship: The Foundation for Fellowship
As we’ve seen, fellowship is first a relationship. But, sometimes the term relationship is used of our subjective experiences. A man might say, “I have a good relationship with my wife.” He means that they get along well, they communicate and enjoy one another’s company. But the most basic meaning of relationship deals with objective fact. It refers to the condition or fact of being related to someone as a son to a father or a wife to her husband. This is particularly true with the concept of relationship as we use it theologically. Relationship refers to an objective fact.
Relationship means we are related to God as His children, born into His family by the Holy Spirit through faith in Christ. Then, as believers in Christ, we are related to Christ and to each other in that we have been joined into union with Him; we are members of His body through the baptizing work of the Holy Spirit. Fellowship means we share this relationship and it is an objective fact regardless of our spiritual condition (cf. 1 Cor. 1:2 with 3:1-3). In this sense, we must understand and act on the following concept: RELATIONSHIP stands to FELLOWSHIP as UNION stands to COMMUNION.
This means we must ever keep in mind that our experience with God and with one another grows out of the objective fact of our relationship with the Lord Jesus (cf. Eph. 2:5, 6). Only those who are in relationship with one another (objective fact) can have true fellowship (subjective experience).8 We must first have a real living relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ before we can have experiential fellowship with God. As this is true with God, so it also becomes true in our fellowship with one another (2 Cor. 6:14-7:1).
In the Bible, fellowship embraces both the objective and experiential aspects. However, for the experiential to occur, we must first have the objective fact. Why? Because the relationship aspect of fellowship (the objective fact) forms the foundation for all the other aspects of fellowship. In relation to God, relationship/union provides the motivation, the means, the confidence, everything we need to reach out to appropriate our new life as those who are related to the living Christ. It is because we are related to Christ that we are partners and related to each other. It is because we are related as a household of God’s people that we share and give (Gal. 6:10; 3 John 8).

Partnership: The Means of Fellowship
As pointed out earlier, Paul and John never used the term fellowship in a purely secular sense. It always had a spiritual base and a spiritual means. The idea of an earthly fellowship founded upon simply common interests or common likes or dislikes or similar personalities or human opinions or purely physical ties was a foreign idea in connection with Christian fellowship.
For these human authors of Scripture, Christian fellowship was tied directly into spiritual realities. Certain things must be involved or we do not have Christian koinwnia. The first essential is the foundation (the objective aspect), but it also includes the means of fellowship (the subjective aspect).
If we are to share experientially in the life of Christ, and if we are to share together as partners and as companions in an effective and meaningful way, certain things are a must. Without God’s means of fellowship, we can’t have true Christian fellowship. What we end up with is mere religiosity as it pertains to God, and simply social interchange and a compatibility of old sin natures as it pertains to men.

The Fellowship of the Holy Spirit
In 2 Corinthians 13:14 we have the clause, “fellowship of the Holy Spirit.” A question arises as to whether “of the Holy Spirit” is objective (the object of our fellowship, a participation or sharing in the Holy Spirit), or subjective (the fellowship or sharing which the Holy Spirit produces or provides as the means, the agent). In Philippians 2:1 we have the same construction and the same question. There is no question that all believers mutually share in the person and ministries of the Holy Spirit as is clear in Hebrews 6:4 (metochos).
2 Corinthians 13:14 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.
This verse has three “of” clauses in the Greek, each referring to the three persons and gifts of the Trinity. Normally we would expect such clauses to be parallel grammatically. If we can determine the pattern of one by the nature of the clause, the others would normally follow the same pattern (cf. Tit. 3:5).
(1) “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ.” It is the grace which the Lord Jesus Christ gives (subjective), not grace which the Lord Jesus Christ receives (objective).
(2) “The love of God” is clearly the same. It is the love we receive from God (subjective), not the love we give to God (objective). This follows by the pattern set in the first clause, but also from the last statement, “be with you all.” The context deals with what we receive, not give.
(3) “The fellowship of the Holy Spirit.” Following the above examples, it is more likely that the third genitive (tou @agiou pneumatos) is also subjective (“the fellowship engendered by the Holy Spirit”; cf. Eph 4:3) than that it is objective (“participation in the Holy Spirit”).9
Philippians 2:1 If therefore there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion,
This passage likewise consists of three clauses, one with “in,” and two with “of.” Again we have a similar parallel. “Encouragement in Christ” is an encouragement which comes from being in Christ. “Consolation of love” is a consolation which comes from love. So likewise, “fellowship of the Spirit” is a fellowship which the Spirit gives.
All aspects of fellowship are dependent upon the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Before salvation, fellowship with God in the sense of relationship (union) depends on His pre-salvation work, the conviction of truth, followed by His work of regeneration and baptizing accompanied by the Spirit’s indwelling as a gift of the Father and the Son (John 16:8f; 2 Thess. 2:13; Tit. 3:5; 1 Cor. 12:12,13). After salvation the experience of fellowship in communion with God depends on the filling of the Spirit. Carnal Christians cannot have true fellowship either with God or with one another. They simply will not be functioning as partners, companions, and stewards. About the best they can have is a compatibility of human friendship, or backgrounds, or of likes and dislikes, but true fellowship engendered by the Spirit will certainly be hampered because carnality grieves and quenches the Spirit. In a question designed to show how Israel’s sin had hampered their fellowship with the Lord and ability to function as God’s people according to His purpose for the nation, Amos asked, “Do two men walk together unless they have made an appointment (an agreement)?” (Amos 3:3).


Fellowship in the Gospel
Acts 2:42 And they were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
Central to these believers’ fellowship was the teaching of the apostles. Being devoted to our relationship, partnership, companionship, and stewardship depends on our devotion to Scripture.
Philippians 1:5 “in view of your participation in the gospel from the first day until now.” This partnership for all the churches of Macedonia as with the Thessalonians began with hearing and receiving the Word (cf. 1 Thess. 2:13).
1 John 1:1-3 What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we beheld and our hands handled, concerning the Word of Life—and the life was manifested, and we have seen and bear witness and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested to us—what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, that you also may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.
The coming of the Son and the proclamation of His Word was not an end in itself, its purpose was fellowship. Fellowship in all its aspects comes from the proclamation of the Word of Christ. True fellowship must have its foundation in the Word and it must get its energy, direction, and scope from the Scriptures. This is central, but unfortunately in our day of the “feel good” kind of Christianity other things have become central and the Bible has been given a back seat.
A passage that is pertinent here is 1 Corinthians 1:10-2:5. These verses deal with the division brought about by the variance of men’s opinions concerning personalities and forms and emphasis in worship as it pertained to such things as baptism and its importance, and the use and function of showy gifts like tongues. What the Corinthians were emphasizing in their meetings was undercutting the ministry of the Word which proclaimed the sufficiency of Christ, a wisdom certainly not of this world. Furthermore, because they had failed to grasp the very heart of the gospel, their fellowship with Christ, they were cliquish and snubbing the poorer saints when the church came together (11:17-34). So, Paul sought to demonstrate that what men need is the wisdom of God’s Word and its message of Christ. This is the basis of fellowship, not forms of worship or showy gifts.
So we should also note the preceding context, 1:9, “God is faithful, through whom you were called into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” As we have seen, fellowship has as its fundamental meaning the concept of having a share in, partnership, having a common share. All believers share in common the life of Christ positionally and experientially. Consequently, they also share with one another in Christ’s enterprise on earth. This is the hinge upon which Paul attacks the party spirit in the verses that follow.

GUARDING THE FAITH.

1 Timothy 6:20 & 21 "Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to your care. Turn away from godless chatter and the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge, which some have professed and in so doing have wandered from the faith. Grace be with you."

In this text Paul is telling Timothy to guard and keep what had been entrusted to him. The apostle is referring to the essence of the gospel, and the heart of all that is distinctive in the Christian religion. It has been summarised like this: "We believe in the inspiration, inerrancy and authority of Scripture; in God as Creator, as one God yet three persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit; in Jesus Christ, conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, one person yet both human and divine; in the fall of man into sin, and of salvation from sin by God through the atonement of his Son and by his Spirit; in death, the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, in the resurrection, the final judgment, in everlasting joy in heaven and everlasting misery in hell."
These Christian beliefs were coming under attack even in the apostle's day. There were false teachers and Paul disdains their "godless chatter and the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge" (v.20). There were some people who once had shown an interest in the gospel but who had come under the influence of these men "and in so doing [they] have wandered from the faith" (v.21). That is the solemn note on which this letter actually ends. Yesterday's blessings on the Ephesian church are a day late for today. "Timothy, we are under assault. Don't presume on anything that has happened in the past to keep you in the present. 'Guard what has been entrusted to your care'" (v.20).
Guard them! But them alone! The truths that have been entrusted to you in the Scriptures. Don't run ahead of God, probing, inquiring, speculating where God has not revealed. There are certain areas concerning God's ways which are, and forever must be, mysterious. "Timothy, learn to control your curiosity and don't get dragged into unprofitable debates about 'myths and endless genealogies. These promote controversies rather than God's work' (I Tim. 1:4)." But keep up with God. Don't put on the so-called 'contemporary' mask and discard what God has said. Don't neglect anything God has revealed. "Guard what has been entrusted to your care."
It challenges every Christian with the duty of never letting go of what God has given us. We think of someone drawing up a will and appointing an executor to ensure that all the terms of the will are faithfully implemented. How important is that? Justice demands it. Or think of a trust being established with millions set aside to further certain specific aims of the benefactor. How important is it that those causes which he has left his fortune to support are actually being helped and not totally different causes? It is all important, and those who are appointed as trustees have to ensure that that end is being fulfilled. Or consider that contract which you have signed with a builder in which he has promised to build you a house of certain specifications for a certain price. How important is it that he keep to the terms of a contract? It is crucial. If such things are a matter of simple honesty in the world, how much more important it is to guard that which the living God has entrusted to our care!
Of course we are to do more than guard the divine revelation. We are to go into all the world and make disciples of all nations. Then the Lord Jesus told us that we should be "teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you" (Matt. 28:20). So we are to declare what has been entrusted to our care. Also we are to teach one another and our children what God has given to us. The divine revelation is like fertiliser, it is most useful when it is spread abroad. There was an oft-quoted remark of Spurgeon's made at the Annual Meetings of the British and Foreign Bible Society on May 5th, 1875. He was talking about a certain mentality that looked on Scripture as something one had to defend. He imagined a number of people hurrying together and discussing how best to defend a caged lion from a group of men who were armed with sticks and were intent upon attacking it. Spurgeon says, "Many suggestions are made and much advice is offered. This weapon is recommended, and the other. Pardon me if I offer a quiet suggestion. Open the door and let the lion out; he will take care of himself. Why, they are gone! He no sooner goes forth in his strength than his assailants flee. The way to meet infidelity is to spread the Bible. The answer to every objection against the Bible is the Bible" ("Speeches at Home and Abroad," 'The Bible,' reprinted Pilgrim Publications, 1974 p.17). That is a famous statement, and we agree with it. We are not interested in setting up a National Society for the Protection of the Bible! Live the Bible. Learn the Bible. Love the Bible. Preach the Bible. That is our priority in the defence of Biblical truth. But we recognise also that we live in an age of high-velocity rifles and ruthless poachers so that there have to be game-wardens whose task is even to defend lions. Do not forget to guard the Bible's truths from its attackers.




1. Why Must We Guard What has been Entrusted to Our Care?

i] The very men of the Bible itself do so. Think of the prophets. They are implementing the teaching of the five books of Moses. They are applying its truths to the people of God who are being charmed into Baal worship and are being seduced by the gods of the surrounding nations. The covenant people have broken their trust, and God raises up a Hosea and an Amos and an Isaiah to defend the truth and call the nation back to the old paths.
Consider the Lord Jesus himself. What was he doing in the Sermon on the Mount? He says, "You have heard this - it is all right to swear by these objects ... it is all right to love your neighbours and hate your enemies ... it is all right to insist on an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth ... it is all right to have a divorce as long as you give your wife a certificate of divorce." What was happening? They were turning away from what God had given to them. So Jesus speaks, "But I say unto you ... I say unto you ... I say unto you," and he corrects them and he summons the people back to the truths he is guarding.
Consider the apostles of Christ. Peter at Pentecost guarded what David had written in the psalms, and what Joel had written in his prophecy. He would not let the people forget those truths. "This is that," he said to them. This event is the fulfilment of that prophecy. He is applying the word of God to the events of crucifixion, and resurrection and the outpouring of the Spirit which they had been witnessing.
Or take the epistles of the New Testament. Paul is guarding the historicity of Adam and the fall of man, the fact that woman was created after man and for him, that God is the Sovereign Potter and man is the clay, that God's purpose had ever been to incorporate the Gentiles into the Covenant of Grace, and so on. He is guarding the great truths God had entrusted to the writers of the Old Testament. The writers of the Bible all guard what had been entrusted to their care.
ii] The men God has raised up through the history of the church have done so. At the beginning no one was admitted into the church without making a confession of faith: "Jesus is Lord." Then the false teachers arose - just as Christ has warned, wolves in sheep's clothing. The truth about the deity of Christ, or the truth about the Trinity, or the truth about the depravity of man, or the truth about the sufficiency of Scripture, or the truth about the basis of a free justification were stolen by the heretics. The church grew careless about guarding what God had entrusted to it, and some men saw this. They were holy men, courageous men. Their lives were moulded by the Bible. All of them were persecuted for what they taught, and many were martyred for guarding what was entrusted to their care. But they would never stop obeying what God said - "Guard what has been entrusted to you care."
Those men gathered the church into great councils and assemblies and they produced statements of what they knew the Bible was teaching, like the Apostles' Creed and the formula of Chalcedon, the 39 Articles and the 1689 London Confession of Faith. Those creeds are like diamonds mined from the Bible. As long as a diamond is in the dark womb of the earth is does not seem to be made for the light. You could easily fail to see its value, but once it is extracted and polished, how it sparkles. So too when a Christian takes up a verse from Scripture, polishes it in the right way, puts it in a certain setting and lets the light of the rest of the Bible shine upon it. Then it can become the most beautiful truth you have ever seen.
The creeds are like hymns. Their purpose is to glorify God. Doxology is too great for us to speak. It needs to be sung. In Psalm 116 the psalmist asks, "What shall I render unto the Lord?" Psalm 111 gives the answer, "I will praise the Lord with my whole heart in the assembly of the upright." When we answer the first question of the Westminster Shorter Catechism, with the words, "Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him for ever," there is something of extraordinary beauty about that sentence. In the year 451 the church was being attacked by error about the Person of Christ. False teachers were trying to rob Christ the God-man of his two-fold nature. So the leaders of the church met near Istanbul in Turkey in a place called Chalcedon and they came up with a magnificent, thoughtful summary of the two-fold nature of Christ, the heart of which stated that the divine and human natures were "without confusion, without change, without division, without separation." Over thirteen centuries later lived the most famous Welsh woman hymn-writer, Ann Griffiths. She has a hymn in which she has turned those words of the Chalcedon Confession into doxology. The hymn is 'O am gael ffydd i edrych' - 'O to have faith to see Christ as he is,' is its theme. She declares in the first verse that she wants to see this:-
'Two natures in one Person,
Conjoined inseparably,
Distinct and not confounded,
In perfect unity.'
That is pure Chalcedonian theology, and it was the stuff of Ann Griffith's meditation and her longing. Whether it was the ordinary Christian people of the fifth century with few of our educational advantages, or the 18th century Christians in Wales, a farmer's daughter from Powys, they all expected to be taught the theology of the Bible, and learn it, and love God with all their hearts. What were they doing? They were guarding what had been entrusted to their care in worship.
The confessions and catechisms of earlier generations are our heritage, left to us by our fathers in which they tell "the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and his strength, and his wonderful works that he has done" (Ps. 78:4). But the confessions are also a weapon by which we guard what has been entrusted to us against numerous enemies. Christians are called to "earnestly contend for the faith" (Jude 3). Don't let the gospel suffer because you were silent. One reads of arrogant surgeons who walk about hospitals like dictators, whose butchery cripples the lives of scores of women, but who are such intimidating personalities that none dares to challenge their incompetence. So it has been with the modernists who dominate large denominations and cry to simple Bible believing men and women that they should stay out of church politics, that they do not understand theology, and that they are going to split the church if they challenge their religious butchery. So the glory is taken from Christ, and Christians fail to guard what has been entrusted to their care. The consequence of that is the churches become irrelevant and go into rapid decline. What denomination dominated by liberal ideas is growing anywhere in the world? Not a single one. God has taken his light from them.

2. How Must We Guard What has been Entrusted to Our Care?
Think of this letter and all that the apostle has been telling Timothy as to how he should behave each day - "hold on to faith and a good conscience ... the overseer must be above reproach ... temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle ... set an example to for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity ... watch your life and doctrine closely ... pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness." Here is this absolute obsession, that runs through the letter, with how Timothy lives his life.
Christlikeness is something to be pursued throughout the pilgrimage of our walk with the Lord to heaven. There is no secret to getting it other than what we find written in every chapter of the Bible, look to God in faith seeking his grace, and turn each day from your sins. Only such people can guard what has been entrusted to their care.
A man with a mere intellectual grasp of orthodoxy is useless in guarding Christianity. That is the faith which King Agrippa had. The apostle said to him, "King Agrippa, do you believe the prophets? I know you do." (Acts 26:27). But the king, though he believed the Bible, had no interest in guarding its truths. He continued to serve himself and the desires of his heart and mind. He had the same faith that demons have: "You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that - and shudder" (James 2:19). One who lives in the fellowship of demons cannot defend the truths of Christ. The grace of the doctrine is essential to guard the doctrines of grace. The living waters of the word may not be served in rusty cups.
But there is another danger too, and that is present in our circles, and that is that guarding the gospel results in doctrinal complacency or static orthodoxy. What is that a picture of? A church resting on its oars, or a church retiring on its laurels. "We have the faith." Yes. "It is stated wonderfully in our confessions." Yes. "Now we have to protect it." No. A church must never suppose it has exhausted the Word of God. The Lord Jesus said that out of that treasure we are to be bringing forth old things, to be sure, but also new (Matt. 13:52). The church must be conservative, that is, it must conserve all that is true, all that our fathers have bought by the insights and their very lives, but a church must also be progressive. The enemy will require it. There are new attacks from what the apostle calls here, "the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge" (v.21). They must be answered. There are new understandings and clarifications which God himself opens up from his word. So, we are exhorting one another to abide in the Word, and we also have to build on that Word, and keep building. Failure to abide spells destruction. Failure to keep building results in petrifaction. To guard what has been entrusted to our care means more than being orthodox. It means being holy and creative.



How then are we to effectively guard what has been entrusted to us? We have cleared away how it is not to be done, but positively what are we to do to obey this exhortation? Three things:-

i] With our minds. The mark of the Christian is teachableness. He was not always like this. He once had a mind that was empty of the things of God. Maybe he was initially put off when he entered a church like ours to see behind the smiling deacons a book table, and he who only read a newspaper, thought, "If I become a Christian I will have to read! Impossible!" But what a change has taken place. He gradually become interested in the faith, and in the Bible, and then in reading it for himself, and then in books that would help him enter into the Bible. The Lord opens the understanding of the people he regenerates. That is why we are not embarrassed about a book table in the vestibule. Grace gives a believer a seriousness about growing in wisdom and knowledge, gaining a literal knowledge of the Old and New Testaments by reading it day by day. When one of the Pharaohs asked Ptolemy to teach him geometry by a short method, the sage is reported to have replied, "There is no royal road to learning." There is no royal road to heaven.
Think of the change in young people when they become Christians. Mary Jones walked miles barefoot to Bala to buy her own Bible, and she was one of thousands of teenagers in whom the new birth registered itself in a new frame of mind. A mighty work of God makes a nation literate.
We are saying that in order to guard the faith you have to know the faith. We sing, "Take my intellect and use Every power as Thou wouldst choose." Then let us be sure that our intellects are growing in grasping preaching, and reading books about the Bible and the history of the church. Go to the Christian Book Shop and select some. Borrow some from me or from the little church library. Take notes of the sermons and think about them afterwards. Ask other Christians for help. Write down verses that you find have been helpful to you. Especially there is one way of growing in the grace of guarding the faith, by getting involved in service - young people' work on a beach mission or in a camp this summer - and then you will have to be growing. We have to guard the faith with our minds, by studying it and knowing it well, so that we are not defeated by ignorance.
ii] With our souls. Think of the writer of Psalm 119. How does he go about gaining a knowledge of the Bible? Prayerfully. "Open my eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of your law" (Ps. 119:18). I am like a blind man before something wonderful - a painting, some embroidery, or a piece of jewellery. I'll never see why people are speaking in tones of such wonder about it until I get my sight. So it is with us, we need to address God with this problem that we are not being moved by the Scriptures. Maybe they no longer grip us as once they did. It is not a better preacher which is your paramount need. It is not more data about the Bible. It is the illumination of the Holy Spirit. "God give me light!"

There was once a 30 year-old man in Scotland called Alexander Henderson who went in disguise to hear the minister Robert Bruce preaching. Henderson despised evangelical religion, and he did not want anyone in the congregation to recognise him, but he wanted to hear Bruce who had the reputation of being a famous orator. So he sat incognito in the congregation, but God knew he was there. Robert Bruce got up and announced the words of the Lord Jesus as his text, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber." Alexander was deeply convicted merely at hearing that portion of the word of God being read. "I shouldn't be here," he thought. "I am in a sphere to which I do not belong. I'm a burglar who has crept in. But I want to belong to these people. I don't want to be a thief. I want to join them in the fold of Christ by the right way." That was the beginning of salvation, seeing the truth of the Bible, convicted by it and understanding what it was saying to him. He then became the great champion of the Bible for thirty more years of his life.
Jesus from John 14:21, "I will love him, and will manifest myself to him." That was the verse that spoke to him, and in those words the very experience which the Lord Jesus speaks of became his also; he knew the Lord as his own Saviour. He wrote these grand words, "The naughty was taken out of my heart, and the good put in ... The Bible looked new; creation looked new, and I felt a love for all mankind." If you are to become a defender of the faith then the naughty must be taken out of your soul and the good put in." We have to guard the faith with our souls, by regular habits of Christian devotion - poured out prayers, persistent Bible reading, attentive church attendance.
iii] With our bodies. One of the strongest keeps for the faith is a pattern of good deeds. Paul tells the Romans that in the light of the grace they have received from God they should be presenting their bodies as living sacrifices to him. In other words, their hands and feet and tongues, their strength and energy should be spent in service. You know how we are built, that if we start acting badly the faith which we say we profess doesn't seem real to us. We consider ourselves hypocrites. But as we stretch out our hands in kindness and care intelligently for others Jesus Christ seems to have truly manifest himself to us.
Think of an athlete and how he trains. There is a diet which he sticks to. He gets to bed the right time and he takes on the daily discipline of training. If he is the goal-kicker for a rugby team he will kick hundreds of balls from all over the ground between the posts every week. If he is a hurdler he will cross hundreds of hurdles just trying to shave them. Certain muscle groups will be worked in thousands of repetitions till they have mass and flexibility. Certain moves will be practised again and again until they become second nature, a dummy, a sidestep, a backhand.
Each time he trains he gets a little better, some careless habit dies a little and a disciplined new one begins to come to life. That is, each training session causes a tiny conversion. But it is only after many seasons of such training that a person can perform his skills by second nature. The mini-conversion repeated thousands of times add up to the change of one's life. A worthy athlete becomes a disciplined athlete. That is the way a person becomes a defender of the faith.
"We have to be trained in godliness or holiness, till it becomes a second nature. Each time we pray; every time we resist a temptation, or bring a gift to a lonely person, or make ourselves think of the needs of others - each time we do these things our old self dies a little and our new self comes more to life. Add up all these mini-conversions across years of training and you have a spiritual athlete. A flabby and clumsy Christian becomes a trim and graceful one"
How crucial this is. When you first defended the faith you were unwise. You were hectoring, disrespectful to your parents, angry, a bit of a bully. You jumped in at the deep end. You thought you were smarter than you were. People tied you up in knots. You got embarrassed and you were an embarrassment. It happens to all of us. Don't give up. Don't mock what once you were. Don't become cynical. Don't do things but sullenly - "I suppose I have to go to Prayer Meeting tonight." Don't think that you are not gifted for defending the faith. Don't think it is too hard or too boring. People will sneer at the God-squad.
You are simply out of shape. The best athletes go through bad patches. A soccer player will have a whole season when he seems to have lost it all, but he comes back. He keeps coming back. He keeps fit because without that he will never come back. It is trained people who have fun. It takes hard work to play well. Doing good with your mind and body, your arms and legs, your heart and soul is the very stuff of the Christian life. We are not saved by doing it. We are saved to do it. We are saved to guard what has been entrusted to the care of the church by the Lord Jesus, and we can never keep the faith unless we keep fit and work for people, just as the Lord Jesus did, seeing the dirty feet, and seeing the basin and seeing the towel, and noticing nobody wanted to do this work, and then doing it ourselves. That shows the reality of the faith in us, and we also have more confidence then to guard it by our words when we are keeping it by our lives.



3. What are the Consequences of Guarding What Has Been Entrusted to Our Care?
Grace will be with us (v.21). These are the final words of the apostle in this letter. What is grace? It is not 'goodbye.' It is not a farewell greeting. It is the omnipotence of God saving and keeping his people. It is Paul reminding Timothy again that he cannot survive without the unmerited power of God. As we keep away from error, and guard whatever things are true and lovely that have been entrusted to us then we will find the grace of God all sufficient.
And how will that sustaining grace manifest itself in those who guard the faith?
i] The Peace and Unity of the Church. It is error and immorality that divides the church not evangelical Christians. King Ahab who married Jezebel and they introduced idolatry into Israel, and very few spoke out against it. The prophet Elijah was one and he preached against the worship of Baal, and God sent a drought on Israel because of its sin. But when King Ahab met Elijah what did he say to him, "Is that you, you troubler of Israel?" (I Kings 18:17). That is always the response of the world. Evangelical Christians will speak again modernistic unbelief and the tolerance of immorality within a denomination. They are immediately dubbed trouble-makers. We reply as Elijah did, "I have not made trouble for Israel, but you ... You have abandoned the Lord's command and have followed the Baals" (I Kings 18:18). It was not Luther who caused the great separation from the unreformed Roman church it was the doctrines and practices of Rome. Those who guard what has been entrusted to the church bring peace and unity. It is error that splits churches.
ii] Pastoral Encouragement and Wisdom. When a congregation is united in guarding all that God has said in his word what a wise congregation that is. There are timid members but they are always being reminded that salvation depends ultimately not upon their efforts but upon God's grace towards them. This God is not like a chameleon whose moods change as ours do, but he says, "I the Lord change not" (Mal.3:6). Once this all-knowing God has sovereignly and lovingly determined to save a person he will not change when we fall into sin, as fall we do each day. He will give us the grace of repentance and pick us up that we keep going and keep going. What God begins, God finishes. "I am persuaded of this one thing: he who started a good work in you will complete it by the day of Christ Jesus" (Phil.1:6). Those who guard the biblical faith have real encouragement to offer their congregations. A merciful sovereign Shepherd to be our Saviour. Rely on the eternal unchanging love of God, and look to him.
Are the answer to our problems found in man's reason or in the Word of God? Everyone in the congregation must answer that. Are you going to accept only what makes sense to you, or what God's word says even when it sounds contradictory? The Bible teaches the foreordination of all things - the selling of Joseph into Egypt, and the crucifixion of Jesus. On the other hand the Bible clearly testifies that God hates sin, that he will not listen to the prayers of the unrepentant, and that he is Holy Holy Holy. These things seem two seemingly unreconcilable positions, yet the Christian guards them both because God has spoken them both. So often we end up with Paul's exclamation of worship before so great a Lord - "Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgements and his ways past finding out" (Romans 11:33). The question is, do you believe such a God or not? If you do then guard all he has said.

THE SANDALS OF PEACE

Ephesians 6:15 “and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.”

What the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, has done is to have achieved peace with God. This is what the Bible affirms in many places, for example, in Romans 5:1, “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” This is something every Christian possesses. Paul joins himself in solidarity with the entire Roman congregation of believing men and women, slaves and free, the illiterate and the poets; he assures them, “All of us now have peace with God and it’s through our Lord Jesus.” It wasn’t because of Paul’s blameless Christian living and years of self-denying service that he had peace with God. It was only because of the life and death of the Lord Jesus. The Son had propitiated the wrath of God which is revealed from heaven against our ungodly and unrighteous lives, and he has done this by taking our sin and dying under the judgment of God upon the cross. Jesus has taken responsibility for all our guilt and answered God’s demands in his own body by his life and death, and God is totally and completely satisfied to look on Jesus and pardon us. His anger towards us has been replaced by peace. He now loves us with the same love with which he loves his own Son, because he sees us in his Son, clothed with the righteousness of his Son, as blameless as his Son, as lovely in his eyes as his own dear Son. There is peace with God though the achievement of Jesus Christ alone. That is the message of Christianity. You can know the peace of God and the love of God though your sins are uncountable. But you must face up to that guilt. You mustn’t play games with God pretending everything is fine and that your sins have only been little pink sins and that “it doesn’t matter to God how men live, and that it’s his job to forgive us.” It is not like that with you. It is not like that with anyone. It has never been like that nor ever will be. Your sins are as red as scarlet when the thrice holy God looks at them. The very angels hide their eyes in his presence, but you were born in sin and shapen in iniquity. You’ve never
done anything wholly free from sin, and while you are rejecting the Son of God you will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on you (Jn. 3:36). Your only hope is to cry mightily to God. He may hear you today. He may give you assurance of his forgiveness today. But there is certainly no peace with God without Jesus Christ. Look to him! Pray the publican’s prayer until you know you’ve been forgiven, “God be merciful to me a sinner.”

So this is the peace that our verse is talking about. It is not our feelings of peace but the good news of peace with God through Jesus Christ for every sinner who trust in him. That is the message of the gospel; “there is peace for you brother, and peace for you sister; there is peace for the vilest offender; there is peace for the chief of sinners as long as they confess their sin and cast themselves on the mercy of God. Come from the war-zone of your daily life; come from the tension and guilt of not doing what you ought to do, and doing what you should not be doing. Find peace with God through the person and work of his beloved Son, Jesus Christ. Cast yourself on the merits of Jesus the great peace-offering.” That is the message of the Christian soldier. That is the gospel of peace.

The half boot of the Roman legionary. It was made of leather; it left the toes exposed; it had thick studded soles and was tied to the ankles and shins with straps. With these boots the legionary marched from Rome to Wales and stood solidly on them while engaged in warfare with the ancient Brits! Shoes have to be fitted individually on the feet of soldiers. One style, officially issued, and provided by the powers that be - your own trainers or loafers are strictly forbidden - but the sandals are all different sizes and get creased and worn in different ways. You understand the analogy? There is one gospel of peace with God through Jesus Christ. One only-begotten Son of God; one Mediator with God, the man Christ Jesus; one name under heaven given amongst men whereby we must be saved; one way, truth and life; no man comes to the Father but by him alone. So there is only one gospel boot for every Christian to put on, but all of us are different personalities with different gifts. We have come to God from different backgrounds at different times in our lives. When I look at a congregation I don’t see a page of postage stamps, rows of identical people all looking back at me. Everyone is different, but no one may say, “Well. I think of the gospel like this. .” The Christian gospel has been defined for us once and for all in the Bible and we have to adjust and shape ourselves to receive and serve it. Our feet are ‘fitted’ with one style of gospel boots, but each one of is different, with different gifts and abilities.

So what is this “readiness” that Paul speaks of here? You notice that the apostle doesn’t urge us to “put on the shoes of peace.” It is more interesting than that. We are being urged to be fitted with “the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.” You see advertisements for perfume or clothes and they suggest that you will possess a poise if you put on this product. It is not just a garment you are wearing but confidence and style, so that you enter a room wearing this and people’s heads will turn and you will be surrounded by fascinating people. That is the gimmick of the advertiser to encourage you to purchase his product. Paul is not selling us anything here; these are not Nike half-boots, but he is telling us that receiving this gospel of peace as your gospel gives you the only foundation for a successful life as a Christian. It will make you ready for the challenges and opportunities in this fascinating pilgrimage of being a Christian. You will be fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. Now what does he mean by this?



i] GOSPEL SHOES MAKE US STEADFAST.
These Roman soldiers’ shoes helped them to grip the ground when they fought. So the Christian too must have stability; you have a foundation of peace with God through the Lord Jesus on which to build your entire life. The hymnist Edward Mote affirms that truth in these familiar words,

“His oath, His covenant and His blood,
Support me in the ‘whelming flood;
When all around my soul gives way,
He then is all my hope and stay.
On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand;
All other ground is sinking sand.”

God has given us some fine stepping stones through the quicksands of life.
The first is that God is, and that he is love and that he grips this world and so our lives have a purpose. Another is that he has spoken to us by prophets and apostles and his Son so we know his mind. Another is that God has told his creatures what is right and wrong; he has told us how we should live in ten great stepping stones. There are more; he has told us what he has done through his Son Jesus Christ to make us right and that we need to entrust ourselves to him. There is no need for any of us to sink. There is another great stepping stone; he has put the Spirit of truth within us, and so with what he has given us in his wise law, and what we have within our hearts in a biblically enlightened conscience it is like having a permanent personal foundation to stand on
day by day. I go to work and face all the moral dilemmas of relationships with other people, and there are moments when I feel out of my depth. I am going under, but no, God gives me a foundation; it is the sandals of the gospel of peace, on which I can stand secure day by day. You can stand your ground. You have a wonderfully strong but maneuverable and flexible foundation.

ii] GOSPEL SHOES MAKE US ABOUNDING IN GOD’S WORK.
“What then is the spiritual application? The point, clearly, is that we must not be slow, we must not be heavy-footed, there must be no dragging of the feet. There is nothing which is so fatal to successful progress as a sluggish, lifeless Christian. Ask the average man in the street why he doesn’t come to a place of worship, why he is not a Christian, and you will find that the answer he is most likely to give you is that it is all so dull, and so dead. He says there is nothing in it, no life. And of course there is much to justify what he says. You have but to compare and contrast a typical sample of worldly people with a typical sample of Christian people to see the basis on which he makes his statement. Look at the enthusiasm and the vitality of people who watch the football on Saturday afternoon in the winter, or the people who go to the races. Listen to the shouting and the excitement! Look at those people who go after their sports or whatever they are interested in! They want to be there in time, they want the best seats, and they want the sport to go on and on, and are disappointed when it finishes. Contrast that with Christian people who seem to think they are doing something wonderful by going to a place of worship on a Sunday morning. They are not quite sure whether they will go or not when they wake up in the morning, but at last, as a matter of duty, they decide they will go — hoping the service will not be too long. Isn’t that the position?
“Do we give the impression when we come to our places of worship that we are doing the most wonderful and thrilling thing in the world? Are we alive, are we rejoicing? How do we compare with these other people? A staid, lifeless Christian is a denial, in many respects, of the Gospel at its most glorious point. To be heavy-footed, slow-moving, lethargic, having to be whipped up and roused constantly, and urged to do this and that instead of running to it, and rejoicing in it, is a sad misrepresentation of Christianity.

iii] GOSPEL SHOES MAKE US EVANGELISTICALLY SUCCESSFUL.
“Our feet are fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.” You are ready for action. You are standing on this great objective reality that it is well with your soul and God. Peace with God is crucial to inner peace. I say to you that if a man is torn up inside by guilt feelings, God’s pardon alone can bring him peace. If you’re full of anxiety and despair about the future, I say that God’s strength alone can give you energy to go on. Lack of peace with God is a dangerous state to be in; it can sometimes move you to do things that are self-destructive or harmful to others. Something inside us tells us that if something is wrong, somebody’s got to pay for it - so we either put ourselves through needless suffering or we make other people suffer by being cruel to them. But once you know that Jesus has suffered for you and paid the price to give you peace with God, then you can have this inner peace. It passes all understanding. Guilt is replaced with assurance, anger with compassion, fear with courage, despair with confidence.

When God makes a peace treaty with you and you feel his peace in your heart, you become a soldier for God. Satan loses his ability to intimidate you. Satan will attack your heart, but you keep working for your master. You fall into various sins, but you confess them to God each day and you keep working for the Lord. If your feet are fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace, your inner peace will help motivate to keep working for him.

There is a great exhortation of Peter in his first letter about this readiness to speak the gospel of peace. What are the methods he suggests? Is there some surefire, copper-bottomed, guaranteed way of witnessing so that whenever I speak people become Christians? No there is none of that, but he mentions essentials that we dare not ignore. “In your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience,” (I Pet. 3:15&16). What does he say? Five things:



Firstly, to make sure that in our hearts Christ is set apart as Lord. Our religion isn’t one interest among many to be picked up and laid down as the mood takes us. We don’t embrace Christ for a time, just while on our way to something else which is more important to us. Christ is set apart to a special place in our life and that special place is his Lordship over us. He is Lord of every part of our beings, our time, our desires and ambitions, our possessions, our relationships, our enthusiams and pleasures. Christ is total and absolute Lord of our lives, and if we find something coming in and taking over and easing him off the throne of our hearts then we hear all sorts of alarm bells ringing. We will never be effective in spreading the gospel unless Jesus Christ is set apart in our lives as our Lord. There is that earlier incident in the life of Peter himself that he might have been reflecting on here, when God gave Peter a vision of a sheet coming down from heaven with all kinds of animals on it, and God said to him, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.” And Peter’s response was “Surely not, Lord!” (Acts 10:14). “No . . . Lord!” You surely see the impossibility of that attitude. If he is your Lord then it must always be, “Yes.” Either the lordship is going to end the disobedience or the disobedience will end the lordship. Peter eventually does what his Lord says and then he is able to go to the house of Cornelius and preach the gospel to the Gentiles. Christ must be set apart as supreme Lord of your life for any success in evangelism.


Secondly, Peter says to be always ready to answer our questioners. We may be ready to answer when we have attended a particularly helpful meeting. We may be ready to give a reason for our faith the week after we have attended a weekend course in how to witness, but when we are lying on the floor of despondency, overwhelmed by our sense of failure, conscious of how poor we are as believers, that we have served God so unprofitably, then when the questioner says, “Don’t you go to church? Why do you go?” Then are we ready? Is the gospel true on a wet February Monday? Is there peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ when our hearts are as cold as refrigerators? We have to be always ready because we don’t know when a question about our faith is going to be asked. We can't tell when the conversation is going to move around to faith and church and Christianity, and we cannot dictate that it has to be at our best times and on our terms, and so we have to prepared always. Our feet must always be fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace

Thirdly, Peter says, with gentleness. Amazing! Here is a soldier in all his armour and with his sword in his hand, but he is not like other soldiers, he is gentle. Why does Peter say this? He is reminding us of the personalness of the testimony. Always remember it is a human being you are speaking to; always consider his worth and his dignity. Always remind yourself that though this man is not a Christian that does not give you the right to speak to him from a position of conscious assured superiority. You know only too well that he may be a human being in the depths of degradation - it may be that - but you know that there but for the grace of God go you. Your attitude to men and women is that you esteem them better than yourself.

It seems to me exceedingly important - even psychologically - that those to whom we are speaking have the true impression that they are very important to us, that they matter to us, and our regard for them is very high. We are not approaching them with any presumption, far less with any consciousness of our superiority, but we approach them with gentleness, not sectarian pride or intellectual arrogance, but meekness, considering our own weakness and unworthiness.
Better a patient man than a warrior, a man who controls his temper than one who takes a city” (Provs. 16:32). The City of Man is always besieged and taken by gentleness.

Fourthly, Peter says, with respect, or literally with ‘fear’ or awe. I don’t think that it means that we witness with a fear of those to whom we speak - it’s not the fear of cowardice, or the fear on a human level of the person to whom we are testifying. It is the fear of which Paul speaks about on other occasions when he says, for example to the church in Corinth , “I was among you in weakness and fear and much trembling.” Now Paul wasn’t frightened of the people of Corinth one little bit, so where did the fear come from? He was overwhelmed by the greatness of his responsibility, that knowing the momentousness of the issues it should be up to him to bear witness to a living soul. Our hearers will live for ever in either heaven or hell and this may be the only chance they have of hearing of Jesus Christ. How solemn and fearful that is, and how great the issues

Fifthly, Peter says, you keep a clear conscience. If you are a hypocrite, witnessing from under layers of fresh guilt and failure, then you are not going to speak with any conviction about the saving and keeping power of the Lord Jesus. You confess your sins to God; you put things right with the people you have offended.

Peter tells us this is the way to readiness and evangelistic success. It is very disappointing isn’t it? No ‘three laws’ or ‘four methods’ or a course of study and a meal in which to win people for Christ. Rather, gentleness, fear, a clear conscience and Christ as the Lord of our hearts. This is the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. How very searching, that these are the means God blesses to present the gospel of peace to others. This is how the kingdom of God advances.