November 4, 2018 Pastor Rick Buck I'd like to invite you to turn in your Bibles to Acts 4, or in your smart devices this morning, whatever you're using. We're going to continue our study in the book of Acts, and our text this morning is. I do have a question for you this morning: Why are you here at church this morning? I mean, beyond that you got an extra hour from the time saving thing and you're here this morning at the first service because of that. Why are you here? What is the purpose of being here in this place today, gathered together with these people, as you worship? The quick and pointed answer is that it's about God. It's not so much about us; it is about obedience. God has called us to come together and worship. God has called us to fellowship. God has called us to sit under His Word. God has called us to pray and to sing and to praise Him, right? The spiritual disciplines. The Bible's clear that it is about obedience, but sometimes very practical people ask, "But how does living in and with the community of faith connect with everyday living in our families, in our jobs, in our neighbourhoods?" Much of what we do as Christians, for some people for many people, maybe doesn't seem directly related to our success and thriving in this world. For some, it may even seem impractical to be here today. For some, maybe even irrelevant. In the past couple of weeks alone, I have talked with people who are experiencing deep points of hurt and brokenness in their marriages, in their finances, in their jobs, in significant health issues, concerns for their children, enduring enormous grief and loss in their families and in their lives. That's just in the last couple of weeks, specific conversations, times of meeting with people, trying to support them. So you ask in the midst of that, How does what we are doing right now address those issues in the real lives we live every day where we are? Why can't church be one of those health seminars, like, here's seven steps to this, freedom and success in your finances, seven steps to this, if you just do these five things, you will be successful in your marriage, your finances, whatever. Why isn't church like that? That practical? One church goer wrote a letter to the editor of a newspaper and complained that it made little sense to go to church every Sunday, every week, to do this. "I've gone for 30 years now," he wrote, "and in that time, I've heard hundreds, if not thousands, of sermons, but for the life of me, I can't remember one of them. I wonder if I've been wasting my time. What's the point?" Some of you might be saying right now, "Yeah, I've been wasting my time. I don't know why I'm listening to Buck right now."
Page 2 Contrast this with the picture the book of Acts gives of believers committed to living in community, practicing the spiritual disciplines together day after day. Not just week after week but day after day. They saw this as critical to the success of their mission for God. Here's our big idea this morning: Sent people thrive on mission when they encounter God through authentic community. Gathering together in community for Word and worship, fellowship, it's the fuel for the scattering to do the mission and the multiplication. We really can't do mission and multiplication, as we see in the book of Acts, without this. We saw last week that we can't grow wider in our witness without growing deeper into Jesus. Jesus in our lives is the key to our courageous witness. But one of the key ways we grow deeper in Jesus is through engaging in the spiritual disciplines with God's people in community. It's incredibly relevant to our success. Let's look at the text in. I'm going to invite you to please stand, if you would. I'll be reading the text, but just follow along. Let's stand in honour of the Word of God this morning and that God would speak to us by His Spirit. Verse 23 we begin, 23 On their release, Peter and John went back to their own people and reported all that the chief priests and the elders had said to them. 24 When they heard this, they raised their voices together in prayer to God. Sovereign Lord, they said, you made the heavens and the earth and the sea, and everything in them. 25 You spoke by the Holy Spirit through the mouth of your servant, our father David: Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? He's now quoting from Psalm 2. 26 The kings of the earth rise up and the rulers band together against the Lord and against his anointed one. 27 Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate Now applying it to the life of Jesus met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. 28 They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. 29 Now, Lord, consider
their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. 30 Stretch out your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus. 31 After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly. 32 All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. Again, this is the outworking of the filling of the Spirit. 33 With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God s grace was so powerfully at work in them all 34 that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them Listen to this. This is radical brought the money from the sales 35 and put it at the apostles feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need. 36 Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus, whom the apostles called Barnabas (which means son of encouragement ), 37 sold a field he owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles feet. This is God's Word to us this morning. Let's pray and ask Him to lead us into this study. Father, thank you for Your Word. We pray that You would be our teacher by Your Spirit. Have Your way in each of our lives. We pray this now in Jesus' name, amen. You may be seated. Page 3 The context, you remember from our study last week, Peter and John had been in jail for healing a lame man and preaching about Jesus and how the miracle pointed to the ultimate salvation in Jesus Christ. The religious authorities released them but gave them a warning to no longer preach or teach in Jesus' name. Now, what's the first thing that Peter and John do after they are released from prison? They go to their families? They go to the lawyer? "Man, we got really ripped off here. You've got to help us out. We've got a legal action against these religious leaders." No. Where do they go? They go to church. They go to meet with God's people and enter into a time of prayer. They go to meet with God's people to get perspective and to praise and petition God in the midst of their circumstances.
Page 4 This text, interesting enough, kind of putting it in the context of the book of Acts, is parallel to Acts 2:42 47. You can go home this afternoon and just look at the parallels between these two passages. You remember in Acts 2, the context for that, Peter had preached the message of the gospel and 3,000 people came to faith in Christ. In Acts 2:42 47, we get this beautiful snapshot picture of what the early church looked like in revival, in renewal. It was beautiful. In fact, in verse 42 of Chapter 2, it says they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Prayer was this priority in the midst of their community. It's interesting because in Chapter 2, you get this picture of they're engaged in the spiritual disciplines together, and then when you get to Chapter 4, he kind of narrows down on prayer but gives us a specific prayer that they actually prayed together. And again in Chapter 2, you'll see this description of the community and their love for each other and their sharing of their possessions, selling things to provide for the needs of the people. And then here in Chapter 4, we're told that again and we're given a specific illustration of Barnabas actually doing it. So in Chapter 4, we're getting a little bit of meat on the bones, if you will, of specific examples of how this beautiful life of the church is lived out in community together and how they do this. The point is that authentic community was a key to their thriving. They saw this. They understood this. Let's look at the text this morning. We begin with the first point: We thrive on mission when we are engaged in authentic worship with God's people, verses 23 to 31. Again, remember, Peter and John, released from prison, immediately go to the church family, verse 23 says, and they report what the Sanhedrin had warned them about: Don't teach or talk in Jesus' name anymore. The first response of this gathered community is to join together in one mind and heart and to pray to God in the midst of these threats, and that basically is verses 24 to 30. Their prayer is very God centred. It's biblically grounded. They quote Scripture. They orient themselves in terms of who God is and what He has said in His Word, and it's passionate. I can almost picture them. We don't know how many there were. It doesn't matter whether it was 50, 500 or 5,000. It doesn't really matter. There they are, together in oneness of mind and heart, lifting their hearts to God. Maybe they were on their knees, hands lifted up, passionately praying together, crying out. Verse 24 says they raised their voices together. There are two parts to this prayer. The first part is their praise to God notice that in verses 24 to 28 and then there's a petition, they ask God for something, verses 29 and 30.
Page 5 They begin with praise, which is so important in prayer. To orient yourself to really ask for the right things, you have to have a proper perspective of who God is, and that's exactly what this prayer does. They begin with praise because it puts God in His rightful place in the context of their lives. It orients. Notice how they talk about God. They address Him, in verse 24, "Sovereign Lord." "God, You are the King of kings. There's other kings and there's lords and there's all these powerful people, but You're above them all. You are the sovereign Lord." And they help one another orient themselves to the truth of who God is, that they answer not to the Sanhedrin, not to the religious leaders; they answer to God, who sovereign over all. It's easy to say we answer to God. It's much harder to live that, isn't it? We can say, "Hey, God's my boss and I want to live that way," but it's hard to live that way. And that's partly why the community comes together, to remind each other of this truth: He is sovereign Lord, and we agree together He is King of all. Part of the role of community is just to prompt each other and remind each other. A lot of times that I'm up here at the front I hope you do learn something new as we teach and study together God's Word. That's the gift that God has given me, and I'm contributing that to the body, and others do as well, and that is a contribution, but many times, I'm just reminding you of things you already know and have already discovered in God's Word. And we're doing that together in our fellowship. You ever notice sometimes a friend will come along and they'll pray for you, and you've been praying about that same thing, but it has a measure of encouragement and support and strength in your life when they pray it that's different when you just pray it. I don't know how to explain it, but God has created this sense of building up, of encouragement, of support, of helping us to reorient our lives. It's so easy to get disoriented, to think that the kings of this world are the key, right? God says, "I'm the sovereign King, and I bring down kings and nations and I raise others up, and you need to get this." You need to get your life oriented and stay there, and prayer is one of the ways we orient our lives. And when we do it together, we remind each other who God is. God's people here reflect on the meaning of God as sovereign Lord. He's sovereign over creation. He's sovereign in revelation. He's sovereign in history. You notice this as you go through these verses in verses 24 to 28. He's the maker of everything. He's the owner of all, creator of all things. He's the revealer. He's revealed His will and His plan in His Word. They quote Scripture, Psalm 2, and they recognize that God is sovereign over history. Man has his plans, but God's will will prevail. We need to see this and understand this. They quote Psalm 2 here, recognizing that while Jesus' enemies raged against Him, God is truly sovereign over them.
Page 6 If you go back to study Psalm 2, you'll see it's talking about the Lord's anointed, about the king, and how God's servant has enemies raging against him, and it's ultimately fulfilled in King Jesus who has enemies raging against him. And just as the Messiah was opposed and was victorious, so His messengers may be opposed, but they will come out victorious in the end through the sovereign God. But don't misunderstand that. That doesn't mean so much physical safety, which is a very temporal perspective. It just means that God's will and purpose will not be thwarted by human power and wisdom. God's will and plan will prevail. Humans, they make a lot of noise, they do a lot of things, but they're only there for a time and then they are brought down. But God's plan will prevail. And of course in Scripture, this is meant to encourage us as we think about God's sovereignty, to know that we don't have to fear, God is on His throne, and in the end, although it looks like we may be losing and men may be getting their way or whatever, we know that God will have His victory. And of course in Scripture, one of the great tensions is between divine sovereignty and human responsibility. God's sovereignty shouldn't make us passive at all or fatalistic. We continue to work, but one of the confidences we have is as we work, God is sovereign and He can take our little stuff and turn it into big stuff. And He can take the fallenness of this world and the crushed dreams and expectations that look like there's total defeat, and He can make something beautiful out of that. That's His business. Of course, the Scriptures point us to the cross as the ultimate example of that. Think about it. I've brought this to you many times, but this should be the orientation of your life as you think about God's sovereignty and how He can work in ways that are beyond human imagination. Just think about the cross. What did He do in the cross, in the greatest evil ever to occur in human history, the murdering of the just Son of God, the perfect, righteous Son of God? God brought the greatest good to humanity in salvation to us all. You see it? God, in the mystery of how He works, takes the greatest evil and turns it to the greatest good, and part of what the Bible tells us over and over again is if God did that in the cross, He can do that in your life, in this situation, in any situation. You need to trust Him. He is sovereign. Believe it. I don't know what you're going through right now, what your circumstances are, but if you will trust Him and look to Him, that doesn't mean simply a relief from the circumstances, but it means that He can redeem whatever you're going through and use it for an ultimate good in fact, an eternal good. This is the good news, and it brings a measure of stability and peace to our lives, doesn't it? That's what Philippians 4 is talking about when we get this peace that passes all human understanding, as we take our junk that's bigger than us and we give it to God. Don't be
Page 7 anxious, but with prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, make your request to God, and the peace of God will guard your mind and your heart. God's complete sovereignty is such an encouragement, such a blessing in the midst of a fleeting and fragile and fractured world, and this is what they orient themselves to, "Oh, yeah, we've faced some tough circumstances, but God's still on His throne, and He's going to have the final word. We don't know how He's going to do it or what He's going to do, but we trust Him in the midst of this." And this whole orientation on a proper vision of God also affects what they ask for. Look at verses 29 and 30 and what they ask for there. It says, "Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. Stretch out your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus." Here they are, looking at the circumstances and saying, "God, we want to ask for the right things. We don't want to ask for easy lives but to be stronger people in the midst of this. We're not asking You to get us out of this mess. We're not even asking You to remove these people from power. We're entrusting the unjust threats that are being given towards us to You, God, and we're asking for You to be glorified in the ongoing, courageous witness of our lives. Help us not to react but to respond by Your grace, making it about You, making it about Your mission, God." Even their request for the miraculous was all about their mission of the gospel. The miraculous signs were to be in service to the Word of God, and they are. If you go throughout the book of Acts, wherever there's the miraculous, its point was to be a sign pointing to the ultimate salvation in Jesus Christ. That's why not everyone got a miracle. That's why it wasn't always happening. These were signs. The temporary relief of a miracle was pointing to the eternal relief that only Jesus could give from the curse of sin and death. So, the miraculous sign always pointed to the message of Jesus, His death, His resurrection and the ultimate salvation that He could bring. These people were enabled by the Spirit, verse 31 says, to boldly proclaim salvation in Jesus Christ. That's what it was about, the mission, the mission of being witnesses. But Luke wants us to get a further glimpse into this encouragement and strength that they found together, an interdependence and community together, and so he goes on, and the second point we see here is this: We thrive on mission when we are engaged in authentic love with God's people, when we love and when we are loved. Not only did they lead each other into God's greatness and goodness through authentic worship, through prayer, but they expressed it in their authentic and practical love for each other. Look at verse 32, "All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus."
Page 8 The mission went forward because of this amazing love they had for each other, and God's grace was so powerfully at work in them all. They enjoyed, the text says, a unity of heart and mind that expressed itself in sharing the amazing blessings that God had brought to them individually, and giving themselves to the mission, again, of testifying to the living Christ. The unity please hear me here was based around character, not personality. They were all striving to have the mind of Christ, the character of Christ, rather than a mind of their own. Personality is built a lot around a mind of our own, right? "Hey, look at me, I'm unique. Look at who I am." But to have this common vision of having the mind of Christ, of humbly serving one another like Jesus served us, that's what this text is talking about. True unity requires diversity of service but a unity of vision, and the unity of their vision was Jesus. To be like Jesus, to live and serve like Jesus, to encourage one another like Jesus encouraged us and gave Himself for us. The statement in verse 32, "No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own," some interpreters have suggested that this is trying to argue for some kind of Christian common ownership, a kind of Christian version of communism or socialism. "See? No one really owned anything. Everybody owned it all together." Well, that's not actually accurate if you look at these verses in their context. This was not about a political covenant together. This was about voluntary love. Laws can't create what only authentic love can. This is an inside out kind of reality, not something that is created by some kind of legal arrangement that we have together. This is the moving of the Holy Spirit in the heart of an individual to do something radical that the world might say is crazy where they actually liquidate their assets to give to people in need. No, they weren't saying, "What is yours is everyone's"; rather, they were saying, "What is mine, I voluntarily say is going to be yours." This is about this sharing and this sacrificial giving what God entrusted to them based on how God had sacrificially given to them. They understood that what they really possessed really belonged to God and should be used for His purposes. They understood it wasn't about private ownership. "This stuff that I have is stuff that God has given to me, entrusted to me, to be used for His purposes. I understand that now." Loving Him by loving people. The point here is that they thought of their possessions as God's and not their own, and so they would hold their stuff with an open hand. "God, You put it in, You take it out. I want to be led by You, God. I want to be moved by Your Spirit to direct Your resources that You've entrusted to my care to the needs of people around me, and I'm going to do that as You lead me." And that's what they did. Notice verse 34, it says, "There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them." The implication of the text is just the opposite of
Page 9 a shared ownership. They actually still had ownership of their possessions, but they recognized that the ownership that they had was actually given to them by God. And so in truth, He was the greater owner over their ownership. And so, this text is in no way teaching some kind of Christian socialism; in fact, just the opposite. Clearly it says as was needed, "from time to time" not all the time; as God directed them they sold things. So it was in their care, their ownership, if you will, to be used as God directed. But the mind of Christ that they shared with each other did lead to some radical decisions, decisions that many in our world would say, "That's crazy, liquidating assets to care for the needs of people as they arose." Now, remember, contextually we've got to remember our context is not identical to the New Testament context. They didn't have the social fabric. They didn't pay the kinds of taxes we would pay so that we could have government programs. They didn't have those things, so the caring of the community was essentially whatever care there was. There were no other programs or social programs, etc. Those things didn't exist. The church was critical to the wellbeing and survival. And we also know in this time there was famine and there was financial crisis happening in that region of the world, and the church was addressing it practically, investing the temporal and eternal. And this was such an encouragement to the body and the witness of the world. I love the generosity of God's people at Emmanuel. I hear about it all the time. I don't mean that just within the walls and the commitment to Emmanuel. I hear some beautiful stories about the way our people serve way outside this community of faith and in our larger community. We try to give you opportunities to do that kind of thing as well, not just to invest here at Emmanuel but invest beyond these walls. A few months ago we had, if you remember, Teen Challenge here. The women's group from Teen Challenge, they came I believe it was in July. Pastor Steve got an email from one of the folks there. Jennie Nadeau in Aurora from the Teen Challenge Women's Centre wrote this email to us at Emmanuel. She says, I hope this email finds you well. I was with the choir back in July at Emmanuel. We were abundantly blessed by that Sunday. I cannot believe the response from your people and their hearts to be on mission with us. I've actually waited a little bit to send over this little thank you to you I've never had to do that before because for months after our Sunday together, we continue to receive gifts and support from the church. To date, we have had nine new sponsors partner with women in the program to support them each month. As well in addition to that, the offering received has
Page 10 exceeded over $17,000. I literally have to do double takes when I see that information in the event. I mean, that is unheard of. Praise God for that. And I pray that God would move us in greater ways, stretching us to love and care, because that's the essence of how we communicate community together and witness to the world about who Jesus is. This is beautiful. Luke then gives us one tangible example of this love in the sacrificial gift of Barnabas. In verses 36 and 37 you see it there he does a little show and tell, if you will, and puts the encouragement of Joseph, nicknamed Barnabas, on display. Here, Luke is also introducing a key servant of God in the book of Acts. You want to do a little study, Luke introduces Barnabas here in just a couple of verses, but throughout the book of Acts, Barnabas comes up again and again and again. And he's given as a model, a man full of the Holy Spirit, a man full of faith, and he's nicknamed "son of encouragement." You could call him Barney the Encourager. He's just this individual that shows up when people need it, and he gives that extra encouragement to help people live for God. When the Apostle Paul was saved, when he became a Christian he had been, remember, an opponent of the church it was Barnabas because the church thought, "Hey, this guy could be faking it, and he might want into the church just so he can destroy us," and they were suspect of his real conversion. He had been persecuting the church. And Barnabas came alongside of Paul and brought Paul to the church and said, "No, he's the real deal. He's a good guy. He loves the Lord. He really wants to serve the Lord. You've got to accept him." He was the encourager, positively. And then of course, we know how the Apostle Paul impacted the early church. When John Mark failed Barnabas and Paul had gone with John Mark, and John Mark at one point left them, and Paul gave up on John Mark, "John Mark, he's not reliable. I don't think he's trustworthy. I'm not going to take him on the next trip." It was Barnabas who said, "No, no, we've got to give John Mark a second try, a second opportunity. God's grace is powerful, and He can help John Mark be the man that he's meant to be." Later in the New Testament, we see how right Barnabas was. And later in Paul's ministry, he calls and asks John Mark to come and be with him, and it's because Barnabas was there as an encourager and supporter, lifting up. He was building into the body. And in Antioch when Gentiles became believers, the church sent Barnabas to go to these young, infant believers, Gentile believers, to encourage them. The text says he encouraged them, and many more people came to faith in Christ. He was a builder rather than a demolisher. Barnabas was a builder up, an investor, a giver to the body of Christ. He saw the opportunity of what God could do through the church, and he built into it again and again and again the lives of individual believers. Folks, that's instructive.
What a great model for us all. What kind of difference are we making, all of us, in building others up in the body of Christ in the church? May we all be Barnabases. Page 11 The spiritual disciplines, friends, of worship and Word, of gathering to go vertical, are critical to our success and scattering for mission and multiplication. And that brings us back to our big idea again: Sent people thrive on mission when they encounter God through authentic community. That church goer who write a letter to the editor of the newspaper, saying he wasn't sure there was any value in the sermons he heard over so many years, he ignited a controversy in the Letters to the Editor column in that newspaper, much to the delight of the editor. It went on for weeks until someone wrote this: I've been married for 30 years now. In that time, my wife has cooked me thousands of meals for me, but for the life of me, I cannot recall the exact menu for those meals. But I do know this: They all nourished me and gave me the strength I needed to do my work. If my wife had not given me these meals, I would be physically weak today or even dead. Likewise, if I had not gone to church for nourishment and encouragement, my life would be spiritually weak today. We're talking here about one spiritual discipline, and there's lots of them, right? Not only do we come under the Word of God together, we sing together, we pray together, as this text talks about. We have fellowship together in the hallways, in our small groups, in our ministries. We serve together. There's so many different disciplines. We witness together. We don't witness in isolation; we witness really as a family, as a team. We want to be a testimony to our world together. There's this need for interdependency. We are stronger together, and we are weaker in isolation. God built us for community, and God built us to engage in the spiritual disciplines together. Dallas Willard wrote that spiritual disciplines some of you are going to have a hard time capturing what he's talking about here. Let me explain it. He says they're "activities that are in our power and that enable us to do what we cannot do by direct effort." What do we mean about that? Think about it with me this way: When you read or you study your Bible, you may not see hear me clearly a direct correlation between what you're reading and studying to your everyday life and needs. You may not be able to draw a line from that verse or that chapter that you read to that practical need in your life right at that moment. But here's what you do do when you read and study the Bible: You're opening yourself up to a God ordained means of encountering God's presence and power and grace that is essential for you to change and be the person that you were meant to be.
Page 12 You see it? It's something that isn't direct but something you have opportunity to be intentional about that opens you up to a power and an enablement that you could in no other way have. And that's why something like prayer that's so simple is so necessary. You go, "Well, how does this help me solve my problem? Pray?" It opens you up to the presence and the power of God, to either change your circumstance that you cannot change or to change you towards a circumstance that is not changing. Either way, God's glory and power and presence are manifesting themselves to enable you to flourish not just survive, but thrive. Do you see it? In the same way, the fellowship and love of community and the community of faith is critical to your experiencing and encountering the presence and the power of God in the Holy Spirit, to become the person that God made you to be as His servant, an ambassador. He has meant for you to grow with believers. This means you are needed, you are absolutely needed in the body, and it means also that you need the rest of believers. There's an interdependence that God has wired you for and made you for, and you need that. One of the scary things, it used to be people would leave churches and they'd bounce around and go to different churches. Now what we're seeing happening is people leaving churches and not joining to another body of believers. That is concerning. If you ever leave Emmanuel I don't want you to leave, but if you ever leave Emmanuel, please go to another Bible believing church and drill down, be a part of it, enter into the life of that church. Don't just be a spectator. Be a contributor and be blessed by the people around you who need to contribute into your life. You see it? We need to be loved, and we need to love. God made us for this. Can I just be honest and real with you about this? Church and community in general are living in hard times today in the Western world. The interesting part about our secular culture as we move further and further away from God, part of what our secular culture has done to us is drive us deeply towards a culture of radical individualism. And so, ironically, we are more connected technologically than ever before but more isolated and alone in the midst of our communities. And researchers are now adding to what the Bible says, "You know, maybe the Bible's right about that whole community thing." Yes, it is. You need it deeply. You need it desperately. And you don't just need people; you need people who will help you need God. You see it? And that's what the body of Christ is. Friends, let me urge you this morning, this is going to take swimming against the flow. I know I'm preaching to the choir, but the spiritual disciplines of meeting and being with the community of faith are falling on hard times, and we are going to have to flow against the
Page 13 stream. We are going to have to work to prioritize the things that are important to God to make this happen. May I encourage you toward that end. It's no mistake as we come in a moment to the Lord's Table that this is given to the church, not to individuals. It's not given to individuals; it's given to the whole body. Why? Because when you belong to Jesus, you belong to the family of God. You are sons and daughters of God and you are related, you are brothers and sisters in Christ. And as you partake of this body and remember what Jesus has done for you, one of the key ways you live that out is by living it out in the body, the love of God in Jesus Christ. May God help us thrive on mission as we give ourselves to authentic community. Let's pray. Father, thank you for Your amazing love for us. We are in awe of Your love in Christ, and even as we have a tangible picture, a visual sermon, in the Table we're about to partake of, we pray that You would remind us, burn this into our hearts and minds, and may we also be reminded that we belong to each other as we do this. May we truly live in authentic community, sharing Your love with each other. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.