How Big is Your Table?
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How big is your table?
Haircut - I love thanksgiving because it is all about family!
When I think about our church, I think about family!
Goal from deacons - unity
Thanksgiving is a time for us to come together as family!
And when we do so, it’s because we love each other!
So, how big is our table? Are we willing to love others?
34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”
37 Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
So, we are commanded by God to love God first and secondly, to love each other
Again in:
34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
Again we are commanded to love one another
Jesus takes it a step further and says that everyone will know that we are His disciples if we love each other!
You know it is interesting that Jesus says this here...
I was thinking about this verse last night and it really hit me...
According to Jesus, people will know that we follow and learn from Him by how we love others...
He didn’t say by going to church, or giving to the poor, or getting the cross tattoo....by being able to quote scripture...
But, by how we love each other!
Now, I will say, that some of those things happen out of love..
We go to church, hopefully to love and worship God and to love on others...
We give to the poor because we love others...
We can quote scripture because we love the Word of God!
But, these things are an outflow of the love that we have for others...
This is how people will know that we are followers of God, loving others!
7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.
10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
And, Peter echoes this thought:
8 Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. 9 Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling. 10 Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms. 11 If anyone speaks, they should do so as one who speaks the very words of God. If anyone serves, they should do so with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory and the power for ever and ever. Amen.
So, Peter and John tells us to love each other, but Peter goes on to say show hospitality to one another…and use our gifts to serve others...
And Paul in:
9 Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. 10 Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. 11 Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord.
12 Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. 13 Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality. 14 Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.
15 Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. 16 Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.
Loving others is expressed when we use our gifts to serve, when we are hospitable to one another...
One of the greatest gifts this time of year is the opportunity to show hospitality to one another...
How big is our table?
Jesus says in:
13 But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, 14 and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”
When we have a banquet, invite other in....bring them to your table..
This week, I challenge you to love other! If you know of someone who needs a meal, invite them over! And serve them some pumpkin pie!
How big is our table?
I want to wrap up a little quicker this morning, but before I do, I want to read a verse in revelation where Jesus is rebuking the church in Laodicea for being mediocre.... After he rebukes them He says:
20 Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.
Here Jesus uses the picture of eating together as being one with Him...
If you haven’t opened the door to Jesus, this morning is a good time to do so!
He is knocking at the door… will you answer? If so, the Bible makes is pretty clear that if we confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe that God raised Him from the dead, that we will be saved....and we can have a continual meal with Him!
If you want this fellowship with Him, just pray to Him and confess your sins, believe in Him, and accept His gift of salvation!
For those who have already done this! I want to take some time to celebrate some of the things that He has done in your life!
1 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever. 2 Let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story— those he redeemed from the hand of the foe, 3 those he gathered from the lands, from east and west, from north and south.
I want to give you a chance to tell your story of what God has been doing in your life recently....