Feels Like Home: Brothers and Sisters

Questions:

You Can’t Feel at Home in an Organization

What details define your congregation’s environment? Does your worship time define you, or is it your teaching? Are you characterized by your ministries beyond the church or your intimate sense of fellowship? Are there common strands through your main influences?

How does your congregational environment shape your ministries?

Ruth: The Love That Will Not Let Go

“Jesus: How We Are to Love  In John 13:34–35 Jesus spells out three distinctives of our love for one another. The Lord’s commandment appears three times in John 13:34 –35 (plus once in Romans, twice in 1 Peter, and six times in 1 and 2 John):

• “A new command I give you: Love one another.” To love one another is the new and defining command of the church. Failure sounds like a cymbal dropped on a tile floor. There is no substitute.

• “As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” Jesus’ love for us is the measure we must use to evaluate our love for others. Thus our love must be sacrificial, servant-hearted, and full of grace.

• “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” The foolproof evidence of our devotion to Christ is our love for our Christian brothers and sisters. Our worship services are not nearly such a clear statement of our love of Christ as is our love for one another.” (pp. 39-40)

Who in your congregation exemplifies hesed love, and what is the effect on the church?

How might your church leaders strengthen the congregation’s sense of covenant bonds with one another?

Brothers and Sisters

Christians are referred to as brothers 139 times in the New Testament. (Some Bible translations translate the Greek adelphoi as brothers because it is a masculine form, but it is clear in most cases that both men and women are being addressed, whether or not the translation expresses both.) Regarding one another as brothers and sisters was far more radical than we realize. In our culture, we’re used to speaking of people outside our family as brothers and sisters. A “band of brothers” describes a tight-knit military unit. Sometimes athletic teams will use the terms, as do good friends. But that almost never happened in the language of New Testament times. No one called someone a brother or sister who wasn’t a blood relative. In fact, the entire perspective on family in that culture was dramatically different from ours. In his book, When the Church Was a Family, Joseph Hellerman explains three principles:

Principle #1: “In the New Testament world the group took priority over the individual.”

Principle #2: “In the New Testament world a person’s most important group was his blood family.”

Principle #3: “In the New Testament world the closest family bond was not the bond of marriage. It was the bond between siblings.”

2 Peter 1:7 where believers are admonished to add to their “godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.” Philadelphian is also translated brotherly love. In their commentary on 2 Peter and Jude, Dick Lucas and Christopher Green wrote, “The New Testament is the only place where the word has been found outside the context of a home. A first-century reader would therefore come across it here with a sense of shock; Peter really does mean that Christians should have a quality of relationships which is demonstrably different and satisfying, demanding a high and new loyalty.”3

I’ve seen too many Christian families who are not anchored in the relationships of God’s first family, the church. Christians are raising children who, like them, see church as an event, not a family; who see being with God’s people as an optional weekend activity. They skip church for all manner of activities, and do not regularly connect their families with others in the congregation.

In our family there are often times when Kelvin or I are gone because of our campus duties and ministries. When we talk with our kids about this—about why mom or dad are gone—we explain to them that it’s because we are a part of two families. We have our family of the four of us, but we are also part of a bigger family—the family of God—and we have a role in both families and we need to care for both families.

Can you restate (for memory’s sake) the significance of the New Testament calling Christians “brothers and sisters”?

How would your church change if people thought of it as their “first family”?

Love’s Coat of Many Colors

Galatians 6:10 “So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.”

Matthew 23:8–12 “But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all brothers. And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven. Neither be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Christ. The greatest among you shall be your servant. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”

Have you noticed how a waiter will say, “Hi, I’m Jack, and I’ll be your server tonight.” Never servant. That would be too demeaning. None of us are naturally eager for the title of servant. Except for Jesus. He was a servant at heart, humble enough in serving that He became “obedient to death—even death on a cross” (Phil. 2:8).

Philippians 2:3–4 “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.”

Philippians 2:7 “but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.”

That’s the rub when it comes to Christian service—that self-sacrificing humility. It isn’t the task that is the test. It’s doing it with the very nature of a servant. Often, people like to serve at church. They like to sing, or teach, or manage the finances. But let someone actually treat us like a servant and the claws come out.

The trouble with authenticity in a church is that it’s not always very impressive. With just a little effort we can make ourselves look better than we are. Not more authentic, just better-looking. But that is a deadly endeavor, especially in the pursuit of church growth. Paul wrote in Romans 12:9, “Love must be sincere,” i.e., genuine, not hypocritical, not theatrical.

We’ve adopted a phrase in our church: “We will paint with the colors God gives us.” That means we will try to use as many of our people as we can in order to portray the Lord and His blessings in worship services and other ministries of our church. We don’t structure our services to appeal to a certain kind of audience.

As church leaders, we are entrusted with overseeing our church family’s love for one another. Like parents, we are entrusted with cultivating family unity and love. Think of the things parents do to strengthen their families: insisting on certain meals together, family fun times like game or movie nights, family celebrations, shared chores, reinforced respect (“That is no way to treat your brother!”), a sense of family heritage (“Remember who you are.”), and loyalty (“You take care of your sister. She looks up to you.”). Church leaders can adapt virtually the same strategies to develop our church-family relationships.

Colossians 3:12–14 “Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.”

Interestingly my greatest advantage in ministry, especially to other pastors, has been vulnerability. I hear it often. I suspect that is true of you as well.

Undoubtedly your church has many loving servants. Take a few minutes and identify them in your mind, thanking God for them. Maybe you should write some thank-you notes.

Why do you think church leaders give little time to evaluating how well your church obeys Christ’s command to “love one another”?

Philemon: Fresh Starts Refresh Hearts

Who has God brought to your church who required a stretch of grace?

In your own experience, how has persevering in a church when it might have been easier to leave affected your Christian maturity?

God’s Family at Rest

Would you describe your church as a place of rest for souls?

I identify three spheres of spiritual rest—worship, corporate prayer, and sitting at Jesus’ feet to receive His grace and truth. Which are your church’s strengths? Weaknesses?

Company’s Coming

Do you think visitors who come to your church sense that “God is really among you”? How could you enhance that impression?

If loving one another starts with knowing names, how could you encourage that without embarrassing your guests?

Personal Attention

What are ways your church is good at personal attention? Who are especially effective at this kind of ministry?

Are there people who have drifted away from your church whom God might want you to pursue?

What Care Looks Like

How have you seen care for your people help your church mature in Christ? How does that work?

How could you more effectively enlist prayer for those carrying heavy burdens?

The Whole Church Preaches

How have you seen your whole church preach the gospel?

How could you help your congregation preach better together, whether through a program or informally?

Parenting the Church Family

If you’re a parent, how has that role affected your approach to church ministry?

What are a couple of ideas from this chapter you could use to strengthen your leadership’s “parenting” abilities in your church?

Close to Home

How would you describe your own thoughts about Christ’s return and for our heavenly home?

How would you like to help your church long more earnestly for these things?