The Joy of Fellowship

0:43The life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it, and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us. That which we have seen and heard, we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us. And indeed, our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.

1:14This is God's Word. You may be seated. Walking seems to have become more difficult than it used to be. If you Google Walking Fails, You will find dozens, if not hundreds, of videos of people walking into telephone poles, into glass doors, into walls, and even into fountains. It has gotten so bad that the National Department of Safety has now a category that is called distracted walking to describe injuries. Many major cities are now posting these signs that you see behind me. Pay attention while walking. Your Facebook status update can wait. In China, they now have separate sidewalks for people who are just walking and people who are walking while texting.

2:17We know how to walk. We're just much more distracted than we've ever been before. Perhaps the same could be said of Christians as well. This summer, we're going to be studying the letters of John in a series that we've called Walk This Way. Now, these letters were written by the Apostle John, one of Jesus' 12 disciples and closest friends. He writes from the city of Ephesus on the western coast of what is now Turkey around 90 AD. And if John was a teenager during the time that he was following Jesus, then that means he is somewhere around 75 years old at this point in time. He is One of the last remaining eyewitnesses of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection. And so, in these letters, John is helping second and third generation Christians, Christians who grew up, so to speak, in Christian homes, how they must walk as followers of Jesus. Now, it's not hard to imagine that 50 plus years after Jesus' resurrection and ascension into heaven, that maybe especially those who grew up in Christian homes, they've become distracted. Other things have taken precedent in their hearts and minds as they are thinking about living their daily lives, as they think about walking as followers of Jesus, and so they need to be reminded how to walk.

3:45And so, we're going to come across several key verses in 1 John. One of these is in 1 John 2, verse 6. Look at what he says. Whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked. This is why we've called the series walk this way. And so, today we're going to jump into chapter 1, verses 1 through 4 in a message called The Joy of Fellowship. All the scriptures teach, and our desires confirm as well, that we were created for fellowship with God and for fellowship with other people. The problem is that our sin has left us alienated, alienated from God and alienated from other people. And so, what we're going to learn as we go. Through these first four verses today, is that in Christ we have joyful fellowship with God and with other believers.

4:39Now, John's writing style is a little bit unique. John writes in a cyclical manner. And what I mean by that is that he will start on a topic and then he'll leave and talk about two or three other things and then come back to the same topic. So he doesn't really write in an A, B, C linear fashion. So for people like me, that's hard. I like things in a straight line, nice and neat, very clear and logical. That's not how John writes. And that's probably not how a lot of you think either. And so this is going to be a great letter for some of us and a challenging letter for others because John is writing in this cyclical way. So one of the things that you can do as we study these letters together is you can make categories for subjects that he's going to talk about as we preach through these letters. So you can come back and see, oh, he talked about that in chapter one, and then he revisits that in chapter two, and then he comes back again in chapter four to that same idea. So let's talk about these first four verses here. These are some of the most challenging verses to interpret and understand. In fact, commentator C.H. Dodd called them a grammatical tangle.

5:48It can require several close readings of these verses just to understand what he is saying. So grammar is part of the reason that they're challenging, but the other reason is. Subject matter. He's talking about the word of life. This is a robust concept that's packed with meaning. And if you're familiar with John's gospel, the gospel of John, this paragraph is going to be recognizable to you. And that's because he starts this letter much in the same way as he starts his gospel account. Look on the screen at John chapter 1, verses 1 and 2. This is how he starts his gospel. In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God.

6:39And now you look at how he starts his first letter here in 1 John 1. That which was from the beginning. And so what John is doing is he's proclaiming the same truth. The word of life has existed from the beginning. That's the very same phrase that Moses uses to open up the entire Bible in the book of Genesis. In the beginning, God created. So the point of all of this, Moses' point as well as John's point in his gospel and in his letter, is that the word of life is eternal. The word of life existed prior to creation. And the clear implication then is that the word of life is God himself. Because only God is eternal. Only God existed prior to creation.

7:28Most scientists agree. That there is abundant evidence that the universe had a definite beginning point. It has not always existed. And anything that has not always existed, that had a beginning point, requires a beginner. It's not possible for something to create itself. You would have to simultaneously exist and not exist in order to do that. And so John is saying that which is from the beginning is the word of life, and by definition, that which is from the beginning must be God because only God has existed from the beginning.

8:05Now we're going to return to verse 1 in just a few minutes, but first I want to consider the amazing claim that he makes in verse 2 about that which was from the beginning. Look at verse 2. He says, The life was made manifest. Now go down to the end of the verse. He writes, the eternal life, which was with the Father, and was made manifest to us. So this word translated manifest means something like to make appear or to cause to be seen. And so what John is saying is that the word of life, God Himself, who eternally existed, has appeared. He has made himself visible to us. Again, let's go back to John's Gospel and see how he talks about this in chapter 1, verse 14. He writes, and the word became flesh. And dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

9:11So, what we learn all throughout Scripture is that there is one God who has expressed Himself in three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. Now, this is a mystery, but it's not a contradiction. One God who expressed Himself as three gods would be a contradiction. One person who expressed Himself as three persons would be a contradiction. But what the Bible teaches is that one God has expressed Himself in three persons. A mystery, but not a contradiction. And an even greater mystery is that the second person of the Godhead, God the Son, Jesus Christ, became flesh and dwelt among us.

9:53So, without forfeiting His deity, without ceasing to be God, He added humanity. He became one person with two natures. And I just love this quote from Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology. Look at what he says about this. He's talking about the incarnation. He says, It is by far the most amazing miracle of the entire Bible. Far more amazing than the resurrection, and more amazing even than the creation of the universe. The fact that the infinite, omnipotent, eternal Son of God could become man and join himself. To a human nature forever, so that infinite God became one person with finite man, will remain for eternity the most profound miracle and the most profound mystery in all the universe.

10:49And yet, both in his gospel and in this first letter, this is exactly what John is saying: the word of life, the Son of God, who was from the beginning, took on flesh and made his dwelling among us. He manifested himself to us. Now, these are incredible claims. And because most of us in the room today are professing Christians who have been in church, we've studied the word of God for a long time, we don't necessarily have that hit us in the same way. But I just want you to think for a moment, put yourself in the shoes of someone who has never encountered the claims of Christianity before, and someone says to you that God, the one God of the universe, took on flesh and manifested himself to us, you would have some questions about that.

11:36You might think that person is crazy, you might think that they're lying, but you would not just say, sure, sounds good, and move on. You would absolutely not do that. So, how do we know that any of this is true? These are incredible claims. So, back up again to verse 1, and let's look at that verse again and see how we know that John is telling the truth. That which was from the beginning. Which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands. Go down now to verse 2. We have seen it. Look at verse 3. He says, That which we have seen and heard.

12:21Now you notice right away in these first three verses all of the personal pronouns and the personal experiences that John is using and describing. In fact, if you go through and count, there are at least 13 personal pronouns used in these first four verses. At least 13 times in this small paragraph, John says, We, our, us. All of these personal pronouns. He's not passing on secondhand information or hearsay. He, along with the other disciples, walked with Jesus in close proximity. And what that means is they had the opportunity to hear him, to see him, even to touch him during his lifetime and after his resurrection from the dead. Seven times in this passage, he mentions hearing or seeing or touching the word of life. So let's walk through those. First, he talks about hearing the word of life.

13:23Now, a lot of Old Testament believers heard God speak. And there were some. Old Testament believers, like Moses and Elijah, who not only heard God speak, but who carried on a dialogue with God Himself. So they heard God too, but John heard the Word of life in a different way. God Himself, through the person of Jesus Christ, spoke directly to Him and the other disciples, not just once, not just a few times. Think about Moses and Elijah. How many interactions are there between them and God in all of the Scripture? Maybe a handful.

14:02But John interacted with, heard the Word of God every single day for something like three years. They had first-hand experience. They heard Jesus teach the truth. They heard him correct their misunderstandings about the kingdom of God. They heard him correct their misunderstandings about who would be saved, who would go to heaven. They heard the word of life firsthand. But not only that, he says they have seen the word of life. And friends, that's far more than anyone else in history could ever say.

14:40Moses saw God, didn't he? But how did he see God? He had to cover Moses' eyes, and he said, You will get to look at my back. That's all. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, when they were in the fiery furnace, the pre-incarnate Son of Man, Jesus, was there with them in that one experience. They, in a sense, saw God. But John and the disciples were face to face with the Son of God every single day as he performed miracles and as he taught the truth and ultimately as he went to his death on the cross. Most of John's readers never saw Jesus, the Son of God, the word of life, but John did. He saw him.

15:24And then, third, he says, we have looked upon the word of life and touched him with our hands. Now, this word translated looked upon means something like to observe with continuity and attention. To observe with continuity over a long period of time, with attention. You're observing it. And this is very important because thousands of people heard Jesus teach. Thousands of people saw Jesus. So that's not really a unique claim that they heard and saw him. But what was different about John and the disciples is that they looked upon him. They were able to observe him with continuity and attention for a long period of time. And remember, James, who writes the epistle of James, later becomes a leader in the church, he was Jesus' half-brother. He did not believe that Jesus was the Son of God until after his resurrection. In fact, he thought he was crazy. And I'm just telling you right now, if any. Man says his brother is God, I don't know what more evidence you need. The case is closed. We can leave.

16:38Neither of my sons would say that the other one is God. Fairly confident about that. But this is what James says. James says he is, in fact, God. He looked upon him. But more than that, he says they touched him with their hands. And this is very significant because one of the heresies, one of the false teachings that was very prevalent around this time, was that Jesus was fully God, but he was not man. In fact, he never actually took on a human body. He only appeared to have taken on a human body. And that type of thinking was influenced by the Greek philosopher, the Greek philosophers of the day, who believed that the material parts of this world were evil and that spiritual matters were good. And so Jesus, God himself, would have never attached himself to evil, material things. He would have only had a spiritual being because spirit is good and matter is evil. And so no doubt that's part of why John says, listen, we have touched him with our hands. We lived with him every day for three years. He definitely was not a spirit. He was in the flesh. We ate with him on the beach after his resurrection. We touched him.

17:56But I think even more than that, John is referring to. Touching Jesus after his resurrection from the dead. Look on the screen at John chapter 20. 10 of the disciples rather at this point have already seen the resurrected Christ. Now, Thomas, one of the twelve called the twin, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, We have seen the Lord. But he said to them, Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.

18:37Now, Thomas gets a bad rap. Thomas is universally belittled among Christians for not having faith. But let's just be honest here for a moment. None of the disciples were camped out at the tomb. None of them had set up their tents and their hammocks and cots and everything, eagerly anticipating that third day when Jesus would rise from the dead. They didn't believe either. And I think we are prideful and arrogant if we think that we would have been different. I, for one, am very thankful that Thomas's response is recorded in Scripture. Because this is proof that no one can say, all this is blind faith. All this is is blind faith. They just made it up to feel better about themselves. No, we know for sure that there was at least one among them who says, I will never believe. Unless I touch him, unless I see the marks in his hands, unless I put my hand into his side, I will never believe. And so look at what happens next: John chapter 20, 26. Eight days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, Peace be with you. Then he said to Thomas, Put your fingers here and see my hands, and put out your hand and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe. Thomas answered him, My Lord and my God. Jesus said to him, Have you believed because you have seen me? Listen to this next statement for Jesus, for you and for me. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.

20:23So again, nothing wrong with Thomas's doubt. I would have been in that same place. But Jesus says, Even more blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed the testimony. And so that's what John is doing here in 1 John 1. He's establishing himself as a credible witness. He's saying, these things are incredible. I know these things are impossible to believe. But we heard him. We saw him. We touched him. He really did rise from the dead. His testimony can be trusted. And that's where he takes the argument in verse 2.

21:00Look at what he says again. He says, We testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us. So, this word testify is the Greek word martureo. I don't usually say Greek words because I'm not trying to impress you or anything. I don't really know Greek that well myself. But that's where we get our word martyr from. Martereo, martyr. And a martyr is one who testifies or bears witness to provide information about a person or event that they have first-hand knowledge about.

21:41That's why this word is so important. He's saying, I am testifying, I am bearing witness because I was an eyewitness. I saw these things myself. I have direct knowledge. So that's what John is doing. He's relaying what he's heard and seen and touched. And this word proclaim means to announce or inform, especially with a focus on the source of the information. So, as we know, a herald back in the day would be sent to make proclamations on behalf of the king. His job was to go and announce or inform what the king had already decided. And everybody knew that the information coming out of the herald's mouth was trustworthy because they trusted the source.

22:30The king's herald. Not just a random herald, not just a random person with the latest gossip. He was the king's herald. The source of information was trustworthy. And John is saying, We testify, we proclaim to you, we announce these things, and you can trust us because we were there. I was an eyewitness. The question, though, now is: why is John writing these things? All of that is great, but what's the connection to everyday Christian life? What's the connection to how we walk as followers of Jesus? Well, this is what he says next. Look at verse 3: That which we have seen and heard, we proclaim also to you, so that you may have fellowship with us. And indeed, our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ.

23:28Now, fellowship is a distinctly Christian word. And you don't hear that used by non-Christians. I've never seen a sign at the Harley dealership, you know, by my house when they do those get-togethers and cookouts outside. Like, it doesn't say, Harley fellowship this Saturday. Never seen that. It's not used by people outside of the church. It's the Greek word koinonia. It means fellowship or communion. And as we remind you, every time that we take the Lord's Supper or communion together, the whole reason that we have communion is because of our shared. Shared faith in Jesus, in his life, death, and resurrection. So remember back to Titus chapter 3, verse 3, which we just studied recently. Look at what it says. For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.

24:28So our problem is summarized in this verse. We were alienated from God and we were alienated from one another because of our sin. Our sin left us broken, hated by others and hating others. Our sin left us without fellowship. But what Titus goes on to say is that through Christ, God poured out his mercy on us. He saved us not because of what we did or what we will do, but because of his mercy and grace toward us in Jesus' death and resurrection from the dead. And so, friends, through faith in Jesus, we are reconciled to God. Jesus has borne God's wrath in our place. He took our sins upon himself.

25:17And through faith in Jesus, we are also reconciled to one another because he broke down the dividing wall of hostility that existed between us. He replaced our hatred for others with love. For others. And what John wants more than anything else is for us and his readers to have fellowship with God and with each other. And what the Bible teaches is that we do, friends, we do have that fellowship with God and with other believers. But oftentimes, many Christians struggle to live in that reality. That we do have fellowship with God that is not based on what we have done. It's not based on what we will do, but it's based solely on what Jesus has done for us.

26:08So on any given day, whether you feel reconciled to God or not, through faith in Christ, you are reconciled to God. And many times, Christians struggle to live in the reality that we have fellowship with one another, not based on what we do or do not have in common, our culture, our ethnic background, socioeconomic standing. We don't have fellowship based on any of those things, but based on our common faith in Christ. This is what we were created for: to enjoy eternal, perfect fellowship with God and with each other. That's what Jesus purchased for us. And John wants his readers to know and experience this so badly. That's the whole reason he's writing. Look at verse 4. And we are right. These things so that our joy may be complete.

27:08Isn't that remarkable? John says, the whole reason that we are writing to you about fellowship with God and fellowship with one another is so that our joy will be complete. There is a sense for John that if they are not reconciled to God and if they are not reconciled to each other, his own joy can't be complete. His heart will be broken until every one of his readers is reconciled to God and to other people through faith in Jesus.

27:39And more than that, their joy can't be complete. Their joy can't be complete as long as they are alienated from God and from one another in their sin. If you go back and you read the Gospel of John, it's such an amazing book. And one of the things that you find all throughout that book is this emphasis on joy. John is known as the apostle of joy and love because he writes so much on these subjects. And I want to draw your attention to John 15, verse 11. This is Jesus talking. And he says, These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.

28:22Friends, Jesus came to give us abundant life. And that abundant life is the direct result of having. Fellowship with God and with other believers. But so many things in this world promise us this lasting joy. We're told that if we have money, if we have possessions, if we have status, if we have experiences, then we will have abundant and lasting joy. But both God's Word and our own human experience testifies that this is not the case.

29:00Hundreds and hundreds of wealthy men and women have written at the end of their life, after they got all of the money, all of the possessions, had all of the experiences, did all of the things that they hoped to do, that they were still empty because they were still alienated from God and they were still alienated from others. That's what our sin does. It alienates us from God and from others. It means that we can't enjoy the fellowship that we were created to enjoy.

29:28And friends, perhaps today you are painfully aware of that fact. I would have to think that there are some of you in this room who have been longing to connect with God for years. You have felt drawn to connect with God for a very long time, and you have tried everything in your power. You've picked up books at bookstores, you've turned on religious channels on television, you have sought to do religious works of various kinds, all in an effort to find the way to. Fellowship with God, and yet you've still not found that.

30:05Or maybe you've experienced the longing, the pain of desiring to connect with other people, other believers, but something has continually stood in your way. Maybe it's your own insecurities, maybe it's your own sin, maybe it's that other people have sinned against you and have created a barrier to that fellowship for you. But wherever you are, you find yourself longing to connect with God or other people or both, and you just can't figure out how that's going to happen. What you need to understand today is that Jesus came to reconcile us to God and to one another through his life, death, and resurrection. Look on the screen at 2 Corinthians 5. I love this passage.

30:50He says, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old is passed away. Behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. That is, in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. You see, we are reconciled to God and we have fellowship with him through faith in Christ.

31:30But more than that, look at what Paul writes in Ephesians chapter 2. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one, and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

32:04It's not just that we are reconciled to God through faith in Christ, it's we are reconciled to one another through faith in Christ. You see, Jesus and Jesus alone is the answer to our alienation from God. He is the only answer. He came to fix what we broke through our sin. And John's hope and my hope this morning is that we would see Christ as our only hope to be reconciled to God and to one another.

32:36And that seeing that, we would put our whole hope and trust in Jesus. In Christ, we have joyful fellowship with God and with each other. Let's pray. God, I do pray for the men and women who are acutely aware of their longing for reconciliation with you, longing for the fellowship with you that other people in their life seem to enjoy. I pray that you would reveal yourself to them. Reveal Jesus as their only hope for reconciliation and fellowship with you.

33:49I pray that they would put their trust in you, Jesus, fully this morning, not hoping in religion, not hoping in their works and their efforts, but instead hoping alone in you, Jesus. And Father, I pray for those in the room who are lonely this morning and longing for connection and community and fellowship with others, but something has stood in the way. Something has stood in the way. Of them connecting with the body of Christ meaningfully. And I pray this morning you would show them that you, Jesus, have broken down the dividing walls, not just between Jew and Gentile, but between wealthy and less wealthy and poor.

34:51Between people of different skin colors, between people of different cultural backgrounds. Every single barrier between us has been broken down, and we now have common union through faith in Christ. God, forgive us, forgive the rest of us who have failed to see the lonely and the disconnected among us. We've been too focused on ourselves and what we want when we gather on Sunday mornings or throughout the week. And I pray that our church would be known increasingly as a people who are pursuing communion and fellowship with everyone.

35:34So that we are the welcoming, inviting kind of place that you desire us to be. And the welcoming, inviting people that you desire us to be. God, we are so thankful for your word that reveals to us that you took on flesh to solve this problem that we could never solve. Our sin and alienation from you. Thank you, Jesus. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.