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God’s New Community #4: Making it Work. Painting a Picture

Date: 26 January 2025, 9.30 am

Speaker: Ps Luwin Wong Sermon Text: Colossians 3:12-17; Acts 2:42-47

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TRANSCRIPT

We are on the 4th and final sermon of our January series on God’s New Community, which aims to elevate our understanding of the church. And it is based on the book God’s New Community by Graham Beynon.


In our first sermon, we learnt that the church is a Holy Family of God.


In the second sermon, we learnt that as members of the Body of Christ, we build up the body by using the gifts that the Spirit has given to us.


In last week’s sermon, we saw how we ought to love one another concretely and to follow the  leaders that God had has given to lead his church.


In this week’s series finale, we will be going through the final two chapters, titled "Making it Work” and “Painting a Picture”.


We begin with “Making it work”.


And before we get into it, let us go to God in prayer.


“Heavenly Father, we thank you for saving us by the cross of Christ and calling us into a new community where he is Lord. We ask that your Holy Spirit illuminate our minds, and open up the eyes of our hearts to behold the glory of the church and to live in a manner that displays that picture to the world, for your kingdom’s sake.


In Jesus name, we pray, Amen.”


Do you know that there are more possible moves in a game of chess than there are atoms in the observable universe? You can ask Nathan, once Sunday school is over, to verify.


Some games, like chess, are difficult because you do not always know what to do in order to win. It is not clear what move you ought make, what opening gambit you have to play, what strategy you should employ. For some games, the difficulty lies in knowing what to do.


For others, like the game of darts, what you ought to do is pretty straightforward. Throw the dart at the centre of the board – hit the bullseye.


Or consider bowling. The strategy is clear, bowl the ball down the lane and hit as many pins down as possible, the more pins you hit the better. You have two tries per frame. If you hit nine on your first try, you aim at the last standing pin and hit it down. The plan cannot be simpler.


The difficulty like darts and bowling, however, lies in its execution. You know exactly what you have to do, the challenge is in doing it properly and consistently.


So when bowlers train, it is not so much about strategy as it is about skill, it is not so much about theory as it is about technique.


And that is the case with being the church. Knowing what to do as the church is the simple part of the equation. The difficult part is in actually doing it, the difficulty is in living out of identity as the church.


Church, most of us can testify, is easy in theory, but messy in reality.


Making it Work

1.         A Messy Reality

Church calls for the sacrifice of time and the setting aside of our personal interests and comforts, to come to service each week, to serve each other in various ministries with our gifts, often without recognition or appreciation for our efforts.


Some, like the praise team, stay behind after service on week for rehearsal, and then arrive early the next week to rehearse again for service. Why? Being the church, loving concretely comes at a cost.


And when we gather as the church, rubbing shoulders with different people from different backgrounds and different personalities and different ages, we soon find that to live as family, requires us to bear with one another. And this means that fellowship is hard work.


As a result, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer, said “many people love the idea of community more than the experience of community.”


We love the idea of fellowship until we experience what fellowship entails from us.

So, the practical difficulty of church brings us two problems:

First problem. We don’t want to live like as a church because we don’t like the personal cost.


It requires waking up early to set up the PA system, it requires staying up late, to prepare the Youth Bible Lesson after a long day in the office. It requires meeting up for small group bible study every other week, and then attending prayer meeting in between, and having to go for church camp every couple of years. And top of that, Dn Richard says we give more money to meet our budget. Church is costly.


Sometimes, we don’t want to live like as a church because we don’t like the personal cost.


Second problem. When we do make the sacrifice to get stuck in, we are going to get it wrong sometimes.


We are encouraged to teach one another, and so we teach in Sunday School, but then we teach the wrong thing, and we get corrected. We play the wrong note on the keyboard, and we get strange looks.


Or we want to ‘serve one another’, so we offer someone in need some practical help, but they misunderstand our intentions and they take it the wrong way.


When we live together as church, it won’t be too long before we say something we wished we hadn’t, or do something we wished we’d done differently. Or not do something and then wish we had, or we will react to something someone says or does to us and then wish we could change the way we responded.


When sinners come together, even justified sinners, when we come together as community, it is bound to be messy inevitably.


So what do we do about it?


Well, here are two common strategies that we employ.


Strategy 1: Lower our view of the church.


We manage our expectations. We read the New Testament and we see how the early church lived and loved and fellowshipped and witnessed.


We go, yea, but it’s 21st century man, times have changed, realistically, you can’t expect the same from us anymore.


We manage our expectations about the church, we lower our view of the church, so as to minimise the disappointment we feel when the church in the world does not behave like the church in the Word.


Strategy 2: Minimise our commitment to the church.


We go through the motions. Like kids playing with their kitchen set from Toy R Us. They have the stove, the oven, the sink, the kettle, all the elements of a real kitchen are there. But it’s all just for show, just for fun.


There is no real fire burning, no oil splashing, no steam to be wary about. No mess to deal with, or to clean up. We attend church, we become members, we sing the songs, we pray the prayers. But we never let these things get too real in our hearts and in our lives.


We jump in fully, we don’t allow our identity as God’s New Community to consume us. We leave as a weekend activity. We don’t commit ourselves fully. We minimise our commitment to the church.


The problem is, that neither of these two strategies do justice to God’s will for us as his spiritual family, as the body of Christ, as God’s Holy Temple, as the precious bride of the Son.


God regards church far too gloriously, he takes the church far too seriously, for us to either to either lower our view of it, or minimise our commitment to it.


What then shall we do? How then, do we make it work?


And here we come to our passage.


Colossians 3:12-17 12 Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 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. 14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. 15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. 16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. 17 And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Here’s how to make church work.


Put on Love.Let the peace Christ rule.Let the Word of Christ dwell.Give thanks to God.


But really, there are only two things we need to do, the other two come about as a result.


Two things we must do:


First, we let the peace of Christ rule in our hearts. And when that happens, it results in a harmonious love for one another.


Second, we let the word of Christ dwell in us richly. And when that happens, it results in glad thanksgiving to God.


So first, strategy 1: Let the peace of Christ rule among us.


2.         Let the peace of Christ rule among us.

This verse is not about peace within us, it is about peace between us.


15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body.

It recalls what we heard in our opening sermon, in Ephesians


EPHESIANS 2:14 14 For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility

In other words, as members of the body, as one new man, we are called to be at peace.


Now, a big question after an organ transplant operation is whether the body will accept the new organ or reject it. The possibility of rejection is there, and if the body rejects the organ,it can lead to devastating consequences, even death of the entire body.


We are all members, organs, joints, ligaments of one body. The question is, will accept, or reject one another? For the body to live, we must at be at peace. We are called to peace.


Will we allow the peace of Christ to rule?


Someone is dismissive towards you at CG, or ignores what you have said. Will you let peace rule your heart’s response, or will your allow resentment to brew?


You summon up the courage to mention a prayer request and then no-one prays for it, will you let peace rule, or will bear grudges against those present?


When you made known your family situation, you expected practical offers of help from fellow church members, but none came. Will you let peace rule, or will you give in to disappointment and frustration?


Paul asks us, will we let peace rule between us? Will peace have the final say amongst us? Will peace be obeyed when we come together as church?


Peace is more than just the absence of hostility – it is the body working in harmony.

We can break the peace of Christ simply by ignoring one another (cold war), just as much as by antagonising one another (hot war).


If women ran the world there would be no wars, just a bunch of countries not talking to each other and gossiping about each other.


Peace is more than just the absence of hostility – it is the body working in harmony.

At every instance, we have to ask ourselves, will this action or attitude promote the peace of Christ among us, or will it hinder peace between us. Will it draw us closer in harmony as members of one body, or will dismantle the unity?


So we read just a few verses earlier, Colossians 3:8-10


But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.

These are attitudes that prevent the rule of peace.


But in contrast, we are called to…


12 Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 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.

There are attitudes that promote the rule of peace.


14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

Above all, put on love, which binds them all together in perfect harmony.


Put on love, now that’s easier said done. It’s easy in theory, but difficult in practice.


It’s challenging, it’s right to find it challenging, the question is how can we rise up to that challenge?


Where can we find the reason and resource and resolve to love?


Paul give us the answer in strategy number 2.


3.        Let the word of Christ dwell among us.


Paul’s strategy 2: Let the word of Christ dwell among us.


16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. 17 And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

What is it: The gospel.


What do we do with it: Let it live among us or inhabit us.


How far do we go with it: Richly


How do we do it: Teaching and Singing.


We let the Peace of Christ rule among us when we let the Word of Christ dwell within us richly.


Or, to put it another way, the way the peace of Christ rules among us is when the Word of Christ dwells within us.


Here is an example of how the Word of Christ within us leads to the peace of Christ between us.


Take forgiveness as an example. In Matthew 18, Jesus told a parable of a man who owed the king 10,000 talents of gold, which is equivalent to 200,000 years of wages for a labourer. The king forgave this man his debt of 10,000 talents. But this man, having been released of his debt, came across someone who owed him 100 denarii, which is a 100 days worth of wages, a paltry sum compared 200,000 years of wages. And instead of forgiving his debtor, he demanded repayment. The parable highlights the absurdity of the man’s actions.


The idea is this: The Gospel, which has revealed to us the extent of God’s forgiveness for the multitude of sins we have committed against him, should lead us to treat as a very small matter, the sins that our brother or sister in Christ has committed against us.


The gospel grants us perspective on forgiveness.


“if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other”, Paul writes, “as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.”


Why do we forgive, because of the Gospel. The Word of Christ.


The Gospel that made peace between us (Eph 2) is the Gospel that keeps peace among us (Col 3).


Now I want to mention one thing. Why illustrate and associate this ministry of the word with singing? Why not use preaching as the example?


It is because singing is not limited an office or a subset of people in the church. Singing, is a congregational activity. The function of teaching and admonishing is taken from the pulpit and clergy and brought to the pew and to the laity. The ministry of the word of Christ is thus democratised.


So when you come to church, come expecting to be taught the gospel. Come expecting to teach the gospel. Come expecting to hear the gospel. Come expecting to sing the gospel.


That’s how the peace of Christ rules the church of Christ by the ministry of the word of Christ.


Put on loveLet the peace of Christ rule in our heartsLet the word of Christ dwell in us richlyGive thanks to God.


That’s how we make church work.



Painting a Picture

With that, we come to our final chapter: Painting a picture.


In Acts 2, Luke paints a picture of church. It’s the birth of the NT church. God’s New Community. We have it painted for us.


Here’s the picture:


Acts 2:42-47 42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. 43 And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. 44 And all who believed were together and had all things in common. 45 And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. 46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

This is ecclesiology made visible. The doctrine of the church made tangible.


The first things I want us to note is the commitment level of the church. Luke says they devoted themselves. That word devoted implies, strong, whole-hearted commitment. It means these things were their priority, the focus of their time and energy.


And to what did they devoted themselves? 4 things:


Devotion # 1Devoted to LEARNING.

Devotion # 2Devoted to TOGETHERNESS.

Devotion # 3Devoted to PRAISING.

Devotion # 4Devoted to PRAYING.


  1. Devoted to Learning

42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching

At my orientation week in Singapore Bible College, a lecturer gave all of us an L-plate. A card with L on it. Which is what first year drivers are required to put on their cars.


To indicate that we are in the process of learning.


We learn continually. About what God has done, about what He is doing now, about what he has promised to do at the end. Raising our knowledge of God deepens our relationship with God.


And when we know more and more about the gospel, we will see how the gospel applies to more and more areas of our lives – the difference that Christ makes to our family life and  our raising kids, to our relationships, to our work, and even to our leisure.


And we must learn from the right sources – the apostolic teaching. That is why their sermons went into the bible, and our sermons should come out of it.


Now, it does not say that the church was devoted to teaching. Not, the devotion is to learning. teaching is not the point. Learning is. The point is not simply to have good teachers, but to be good learners. So Hermon, are we devoted to learning? Are we devoted growing in the knowledge of the apostolic gospel?


  1. Devoted to Togetherness

42 and the fellowship.
45 And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. 46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts.

Fellowship comes from the Greek word Koinonia. It means togetherness, or sharing.


As a church, we share much more than a common interest in hobbies or sports, we share a new family, we share in a new body.


What does it look like? This group had daily church.  We must not miss the force of the fact that a group who basically didn’t know each other began spending time together. They began a new life as a community.


They lived as family, eating together in each others homes, which is what a family does, as we well know, in the family reunion dinners we are attending and organising this week.


In larger (temple) and smaller groups (homes). A picture of shared lives.


Go to each others homes for CG, go on holidays together, hang out with one another, don’t just sit in the same building on a Sunday morning.


Sunday service is not a preaching conference – it is a family gathering. And with that in mind,  may mean we need to change what we do on Sundays. We can’t just come and go without really talking to someone else. Maybe lunch together is more of a necessity than an optional activity. We must find ways to display our fellowship, our togetherness, our familiness, when we meet as a church each Lord’s day.


But if we take our first two devotions together, learning and fellowship, it also means spending time together, is not just about enjoying each other’s company, there must be an element of learning.


When we fellowship, we ought to build up one another through prayer, gospel conversations, confessing sins, bible-reading, speaking the truth in love.


Now, the Sunday Service will not be sufficient, nor conducive for such deep sharing of lives. So fellowship must necessarily also take place outside of Sundays. In our CGs, in our 3-2-1s, or any other way in addition to Sunday.


We need these things to happen to be devoted to our ‘togetherness’.


  1. Devoted to Praising

46 breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God…

That is the essence of breaking bread, it’s a family meal which remembers the goodness of God in creation, and provision, in redemption and salvation.


This breaking of bread creates community of thankful people, a rejoicing people, a people of praise.


And family, praise is a response to that which praiseworthy. Namely, it is a response to the word of Christ. It is a response to God and to what he has done, is doing, and will do. It is a response to the Gospel that dwells richly within us. The richer the indwelling, the richer our praise.


So if we want to praise more richly, we must not assume that the way is to simply sing more loudly, no, the way is to learn more deeply about the word of Christ. So that it dwells richly within us.


Mt Hermon must be a devoted to praising.


  1. Devoted to Praying

42 and the prayers

Prayer is another vital response to God.


In the book of Acts, the picture we have of the church is a people devoted to prayer.


Acts 1: Prayer for choosing the 12th apostle

Acts 2: Devotion to prayer

Acts 4: Pray for Boldness

Acts 6: Prayer for Deacons

Acts 7: Prayer for forgiveness

Acts 8: Prayer for the Holy Spirit for the Samaritans

Acts 9: Prayer for healing

Acts 10: Devotion to prayer by a Gentile

Acts 12: Prayer for Peter


To not pray is to say in effect, to God, “We can manage by ourselves, thank you very much”.


God’s new community knows just how reliant they are on the grace of God to save them, and on the grace of God to sustain them, and so they devoted themselves to prayer.


The church is never taller, than when she is on her knees. The church is never stronger than when she bends in weakness before her God in prayer.


Charles Spurgeon, once said of his own church “one thing is due, namely, that in private as well as in public, they, the congregation, must all wrestle in prayer.”


When asked why his ministry was so successful, he simply answered “because my people pray for me”.


In prayer we:


  • Adoration: Praise God

  • Confession: Confess our sins

  • Thank God: For what he has done

  • Supplication: Seek God’s will and power to act in the world.


42 and the prayers

But note this, Luke doesn’t simply write that the church was devoted to praying, he said that they were devoted to “the prayers”, which indicates that they praying scripted prayers, liturgical prayers, set prayers, which has become tradition for the early church.


The Anglican’s have one called the Book of Common Prayers. These scripted prayers can be great additions and edification for our own prayer life.


I conclude my own personal devotions, by praying through a Psalm. And also from a book titled: The Valley of Vision. It is a collection of prayers written by the Puritans.


Here is an example of one prayer found in the book, titled "A Disciple’s Renewal”.


 MY SAVIOUR,

Help me.
    I am so slow to learn,
      so prone to forget,
      so weak to climb;
I am in the foothills when I should be
    on the heights;
I am pained by my graceless heart,
  my prayerless days,
  my poverty of love,
  my sloth in the heavenly race,
  my sullied conscience,
  my wasted hours,
  my unspent opportunities.
I am blind while light shines around me:
  take the scales from my eyes,
  grind to dust the evil heart of unbelief.
Make it my chiefest joy to study thee,
  meditate on thee,  gaze on thee,
  sit like Mary at thy feet,
  lean like John on thy breast,
  appeal like Peter to thy love,
  count like Paul all things dung.
Give me increase and progress in grace
    so that there may be
  more decision in my character,
  more vigour in my purposes,
  more elevation in my life,
  more fervour in my devotion,
  more constancy in my zeal.
As I have a position in the world,
  keep me from making the world my position;
May I never seek in the creature
  what can be found only in the Creator;
Let not faith cease from seeking thee
until it vanishes into sight.
  Ride forth in me, thou King of kings
    and Lord of lords,  that I may live victoriously,
    and in victory attain my end.

Amen.

You pray a prayer like this everyday for a month straight, and you cannot but be transformed. BY God’s grace, something happens in your heart.


Devoted yourself to such written prayers.


But devote yourself to praying. And some obvious application for Hermonites are as follows:


  • To attend our fortnightly Prayer Meetings held over Zoom on Wednesdays, where we pray for the church and for one another gathered online.

  • And the weekly prayer focus, as a family before meals.

  • And weekly prayer page, in our CGs and person devotions.


So in addition to books like the We have sufficient resources for prayer in Mt Hermon for Hermonites to be devoted to praying.


Let’s devote ourselves to prayer.


47 And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

5.  Evangelism?

None of these four priorities mentions evangelism. That’s partly because the focus is on painting a picture of the church’s life together.


The attractiveness of this new community’s life drew people into the church. People were drawn by the believers’ love for each other, their unity, their desire to speak and listen to the truth, their joy in the Lord.


Who will Hermon be, how will Hermonites relate, and love, and serve each other, how greatly will praise and gratitude and joy be a culture of our community?


What sort of picture will we paint? Will the world be able to see Christ in it? Will the world be thereby drawn to us? Hermonites, the brush is in your hand. By our Spirit-filled, Word-dwelled, peace-ruled lives, let us paint the beauty of the church.


By our devotion to learning, togetherness, to praise and the prayer, let us paint the beauty of the church.

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