3 Edify the Saints

There was a church in a small town in
Tennessee that had a most interesting name.
The sign in front of it said, "Left Foot Baptist
Church.“
There was a young man who passed by the
building several times, and he always got a
good chuckle from the name.
Finally, one day when he was waiting on his
bus, he asked someone about the church
with the unusual name.

I don’t believe that he was counting on the
answer that he got.
He found out that several years before a
great conflict arose in the church.
You see, it was a foot-washing Baptist
church–they washed one another’s feet as
an act of worship.
But the conflict broke out over which foot
should be washed first.

Half of the congregation thought they should
start with the right foot.
The other half thought that they should
always start with the left foot.
The conflict simmered and brewed until
finally the left-foot proponents split off and
organized their own church.
Of course, they called it "Left Foot Baptist
Church."

While that story is unusual by itself, we know
that it is not unusual for churches to allow
small and insignificant matters to tear them
apart.
When these small things become the focus
of the church, then they keep the church
from fulfilling God’s purpose.

I am very thankful for the positive spirit of
unity that exists in the church family here.
It is something that we need to continually
work at as we strive to live out God’s
purpose for our lives and for this church.

As we talk about our purpose as God’s
Church perhaps we should adopted a
purpose or mission statement for the church.
It should begin with what we talked about
last week--our number one purpose is to
evangelize the lost.

Today we want to take a look at the second
part of our mission statement.
Not only are we to reach out to the lost and
bring them to Christ, be we are to help those
new believers grow in their relationship with
Christ.

ESV
The word Therefore means: Consequently,
As a result, For that reason, Hence, &
demands we look back to see what was
previously said.

The word used in the KJV for "
" is the word " .“
So, the second part of our purpose is to edify
the saints, building up other Christians.
"The Lindley Christian Church exists to
evangelize the lost and to edify the saints..."

The idea is of a church full of active
participants, not passive spectators. (Guzik)
In Paul gives us some
guidelines as to how we might edify one
another and build each other up.
This is Paul’s vegetarian sermon because
this short passage is full of
" ."

First of all, Paul says that we need to Focus
on God

This seems to be elementary, but may be the
hardest step if you been walking the wrong
direction and have found yourself running
away from God.
It may be that you need to sit down and have
a serious discussion with God about where
your life is headed.
You need to be open and frank with a desire
to change and let God cleanse your guilty
conscience.

Follow the straight and narrow
New drivers have a tendency to swerve back
forth.
The trick is to make small adjustments to
keep the vehicle moving in a straight path.
That’s the way you should drive.

Help Others Grow
The word " " Thayer Definition: 1) an
inciting, incitement 2) irritation
incite: 1. To move the mind to action by
persuasion or motives presented; to stir up;
to rouse; to spur on. (Websters)
A Kick in the Seat of the Pants

Have you ever been walking along and get a
stone in your shoe?
You don’t want to stop to take the time to get
it out so you keep walking, but eventually
you feel like you’ve got to remove this
boulder.
Your mind is moved to action so you take
your shoe off & the stone is so small you can
hardly find it.
Small as it was, however, it sure was
irritating.

You cannot help others grow unless you are
faithful to the body of Christ

Too many times we got the cart before the
horse.
The reason meeting together is so important
is so you can minister to others and so you
can be ministered to.
Preachers like to hit this hard because the
more people they can get in the building the
more job security they have.

People come to church for one of two
reasons–they want to be here or they have
to be here.
When you get involved in the lives of others
and understand that you have a purpose to
minister, then you will want to be here.
If the only reason you come is because it is
your duty, it makes it more difficult.

Encourage one another.
Everyone needs to be encouraged at times–I
don’t care who you are or how strong of a
Christian you are.
It’s nice to hear someone say, "It’s good to
see you here today" and really mean it.
It’s great when you’re hurting or dealing with
a sickness and people say, "I’ll pray for you"
and mean it.

After every sermon one lady always said
“Mighty Powerful.”
She said every sermon is either powerful
good or powerful bad, so "mighty powerful"
kind of covers both sides.
The church is more than people meeting
together and having a worship service on a
Sunday morning.
The more you are involved in other people’s
lives, the more you will feel a part of the
church family.

Let’s begin by taking a look at the early
church
ESV

In this passage we see four important areas
in which the church is built up.
1. Apostle’s Teaching
Preaching and teaching
They relied on the apostles to communicate
to them who Jesus was and what He had
done.
These were brand new Christians, just 4
verses away from Peter’s call to be
baptized. They had just trusted in Jesus;
now they want to know more!

Devoted uses a Greek verb communicating
"a steadfast and single-minded fidelity to a
certain course of action." (Longenecker)
There was to be no departure from the
apostles' teaching, because it was the truth
of God.
Thankfully, God allows us to sit under the
apostles' teaching - the New Testament
record. (Guzik)

2. Fellowship
Usually when we think about fellowship we
think about such things as pot luck dinners.
However, a better way to understand what
fellowship is, is to think of it as community
building,
Forming relationships.
This requires spending time together with
brothers and sisters in Christ.

The Greek word koinonia has the idea of
association, communion, fellowship, and
participation; it means to share in something.
As Christians, we share the same Lord
Jesus, we share the same guide for life, we
share the same love for God, we share the
same desire to worship Him, we share the
same struggles, we share the same victories,
we share the same job of living for Him, we
share the same joy of communicating that
gospel to others. (Guzik)

3. Breaking of Bread - the Lord’s Supper
Remembering the tremendous sacrifice of
our Lord Jesus Christ.
Even living so close to the time when Jesus
was crucified, they still never wanted to
forget it - how much more should we? (Guzik)

We are to constantly be in prayer for each
other.
Especially for Emmett our elder as he
oversees the work of the church, the
deacons Jim & Roger as they fulfill their
various duties, Nate & I as we preach.
ESV

In Paul’s letter to the church in Colossae are
instructions that will help us edify the saints.
Perhaps Paul is building on the first church
pattern in .

Each of us as member of the church are
called in one body be thankful letting the
peace of Christ rule in our hearts.
As individual members of the church, the
body of Christ on earth, there are some
things we need to be doing.

How is it possible for the word of Christ to
dwell, live, in you if you don’t spend much
time in it.
There must be reading & studying God’s
Word.
The words " " tell us that we must
study the Bible with other Christians, not just
alone.
We can build each other up when we study
the Bible together.

In addition to studying the Bible together we
through
It is not the style of song that matters. What
matters the attitude of your heart. Did you
notice

Service
The new man lives his life, all his life, for
Jesus. He will only seek to do the things that
he may do in the name of the Lord Jesus,
and he will persevere in the difficulty of doing
such things, knowing that he is doing them in
the name of the Lord Jesus. (Guzik)

Prayer
Again the emphasis on being thankful.
If we spent more time being thankful our
spiritual lives would blossom.
Note that our approach is
‘ ’.
This reminds us that of ourselves we have
no right of access.

It is because we genuinely come in His
name, through the redemptive work He
carried out on our behalf, that we have
expectation of a hearing, even for the
expressing of gratitude.

Access to God is not the easy thing that it is
portrayed by many to be.
But it is easy for us because of Him.
( )
‘ ’ has special significance in this
letter for it excludes any intermediaries.
(Pett)

Giving
God makes it plain in the OT that our giving
is connected with the spiritual blessings we
receive
ESV
Giving also includes providing for the needs
of others.

That is our responsibility as God’s Church–to
hold each other up, build up one another, to
edify each other.
ESV

3 Edify the Saints

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3 Edify the Saints