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As we come into this family with God there are levels of relationship that God brings us into. They are
We talked about level 1 (making a commitment) in our last lesson. Now let's look at the second level.
Level 2 -- Friendship
The second level is that of friendship. It becomes a little deeper here than what we saw in level 1. Friendship is when I'm learning to share and the Bible talks about sharing in Acts 2:44. This is the very first church. It's talking about what they did, just a thing that came naturally as the Spirit of God came upon them. It says, "All the believers met together constantly and shared everything with each other."
Now, a lot of us, that "they were sharing" kind of makes us uncomfortable. Now if you don't have anything, you like that. "I'm a void of all this stuff. I believe we all should share. Can you share that boat? You aren't going to be using it next weekend, are you? Can you share that car?"
Those who are kind of lacking in material things like that word "share." But those who have plenty go, "I'm sure that's not what He meant. I'm sure he meant something else there." Well, we are going to be a person who shares. That is how relationships are built; that's how friendships are built. If you know somebody who has had a friend for 20, 30, 40 years, somebody in that deep of a friendship, you're talking about a lot of sharing that has taken place.
But one thing that has happened to build that relationship is that they had to choose to meet together and share their time. They shared their resources; they shared a lot of things among them. But they had to get together to share.
There are several habits that we have to have in our life for us to grow. We need quiet time; we prayer; we need Bible study. These are different habits that we have to grow. And another one of the habits that I will talk about is the habit of fellowshipping with other believers. I think it has to be a habit, and you have to build this habit, because you want to do it even when you don't feel like it. Fellowship is a hard thing, and not all of us are built for it.
There's a lot of the people that are outgoing. They are extroverts, and they get their energy by being around people. They are always smiling and greeting people. They are jumping in your face, and saying things like, "Hi, can I come over today?" They can do that because they are extroverts and they love people. But not everybody is that way. In fact, a large number of people are not that way, they are not that way at all. (In fact, I am not one of them either.)
I get my energy by getting off by myself, and at times I like people to leave me alone. When you put this in a relationship context, it makes things very difficult, because you won't naturally gravitate to relationships. Just the opposite, you will tend to pull away from relationships. And I tell you what, once the enemy gets you alone, he has got you. Isn't that right? When he gets you alone, he cuts you off. Then he takes you out, because you are alone and there is no one to support you.
Fellowship is something I have to choose to walk in, whether I feel like it or not. A lot of times, I don't feel like it. But it is a choice I make. Why? Because if you are going to stay healthy and grow and mature in the Lord, fellowship is a critical part of it. You are going to have to learn how to connect and how to relate with other people. If you are going to be successful and overcome, you are going to have to know how to do that and part of it is going to be sharing.
Now, what does God want you to share? First of all, He's going to want you to share your experiences. Now I'm not talking about just sharing our testimonies. I'm talking about sharing your failures, your successes, your victories, sharing the things that you've gone through.
The Bible says in Proverbs 27:17, "People learn from one another, just as iron sharpens iron." We learn from one another. There is an old saying that you are probably familiar with: "It is wise to learn from your own mistakes but, it's even wiser to learn from other people's mistakes." You see, you don't have to experience everything to learn it on your own. God has given you people around you with a variety of experiences with their successes and their failures to learn from.
If you look around you at church next Sunday, the people next to you know things that you don't know. You know things that they don't know, because nobody knows it all. You don't have enough years in you lifetime to learn it all by yourself. You need to learn from the people around you. In your church, there is a wealth of information because of the experiences that we have--and God wants us to share our experiences with each other. Why? Because He wants us to grow and we need each other to grow.
Maybe God just simply made you deficient? He didn't give you everything. He made you to need other people. Not only must we share our experiences, but we must share our homes. Open your home to each other. God wants us to share our homes. I don't know if you knew this but when the church was birthed, they didn't have buildings. For 300 years they didn't have buildings.
In Acts, chapter 2, that they met in the temple and then they met from house to house. In fact, several places in the Book of Acts, you'll find that they met in the large group which is what we're doing now, and they met in the small group, because you see, it was in the small group that relationships are built. You'll see some in the Bible, it says for the church that met in the home of...you see, they met in homes. Why? Because that's where genuine fellowship takes place.
We can attend church and do the things that make it "church" -- teaching, worship, etc. But real, genuine fellowship is not going on in those things. For instance, during the sermon, the pastor is talking and no on else is. This is not really fellowship. You really need the relationship of the people in a smaller setting--and the natural place where God has given us is our homes, because we all have homes. We all live some place. He has given us these places that we can connect and relate with people.
Many of you are in churches that have small groups called things like "home fellowship groups," "Kinship groups," "cell groups," etc. If you are not currently involved in one of these groups, maybe you should seriously think (and pray) about joining one. I know it can be scary, but it is a good way to start building relationships.
You may have concerns like: what are they going to do? Did I bring the right thing or should I have brought anything? I didn't anything and should I? Was I supposed to bring something? Are they going to like me? Are they going to accept me? What are they going to make me do there? What are they going to make me share? And so you might freak out; sometimes it can be a scary thing.
Some of you don't like going to groups because you had bad experiences in going to groups. Let me tell you, I've had some bad experiences in restaurants. But it doesn't keep me from trying other ones out. I'm not going to say, "I'm never going to eat at another restaurant again for the rest of my life." I got to say the food was bad there; I got food poisoning or something. No, I'll go to another one. If you've had a bad experience...just keep at it. Eventually you'll find a good one. There are plenty of great people here and God wants to you start connecting with them.
So we're learning to share our experiences. We're learning to share our homes; we're learning to share out problems because all of us have problems. Nobody here is problem free and we need a place where we can talk to people about the things that are going in our life.
The Bible says that we need to weep with those that weep and we need to rejoice with those who rejoice. And when I share a joy, it's like it's doubled. Everybody else gets to share in it. We're all bubbly over this thing. But when I share a problem or a hurt or a pain, it's like it gets cut in half because somebody is helping me carry that load for me. Somebody is carrying this thing for me. So I'm able to share the things that are going on in my life, and I need encouragement. We all need encouragement here.
Galatians 6:2 says, "Share each other troubles and problems." Now, we are supposed to be doing that, sharing these things with each other. Let me give you another verse. It says Hebrews 10:25, "Let us not give up the habit of meeting together. Instead let us encourage one another."
Let us encourage one another and we all need to be encouraged, right? We're not always up all the time. There are times when we're going through stuff and I need somebody to go through the stuff with me. I know somebody is going to feel this with me. Somebody is going to endure this pain with me at least that's what we want. We want somebody to feel it with us and go through it with us. We're not always looking for somebody to fix our problem. But it's awesome whenever somebody will go with me through my problems, my issues, or situations that I'm facing.
So the first level is I'm just going to commit, I'm going to choose to belong. I'm going to enter into a relationship. I'm going to be a part of this particular body and this particular church. The next thing is I'm going to choose to build friendship and relate to people. And I'm going to do that by sharing. And as I share, I plan to develop and build my friendship. I'm going to choose to do that.