Fellowship Has Responsibility — Paris Reidhead

The Early Church’s Fellowship in Antioch

Will you turn please to Acts chapter 11. 11th chapter of Acts, beginning with the 19th verse, including the chapter, the 30th verse. The persecution arose about Stephen, and some of them, preaching the Lord Jesus, a great number believed and turned unto the Lord.

The tidings of these things came unto the ears of the church which was in Jerusalem, and they sent forth Barnabas that he should go as far as Antioch. Who, when he came, and had seen the grace of God, was glad, and exhorted them all that with purpose of heart they should believe unto the Lord.

For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith, and much people was added unto the Lord. Then departed Barnabas to Tarsus for to seek Saul. When he had found him, he brought him unto Antioch.

And it came to pass that a whole year they assembled themselves with the church, much people, and the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch. And in these days came prophets from Jerusalem unto Antioch, and there stood up one of them named Agabus, and signified by the Spirit that there should be great good throughout all the world, which came to pass in the days of Claudius Caesar.

Then the disciples, every man according to his ability, determined to send relief unto the brethren which dwelt in Judea, which also they did, and sent it to the elders by the hands of Barnabas. We are dealing week by week with the matter of fellowship, New Testament fellowship, that which is to be the foundation upon which the church rests.

In the past, I have read many articles and books on the subject of the church. Some true as they were in any striking or significant degree in my experience, because it is rather as though we were looking at the shell, we were looking at the form, we were looking at the edifice, than looking at that which is made it possible.

And so we find that the word has a great deal to say about this subject of poininea, communion, and participation. Into a relationship with the Lord Jesus, as we saw this morning, and we'll continue to look at next Lord's Day morning.

Then we find that there is the ground. The church has a corporate existence because the individuals are in a relationship with the Lord, sharing his life with him, and thus they can share with each other.

Every Believer as a Witness and Missionary

Now, we are seeing this sharing in effect. We're seeing it at work in the portion that's been read for. Just to remind you of what we saw in beginning measure at least last Sunday evening, was namely this.

That persecution broke out in Jerusalem regarding Stephen, which caused the believers, the disciples to flee, the apostles to go to Jerusalem. And everywhere they went, they went preaching the word, and the Lord went with them confirming the word, with signs and wonders, as we elsewhere read.

And so they had the ministry of reconciliation committed to the rank and file of believers. It must be fixed in your mind and become the very foundation of your life. If you are in Christ, you are a witness for Christ, and a missionary for Christ.

We must see this. How long have we been governed and influenced? Someone has said Rome is the mother of us all, speaking of Protestantism. And in a sense it is as though Rome is the brick wall up which the ivy of Protestantism has tried to climb, keeping itself separate and yet somehow clinging to it.

And in these days, I believe the spirit of God is trying to release the vine of his planting and get it to grow on the trellis of his word, rather than on the trellis of history. And it's very difficult, because the vine is deeply entwined and it's in the rocks.

Have you ever tried to take ivy off of a wall? It's very difficult, very difficult indeed. And sometimes you'll actually pull chunks of mortar out, and you'll split bricks, because these roots have gone in and have gone deep.

And we thus have to recognize that the very forum in which we're seated tonight, the very building in which we are, the Declaration, all are traced back not to the word of God, but to Rome. Perhaps we could go and say to the synagogue of our Lord's day, this to some degree would be true, but again I would say back to Rome.

Now, I do not feel that in my heart the least iconoclastic, the iconoclast is the icon breaker. I don't feel that I have that. I'm certainly not fighting disarrangement of the pulpit in the center and the people spread around it.

I do not believe that we could change all of this and change nothing for the better. This would be a simple mechanical change. The change that we have to make is a change not in architecture or necessarily in organization to begin with, but it's a change in attitude, change in your attitude towards your life.

You're not simply one that's to occupy 22 inches of space in an auditorium regularly and faithfully, though I must admit we miss you when you aren't here, occupy that space, and we're delighted when you are.

But our reason for it is that if you're here, perhaps you're going to hear from the desk and from the word and by the spirit that for the remaining six days of the week, God wants you as a witness for Jesus Christ.

And hearing this and sensing that the prime evangelistic strategy of the New Testament was gossiping the gospel on the part of everyone that named the name of Christ, that this was the means of evangelism.

In fact, if you'll study the tradition of the New Testament and the writings of the church fathers, you will find that when the believers assembled, it was primarily a secret or private meeting. They really didn't know often who was going to do the teaching.

Frequently they didn't, but they did have a man stationed at the door. Perhaps we could say the janitor was more important than the preacher, because it was his responsibility to invite everyone who did not know the Lord Jesus just not to meet with them.

Because you see, it was an assembly of the believers worshiping the Lord, being nourished in the truth and faith, and then they were going out to witness. And the evangelism was to be where the people resided, in the streets, in the marketplace, in the home.

And we find that it's increasingly difficult to get the unsaved into our evangelistic meetings, into our churches. It's increasingly difficult to reach them in what we would call the traditional American pattern of evangelism.

Evangelism in Everyday Life

And we are thus being forced, by the sheer weight of necessity, to rediscover God's plan, God's means of evangelism. And it is this, that where you go, whether it be to work tomorrow, or to visit friends, or wherever it is, you go for whatever task you find necessary to go, but you go as a witness for Jesus Christ.

I'll never forget the experience I had in the Maban tribe in Africa. I had been introduced to a man, and I said, oh, you're here on business. You see, at that time, the British were in charge of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, as it was called.

And they had drawn a line, the ninth parallel, and said there would be no Muslims below that parallel, and no missionaries above it, incidentally. Just yesterday, I believe it was established in the Sudan, it may have been a few days earlier, but I believe it went into effect yesterday, in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, that hereafter it will be illegal to talk to anyone about religion other than his own.

In other words, it will be a defense for which missionaries can be excluded if they talk to pagans about Christ, or talk to Mohammedans about Christ. Or if pagans talk to the Christians about their religion, it will be equally criminal.

But, of course, it isn't criminal for the Mohammedans to talk to anyone about their religion, because this is the state religion. And it's practically been a death knell for a witness in the Sudan. But I'll never forget that day, as I tell you, when I met this man, introduced to him.

He was a Mohammedan, obviously. Oh, I said, you're here on business, are you? You're here as a trader. He looked at me with the utmost sincerity and earnestness, and he said, no, my business is to be a messenger of the prophet.

I'm only here trading to pay expenses. That's why I'm here as a messenger of the prophet. And this has characterized Islam, and probably is the reason why nine people are being converted to Christ. For one, being converted to Islam.

For one, being converted to Christ in Africa. Because they have learned that every Muslim is a messenger and a servant of the prophet. Now they've taken it right out of the book. Do you view yourself tomorrow as being scattered abroad, not primarily for the necessity of earning a living?

Obviously, that's important. But your real reason for being there is to live Christ, for these that are without it, and to intercede for those who know him not. And as opportunity is given, and you can control the conversations, you witness to them, they'll turn you in Christ.

This is true with your recreation. This is true with other interests. Whatever community or society you may belong to, maybe some of you are members of the garden club, or the PTA, or the veterans, whatever collateral organization you're a part of, is to be viewed as a legitimate and proper field of witness.

Scattered abroad, they went everywhere preaching the word. Driven by the sword of those who thought they could extinguish the faith they actually scattered in. Now, we must see this, that the fellowship of witness includes every member of the body.

Until you come to the place in your heart of hearts that you realize that evangelism is your responsibility. Your responsibility. He gave evangelists, pastors and teachers, and the evangelist, incidentally, is not the man who comes for special meetings.

He would be fitted into the scriptural definition of an exhorter. He gave evangelists, church planters, pioneer missionaries, and pastors, all the elders, and teachers, as those having elders with a special ministry of teaching, for the perfecting of the saints into the work of the ministry.

And the work of the ministry is to live Christ before the sinner, intercede for sinners, and witness to them. It's imperative that you thus view yourself. You've got to see it, if you are to fit in and have any part become a reality.

I believe it's imperative if you are to know the fullness of the spirit. Well, you remember in Luke, the 13th chapter, at midnight, when knocked and demanded bread, asked for bread. The man, the good man of the house, got up, not because they were neighbors, but because the one knocking was concerned about his inability to give bread to the hungry that came to him, expecting to be fed.

We are on the grounds to expect God to meet us with the fullness of himself, the empowering of his spirit. When the reason for it is not our own comfort, not our own joy or peace or blessing, but the reason is that we might have bread to give to the hungry.

Now, they went everywhere, and the hand of the Lord was with them. The hand of the Lord will be with you. The hand of the Lord will bless that word. Do not believe that you have to become, necessarily, the extroverted personality that talks to everyone he meets, and gives facts to everyone he sees.

You may. And if you can, if this is true to your nature and personality, and you can do it sincerely, then the Lord bless you. We certainly need it. But I think that when you have something so wonderfully real in the Lord Jesus Christ, you can talk to people without embarrassment.

It's amazing, you know, how in the recent human crisis, it's easy to talk with perfect strangers about the situation. What is it? It's something that you share. Of course, they were as interested as you were.

I find people, perhaps it's something the Lord's doing in my heart. I'm finding it increasingly easy to talk with people about the Lord Jesus Christ. Because I'm not trying to sell them something. I'm not trying to promote something.

I'm not trying to get them to respond to a formula. I'm just trying to get them to connect. Now, if you feel that witnesses essentially get selling Jesus, if you feel that it's getting them to sign up on a formula, you're going to be intimidated.

You're going to be silenced. First place, they won't do it. Second place, if they did, it would probably be just to accommodate you. And the third place, it's not necessarily what God wants. But you see, what he's asking for is that he is just real, wonderfully real.

And you talk with him. Now, you don't have to shoot them full of scripture verses. Now, this is good. It's wonderful to be able to turn to the Word and say, Well, you see, this isn't my opinion of what God's Word says.

But I think it's a little stupid to just talk in scripture verses when you're dealing with young saints. Translate it into the language that they know. And communicate with them. Just talk. Oh, we ought to read the Sermon on the Mount daily.

Until we find out that we can talk about heaven and hell and about redemption and grace in one syllable word. See this, I promise you that I'm going to dwell on it until the Spirit of God grips our hearts and we become a witness.

Make time and take time just to talk with the Pope. Do it simply. Do it directly. Do it sincerely. Never talk above your experience. Just simply eat free. That's what they did. This is the primary witnessing staff.

The Church’s Shared Responsibility in Evangelism

Witnessing was shared by all. But then there was the matter of church responsibility that came back upon the Apostles. Established, whereas you are the one that will probably have the best contact in your neighborhood, in your community, to your friends, to those you meet.

You invite me there and there's a whole wall. When people haven't here, perhaps I should be troubled, they haven't. But elsewhere, I've often had people say, would you come over? Mrs. So-and-so next door wants to.

Go ahead, leave it. That's what we're here for. It's always a reflection on the pastor and teacher. People don't know how to leave. Do not know how. Be shared by all. Everyone here tonight ought to be able to go out tomorrow and the remainder of the week and count on you to be a witness for Christ.

So, with the winner, if you please. Someone that's able to tell others about the Lord Jesus and how to carry on a conversation with others and to lead and guide and direct that conversation to the matter of the claims of the Lord Jesus Christ.

This is where evangelism is done. I bring you back again, as I have repeatedly in the past, the words of Moody. He wrote to that church, to that committee in St. Louis that invited him for what then would have been the third citywide campaign in St. Louis, which he couldn't attend because of failing health.

And he said, I've been 40 years an evangelist. During this time, I've seen tens of thousands profess faith in Christ. But I have yet to find anyone who's made a profession of faith in Christ and lived 10 years thereafter as a consistent Christian.

But what there was someone who witnessed to me and prayed for me before I came to town. I conclude that he, the important thing then, is not the coming of me or Moody, but the intercession by and the witness of the people that are now living in St. Louis.

I think this is true. In the church, and so the apostles are concerned. They're keeping close touch with what's happening. Letters are sent. Messages are carried. And they heard in Jerusalem what God had done.

And so they said, who among us is able to go and to help these people? So we find fellowship of responsibility. And so Barnabas was sent that he should go as far as Antioch. It was some distance. It was a difficult journey.

But Barnabas was prepared to go. He was there. He wasn't an apostle. He was a good man, a wealthy man that had sold his home and given it to the church. But he came representing the apostles. And so it ought to be that we see continually in developing in the congregation those that are able to take increased responsibility.

Barnabas and the Ministry of Encouraging Others

You are going to discover that your Christian life is not going to become effective on the basis of some tremendous thing. You know a lot of people say they were on the wrong side of the road the wrong time, that's all.

No, I believe that if you're going to have a ministry for the Lord, it's going to be doing each day a simple task with compassion. And Barnabas did it. So there was this fellowship in responsibility that was shared by the apostles and by Barnabas.

But I want you to see something else that's extremely important. Barnabas was a good man. Barnabas was a generous man. He was a man full of the Holy Ghost and faith. And I have proof for it, because Barnabas knew he needed help.

And he decided to send one that would completely outshine him, one that would completely obscure his ministry, and one that was safely residing up in Tarsus and wasn't being hurt by it, and was thus no threat to his promise.

If Barnabas had been interested in promoting himself, he did the most foolish thing he could have done by sending for Saul of Tarsus. But you see, he was a good man, and full of faith, and full of the Holy Ghost.

And he wasn't the least concerned. He was quite prepared, I'm sure to say with John, he was too. And he was quite prepared to send up and bring this man of whom the disciples had been afraid. He had introduced Saul, Paul, down in Jerusalem to the disciples.

And they'd withdrawn from him, not at all sure. And Paul, I'm confident, drew from his own experience when he wrote to young Timothy and he said, lay hands on no man suddenly. Don't appoint people too quickly to responsibility.

Don't say to this young convert, oh, you're a deacon. Don't say to this young man, you're an elder. Don't lay hands on people suddenly. Don't obtain them suddenly. Because if you do, you'll get into trouble.

And if we do, we get into trouble. And so the apostles had sent Saul up to Tarsus, and they waited. And they waited, and they waited, and they waited. And they didn't send for him. But you see, there was a time when he was needed.

He'd spent three years, postgraduate work in the backside of the desert, unlearning, getting ready to minister. He had been content to just stay in Tarsus. And frankly, I think he was just running a little tin shop up there.

I don't know what the rest of you think of it. I just think he'd gone completely out of the Pharisee business. He had no living there. And every Jew that day had the wise parents and a wiser society that said that they had to, at the time of Bar Mitzvah, learn a trade.

Because they were afraid, you know, that something like this would develop. And I think he had a nice little business up in Tarsus. He was sitting there. He'd learned much about the Lord in those three years in Arabia.

He was having sweet and warm fellowship with the Lord. He had this revelation of Christ. And he wasn't particularly worried. He was just a sailor. And the time came when the Spirit of God pressed upon Barnabas' heart, ready for Saul.

My friend, if you are ready for his service, there will come a time. It's imperative, therefore, that you should understand that if you are to be used of God, you must allow God to win you what he desires.

Someone would say, this brilliant man, this scintillating intellect, this eloquent orator. And here he is, John the Scissorhands, in the desert, and now at the cross. What? The only thing that is a waste in a Christian's life is when he's out of fellowship.

As long as he's in fellowship with God and in the Word, whether he's used or not used, that is profitable time. The arrow that's being polished and the shaft that's being smoothed is not being wasted because the time will come that only the polished arrow can do the boldest bidding.

So God has been polishing this shaft. Is God polishing you? Is he polishing you in some little corner? Has he got you with a place where you're before him in prayer? And you're asking him to teach you the Word?

And you're feeding his egg. Well, I don't want to take a Sunday school class. It means too much study. My friend, if you are studying the Word of God without a Sunday school class or some other ministry, you're living in disobedience to God.

If your study is conditioned only upon your responsibility, you've reached the limit of your service. You won't have that. The blessings are from God. You ought to study the Word of God knowing that all Scripture is given by inspiration to God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness that might be perfect unto every good work.

All this for God, unless you're studying the Word. Now, I don't have reference to correspondence, reference to night school. These things are good. I don't have reference to just reading the books of other writers.

I am talking to you upon this which you study, which is concentrated thought and attention to the Word of God. Till it nourishes your heart and strengthens your spirit and until you have something to give, something that's burning in you.

I meditated in the Lord and my heart burned within me that I had to speak with Jeremiah's Word. If I hadn't spoken, literally, I'd have blown a fuse. The pressure was building up to the place where I couldn't stand it.

Something was going to go. Why? How could he have said, study to show thyself approved unto God if he hadn't been studying to show himself approved unto God? He said to Timothy, give thy attention to reading.

Meditate in these things. Why? Because that's what he's done. And he's done it in the Arabian desert. And he's done it in Tarsus. And so when the Spirit of God prompted Barnabas, the sweet and tender man, the son of consolation, you need help, Barnabas.

You need someone to share with you. Your gifts, as they are, aren't adequate. Don't you see the fellowship of the church? The church needed every man as a witness. The apostles needed Barnabas, now Barnabas.

Oh, how marvelous it is that every member of the body is absolutely dependent upon every other member. And my dear friend, there is something that you can do in the plan of God better than anyone else.

If you're willing to be available to me. There's some life you can touch, some place you can feel, some work you can do. So you're preparing for it by your attitude tonight as you listen. Now what you're going to do before you go to bed.

What you're going to do when you wake up tomorrow. What you're going to do when you're on the subway going to work. You tell me what you're thinking about. You tell me where your mind runs when you release it from the task at hand.

And I'll tell you the kind of a Christian ministry and life you're going to have. For as a man thinks in his heart, so does he. It's all his heart that he's preparing. Just like the angels. Then the Spirit of God said, Barnabas, you need Him.

Oh, you need Him. Barnabas didn't say, oh, my. Well, look what He'll do. He'll procure me. Oh, you see. He was full of the Holy Ghost. And he was full of faith. And his only concern was who can God use for the blessing of His people.

Who can be God's servant? Who is the one that can speak so? He said he was willing to go as far as Antioch. But, you know, he went further. He went as far as Tarsus. He was prepared to go as far as God would lead him.

And so he went on up to Tarsus for to seek Saul. Because Saul was important in the plan of God. And when he had found him, I like that. He went, where's Saul? Well, I don't know. He's come back to the dead.

Well, where is he? Well, he's up there in Tarsus somewhere. I remember a few years ago, a young man in the ministry went to a public relations company in Chicago and paid them $500 ,000 in order to make his name a household word.

Well, they made it a household word, all right. But there wasn't much else to find. They had his name around. I've forgotten what it was now. But for a while, it was quite well known. And he paid $1 ,000 for it.

He was burned. Dear friend, the only thing you need to do is just be at your peace. With a heart filled with love for God, a heart filled with burden for his people, and your heart and mind filled with the truth of God, and your life poured out.

And in due course, God will have somebody that will teach you. A new parent down south, he said, My son's going to Bible school, and I'm just so distressed that there's no place, no church in the Alliance for him.

I said, I'm not worried about that. This doesn't concern me in the least, brother. The only thing that I'm concerned about is that your son be prepared for any place in the Alliance or elsewhere. For if he has the preparation, God has the place.

And the preparation isn't a diploma. The preparation is a relationship to the Lord. It's so vital and so warm, so rich, so convenient, that wherever one is, there's something to share. Walter Lewis Wilson, riding in my car in Minneapolis, going to a service at the First Presbyterian Church, looked at me.

He said, Brother, do you sense what I have? So few of God's dear people have anything to give. He said, Every day before I leave, I say, Lord, give me something warm and real in Bible, that if I touch a hungry heart, I can share with them.

If I touch a needy heart, I can help comfort them. He said, It's just so few that there's anything from the Lord. When you go out in the morning, do you just fill your knapsack? Lord, is there something that you've given me for a burdened heart?

Is there something you've given me for a perplexed heart? Is there something you've given me for a lost heart? Can I have something to share? I'm so glad that little boy has thoughtful enough to read the Bible.

You go out that day away to find the hungry that God has left. Well, you see, when you do, there's always some opportunity. You'll have an opportunity if you have something to use. And I think many times God keeps us from opportunities because He doesn't want to embarrass us.

When we have something from Him, we have something of grace from Him. Knock, He'll be the way. He'll be the path. I've just been groaning in my heart because I had to fly a few weeks ago over. Out there, that dear little book.

I had to take that little book with me. Christ was amidst everyone for a while. He was in Denver. He's back. The great grief was that I just couldn't have never met Him. I remembered once He had something warm and fresh to share with the hungry.

And people killed me to pass the word on because they'd never been turned on before. As long as you breathe, you're going to breathe out something worth to do. But notice, it wasn't only that Saul was ready and God had a place for him and he was included in the fellowship of the ministry with Barnabas.

But it was something else. It came to pass I was with the church and taught much people. It'll come. You know what one of the best things could be for revival? Would be to go back to what happened a few decades ago in America when they started the meeting.

They didn't say when they were going to quit. I get a little amused when I drive through the South. I don't see it so much up here. Drive down the South and it says, Revival beginning November 15, closing December 2.

They've got it all arranged with God, haven't they? It's nice, neat. They can turn it on and turn it off like you turn the hot water in the hotel. Comes out boiling, goes off. One thing is they're having a meeting.

One preacher said, Well, you know, I really feel that if we'll come back to where the fathers were and we say this is God. Now that's what happened here. The way he got so on. For a whole year. Jim Stewart, he was here with us in 1957 at our missionary convention, had that kind of a ministry.

James isn't well understood in this country because all the anointing of God seems to be pre-Orphan. There's a ministry down in South Germany, in Boxing. The Spirit of God said to him and his wife, We didn't know how to get in touch with you where you were.

But there's a little group of us that are meeting. So they met in the back room of the church. Then they announced to the Christians, a little letter went out to the Christians of the area that we're meeting for fellowship in the word of God to see what God has to say to his church for revival.

And so they met in a little church building and soon that was pretty well filled. Three, four weeks had gone. Then they said, and now we want to bring out the members of churches who are professing nominal Christians that they might see the wonders in Jesus.

So another announcement went out. And it was about three or four weeks that they met until there was an evidence of the moving of God. And finally they said, the believers said, Oh, we must take the auditorium.

They got the largest hall in Trondheim. And they went on for about another month. And it was filled at six o 'clock. It would be filled. They didn't go home to eat dinner. They came. They sat there. When Brother Stewart would come in at seven o 'clock, there'd be a service in progress led by the Holy Ghost.

Someone would start a song and they'd sing. Someone would get up to pray. Someone would start to weep and come and kneel to receive praise. Sometimes he couldn't even breathe. You know, the last day when it was clear that God had finished, the mayor and the city council of Trondheim declared it a city holiday.

And morning, they filled and filled and filled the auditorium. Again, God brought. I'm wondering if that isn't what happened here. When God brought this man down, his heart had been filled with the love of God, the truth of God.

And he taught much people. I think it's an oversimplification. I think God had done it. Because there was a fellowship. Fellowship, a witness that gathered the believers. A fellowship of the apostles that sent instruction to give name and strength to the church.

A fellowship of Barnabas who reached out to find the man whom God would use at that time and in that place. There was fellowship. There was koinonia. There was sharing. And then Paul comes with a deep yearning and a burning love that the people to whom God had sent him should have everything he had.

He'd hold back nothing. Because he wanted to leave Paul's presence. He wanted them to know the Lord as he knew him. And God had in that place what he wanted. But notice the sharing, the community, the responsibility, the vision, the prayer.

You choose to be yours. You have to carry it. Then, of course, there's the whole church. And finally, there are those that are the responsible agents of God. I believe that here's a pattern for the blessing of the local church.

Fellowship, Revival, and Shared Responsibility

Here's a pattern for revival. If you set by in your calendar, February 17th through the 20th, we're going to have the privilege of having Lee Broad wants to do something. We talked with him on the telephone the other day.

He said, I haven't guessed who I knew was a pastor in Long Island but then went to Norway and saw God working the grave. I haven't guessed who I knew has been living with a burning, groaning, longing heart for God to get revived and get a church.

And he could bless it with you. So you set those days aside. He's coming to us just for those four days. Let's ask God to meet us in preparation for something that will be holy years. We thought perhaps it would be the week later, but it had to be this week.

There's two reasons. I believe, dear friends, that God is wanting to do what's here, what he didn't finish, but it falls on you. Each one carries a responsibility. It's on the eldership. It's on the pastor.

It's on the man whom God will send to us anointed to minister. We bear it jointly. We share it together. And so I feel that we have here a path that shows us clearly that the Holy Ghost has a place in the ministry and a part for everyone.

No one's excluded. No one's overlooked. And no one's uninvolved. Some who do different work. Paul had one ministry that Barnabas didn't have. Barnabas had a ministry the apostles didn't have. The layman had a ministry the apostles didn't have.

Each had its place. You have your place. May God show us that this is the nature of fellowship. The beginning of Paul's ministry was when he had been prepared, the beginning of every ministry, for the Lord to lead you into the fellowship with himself that he desired, into the fellowship and understanding of the word that he desired, so that you have something to share, something that you can commune with others.

And I think the Scripture gives us every reason to believe that God has a ministry. Let us bow our hearts. Just find your place in God's plan. Are you willing to take him at his word when he said, study to show thyself approved of God?

Meditate, give attendance to reading. Are you willing to be to the Lord Jesus what he planned and desired? You are very important. Everything seems to hang or fall on you. I doubt you, but it won't be the church, because you have a part in it, a place in it.

So you're going to have to fulfill your responsibility on you. Are you prepared to say, Lord, what will thou have me to do? Then to do what he shows you. Thank and praise thee that thou hast given us this word that shows us the plan, the place of every believer, the responsibility of the eldership, the particular ministries that thou hast chosen, those that have special ministries of teaching.

Amen.