Happy New Year! This morning at New Garden Church we met online to kick off 2023. I was able to provide the message this morning via video, but I wanted to share it here in blog form! May we all experience a deep with-ness with God and each other this year. You can find that gathering in its entirety on YouTube here.
We are officially in the resolution season of the year. I’m generally not a resolution type of guy, but I personally do like using this time to reset and get some things in order, and try start the new year off on the right foot. I hope that today, with our time together, we can do that too. I won’t be throwing any new and crazy ideas at you today, but I hope that our church can take some things to heart over the next year, and that today’s message begins that journey.
Please pray with me.
God, this morning are thankful for a new year and all that it may have for us. We know that the next year will hold both joy and sorrow, and God we ask that you give us the community and faith we need to grow in both of those times. Fill us with your Spirit, and be with me today as I try to speak a message from you. Anything that’s not from you, God I just ask that it will be dropped from our minds. In the name of Jesus we pray, Amen.
As we are exiting the Christmas season, the piece of the story of Jesus birth that has stuck out to me the most was that Jesus was to be called Immanuel, which means God with us. That before Jesus, God had not lived on earth as a human among the people, but in Jesus, God was with us. And most of us probably know the story, that Jesus was here on earth, teaching people about this new Kingdom of God and performing miracles – even raising people from the dead. And most of us also know that out of love, Jesus was killed, but three days later rose from the grave, and later ascended into heaven.
And after Jesus ascended into heaven, was God no longer with us? No! In Acts chapter 2, we see God send the Holy Spirit into the people at Pentecost. And this Spirit remains in us today, giving us the opportunity to be an instrument of God’s power and love. God is with us today through the Holy Spirit. With you right now!
One cool thing about it though isn’t just that God is with us, but God is with God too, and always has been. That may sound weird to say, but its true. In Genesis 1, as God is creating everything over those 6 days, and on the 6th day, he says this:
Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness…”
And while this is a mind-blowing text for many reasons – for starters, we’re created in the image of God – what I also take away from this text is that God is not alone, God experiences togetherness too, and has since the beginning. It’s different than if I went on vacation by myself and said that me, myself, and I had a great trip. The way we believe that works is that God the Father, God the Son aka Jesus, and God the Spirit aka the Holy Spirit, created the universe together. We get a similar picture in John chapter 1, where he references Jesus as The Word:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.
Jesus is both God and He was with God in the beginning. It’s a really cool idea. And so this idea of community – or as I want to call it today: with-ness – goes way back to before time began. God has been experiencing this since forever, and its core to who God is. And I also think its core to who the bride of Christ – the Church – is intended to be. We’ve talked about God with us, and God with God, and now we’re talking about us with us.
It’s not shocking to me, in this context, that God has created a group of people, the church, to be the image of God here on earth. We are to be a light to the nations, a witness of God’s goodness in the world, but without the with-ness we’re talking about, our witness will fall on deaf ears. The church must be deeply committed to community and togetherness in order to share the gospel in a way that draws people in. I think that when the church started, they really understood this idea and put it into practice. In Acts chapter 2, immediately after thousands of new believers came to faith in Jesus, it reads:
They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common.
They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
So I have a couple questions for us to think about this morning, and I want us to put some thought to it, and whatever our answers are, I want to put these things into practice in 2023.
The first question is this: How can we create a church culture of with-ness this year? How can we be a group of people that is connected in a way that mirrors the connectedness of God and the church we’ve read about today in Acts 2?
For starters, I would like to challenge everyone to host someone from our church in your home this year, bonus points if you host someone that you aren’t already buddies with! I know there’s a lot of reasons we could come up with why we shouldn’t do this: my home’s a mess, my kids are crazy, I never cook, etc, etc. – but you’ve probably had this experience, I know I have: when we see someone’s home, we get them on a level we probably didn’t before. Our connection is instantly deeper. We can offer these people more grace and understanding in our interactions. Hospitality is a Christian value, and while you may not consider it your personal spiritual gift, practicing hospitality helps us grow.
Another way I think we can cultivate this with-ness is by praying together. So this year, one of my hopes and goals is that there will be more opportunities to pray together, on Sunday mornings, and other times. Praying together – like hosting someone in your home – provides a window into someone’s life – their passions, their struggles, their dreams – that leads us to a deeper connection and mutual understanding.
How can we cultivate a culture of with-ness in our communities? We often talk about being a group of people who are FOR Hermitage. We definitely want to be a group of people who are willing to provide support in our communities, but how can also be WITH our communities in 2023?
Attend an event in your neighborhood! This could be an HOA meeting, a town hall meeting, a block party, a cookout, anything. Sometimes, I think its easy for churches to fall into the trap of trying to be the directors and creators of every community event, and while that’s a great thing, there can be tremendous value in joining into the good things that are already happening around us. We can be both WITH our communities and FOR them.
So we’ve talked a lot about how we can do the us with us portion of the Christian life well this morning, so now let’s ask a question about the God with us portion:
How can we experience a deep with-ness with God this year? This is the one that I think we as a church do the best talking about! And every week we come together, sing, share communion and remember Jesus. So I don’t have any earth shattering ideas that will change your life this morning. But I’ll say this: we have to connect with God outside of Sundays.
You know me, I love the Titans – probably too much. Things haven’t gone well of late… After the 5th straight loss last week to the Texans, Coach Vrabel said in a press conference that he didn’t know what a lot of the guys were doing outside of the 8-4 work day in preparation for the upcoming games, pointing to that as a possible reason the team is falling short of their hopes for the year. And sometimes I think our faith and our connection to God is the same way. God isn’t asking us for a few hours a week, God is inviting us to a transformed life. A lifestyle overhaul.
In Deuteronomy chapter 6, God commands the Israelites:
Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts.Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.
God is commanding the Israelites to not merely offer weekly sacrifices at the Temple, but to pass this lifestyle on to their children, to talk about God often, and put these words from God on their hands and head and walls. Maybe we don’t spend a lot of time walking along the road, but we don’t spend a lot of time driving around – especially in Nashville traffic these days! This is one I need to practice more: do I need to hear another hour of sports talk about Titans roster moves?? No! I need more reminders of the goodness of God in my life. That can be conversations in the car, songs that point us towards Jesus, or even a little bit of quiet reflection.
1 Thessalonians 5 tells us to rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and give thanks in all circumstances, which is pretty clear to me that we’re being told to give our all to Jesus and this Kingdom lifestyle he has brought to earth.
So that’s my challenges to us this morning: Try new things this year to experience a deep with-ness with God and each other this year.
One way that we experience Immanuel – God with us – every week is through our practice of communion. As we go to the table this morning, we can invite Jesus into our hearts, minds and actions over the next year. Let us give Jesus all of us, so that we can experience this Kingdom life He has called us into.
Let’s pray,
Lord, thank you for this day, and for this new year. God in this year, let us give ourselves to your teachings and love in a way that transforms our lives and the lives of the people we encounter. Fill us, our homes, our communities, and our workplaces with your Spirit so that we can become more like Jesus. In his name we pray.
Let’s go to the Table.
my own understanding 