Denominator

This love believers have for each other is a real thing, and it needs to be guarded and protected. Some of the things that keep this love from growing and lasting in the church fellowship are gossip, judgment, backbiting, and complacency. Of course, gossip is horrible in a fellowship because its goal is to separate and keep unity from forming in the church fellowship. Judgment is forbidden in Scripture, and no excuse the "accusers" can come up with will make it any less of a sin. Jesus was judged constantly by the religious leaders, and they were the accusers. Satan himself is the accuser of the brethren. So do not fall on Satan’s side....please. Backbiting is going behind someone's back in order to harm them, usually with half-truths and innuendoes. Complacency is stepping back and letting everyone else carry the load of the fellowship, and thus excluding yourself from investing in the process. It is also called "works."

Peter wrote in 1 Peter 1 that we are supposed to have a sincere love for each other as believers. Sincere means a "real" love, not a compromised love that is conditional. 1 Peter :1 ²¹ Through Christ you have come to trust in God. And you have placed your faith and hope in God because he raised Christ from the dead and gave him great glory. ²² You were cleansed from your sins when you obeyed the truth, so now you must show sincere love to each other as brothers and sisters. Love each other deeply with all your heart. Jesus is our common denominator, and because of His love, we love. Because of His service, we serve. Because of His forgiveness, we forgive. It is all about Jesus!! Denominator (def) - the bottom number in a fraction that shows the total number of equal parts that make up a whole.

We are the many parts, as Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 12, and Jesus is the HUB of it all. Our fellowship fails when we do not lift up and follow Jesus, and it grows when Jesus is the focus. Hebrews 12: 1 Therefore, since we also have such a great cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let’s rid ourselves of every obstacle and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let’s run with endurance the race that is set before us, ² looking only at Jesus, the originator and perfecter of the faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

The body of Christ is the church, and the world's way of seeing the "pecking" order cannot be a part of any fellowship, because all are the same in God's eyes. On the contrary, we even honor those parts that seem to be less significant. 1 Corinthians 12:²⁴ whereas our more presentable parts have no need of it. But God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that part which lacked, ²⁵ so that there may be no division in the body, but that the parts may have the same care for one another. ²⁶ And if one part of the body suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if a part is honored, all the parts rejoice with it.

When we accept Jesus as the foundation of the fellowship, everything proceeds as it should, with all people in the fellowship being challenged to serve and protect that fellowship as they all follow the Great Commission together. One is not more important than any other because that would be the religion that is not of God.

The Pilgrimage Continues,

David Warren