One Loaf, One Table, One Body

The debate still rages about who's the greatest basketball player of all time. My vote would still go to Michael Jordan. Jordan was an incredible athlete, incredible basketball player. One of his greatest games took place on March 28, 1990, when he scored his career best 69 points against the Cleveland Cavaliers and led them to an overtime victory, 117 to 113. It was an amazing game and after the game, reporters swarmed him in the locker room to ask him questions about that record-breaking game. Not only had he scored 69 points, he had 18 rebounds, 6 assists, 4 steals. It was just an unbelievably amazing game. But not all the reporters could get close to him and so one reporter kind of drifted over to another teammate of Jordan's, happened to be a rookie center for the Bulls named Stacey King. And so this reporter asked Stacey King, what do you think of Michael Jordan's incredible performance tonight? And Stacey King said, I will always remember this, as the night when Michael Jordan and I teamed up for 70 points. You see, he had scored one point as a free throw that night. You know, while he said that tongue in cheek, he made a very important point and that is without the 48 points scored by the other players of the team, there would have been no win that night. And Michael Jordan could not win that game by himself. The same is true with the church. We cannot win spiritual battles without teamwork that the Bible calls unity. It may surprise you, it may not, but for some of you it may be a little surprising that one of the reasons why we have communion is to celebrate the unity of the body of Christ. Now obviously the main representation of communion is the death of Christ and his giving of his body and blood for our sins on the cross. That's the main reason why we do this. That's why Jesus told us to remember this. But Paul, the Apostle Paul saw in the communion service also the expression of the unity of the church. And that's what he wrote to the Corinthians about. In fact, he took the Corinthians to task because of their disunity, their lack of unity in their church and the fact that when they came together for communion, they were violating one of the greatest representations of communion. And that is the fact that we are one body. Their disunity violated the unity that was to be represented in the communion service. In fact, he says this directly to them in 1 Corinthians chapter 10 and verse 16 when he says, because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body for we all share the same loaf. He's talking about communion. Now they did communion a little differently in the early church. They did use as was common in the Passover feast where Jesus instituted communion. They did use one loaf of bread. It would probably look something like our French bread today, something like that. And each person would take a little piece of that bread. And so literally they all did share one loaf. And that Paul indicates is a beautiful representation of the fact that we are one body because we all share the same loaf. Well, we don't do it quite the same way today, but we do come to one table. And this table here at the front calls our attention to this one point and represents for us the same that the one loaf did in New Testament times, the unity of the body of Christ, the unity of the church. And so whether it's one loaf or one table, it represents one body. And that's what we represent today when we protect of communion. It is such an important element of communion and the lack of unity can be so disruptive to the meaning of communion that for that reason, at least once a year in these messages on communion Sundays, I will address unity and the fellowship of the body of Christ. That's what I want to do today. Let's look at Philippians chapter two, the book of Philippians chapter two. The Philippian church was a special church to Paul and it evidently was a great church from what Paul says about it. They were a giving church. We know that they gave time and time again to his ministry even more than once to him while he was in Thessalonica for three weeks ministering. They gave to his needs and supplied his needs. They were very dear to Paul and the book of Philippians really is a thank you note. Thank you letter for their gracious partnership in his ministry. However, there seems to be one little blip on the radar screen when it comes to the Philippian church and it occurs several times in the book. And that is evidently they suffered a bit from a lack of unity in the church. Paul addresses it in chapter one. He addresses it again in chapter four where in verses two and three he talks about two ladies who evidently were fighting with each other. And he says I plead with the odia and sentica that they be of one mind that they be like minded in the Lord. And then he says you yoke fellows you other servants in the church help them get their act together. Now how would you like to have your name in the Bible? That would be great wouldn't it? But for the wrong reason that would not be so great. And that's evidently what happened these two ladies they're called out because of their lack of ability to get along with each other in the church. But the place where Paul addresses unity and the lack thereof most clearly and directly in Philippians is in chapter two. The first four verses he talks very directly to them about unity and pleads with them to be unified. Notice if you will the reasons for unity in verse one. Paul says in chapter two verse one if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ. If any comfort from his love. If any fellowship with the spirit. If any tenderness and compassion. Then he goes on in verse two to say be unified. But notice those four expressions in verse one if any four times he says if any. And by use of the word if he's not expressing doubt. Really the word means sense. We know that from the original language. It's in a certain construction that indicates he's saying since we have these things. It would be very much like me saying to Jeannie one day honey I need to run out to the store for a couple of things and she's saying to me well if you're going to the store. Would you please pick up a loaf of bread. There's no uncertainty about me going to the store. I've just told her I'm going to the store. I've got my keys in my hand. I'm walking out the door to the car. I'm going to the store. She knows that. She's not questioning that. But she's saying since you're going. Would you please get a loaf of bread. That's the way Paul uses the word if here. These are not these are not possibilities. These are not just hope so's Paul is certain that every believer shares these four spiritual elements. And because we share these four spiritual elements. We should have unity. This is the basis of our unity. These are the reasons for our unity. But what are they very quickly look at them encouragement. Paul says if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ. You know one of the things that we share in Christ as believers is we know where to find encouragement. It's in Christ. It's from being united with him. It's interesting that at the very end of chapter one Paul has just talked about opposition and suffering in the Philippian church. They have faced both of them. It uses both of those words. You faced opposition. You faced suffering. And then he goes right on to say now in light of that if you have since you have any encouragement from being united with Christ. When you face opposition of any kind. When you face suffering or difficulty of any kind. The believer knows where to get encouragement. Encouragement does not come from a bottle. It does not come from pills. It does not come from self-pity. It doesn't come from suppressing your feelings and wishing they weren't there. Encouragement comes from knowing that you're united with Christ. That you are his, that you have a savior, that you have one to come to for help, for strength, for encouragement. That's where encouragement is found. We should know that as believers. And we all share that same potential since we have encouragement in Christ. But then notice the second reason for our unity. If any comfort or sense any comfort from his love. The fact that God loves us and the fact that he loves us enough to send his son. Should bring great comfort to our hearts and cause us to reach out to others in love. It's exactly what John says in his first epistle. First John chapter 3 and verse 1. John says, see what great love the Father has lavished on us that we should be called children of God. And that is what we are. You see the comfort and encouragement, the blessing in those words. Knowing that he loved us so much that he can call us his children. That's what we are. And there's great comfort in that expression. But John goes on to say a chapter later in chapter 4 verses 9 through 11. This is how God showed his love among us. He sent his one and only son into the world that we might live through him. This is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. And then here's the point that he's making dear friends. Since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. God's love for us and the comfort we draw from that ought to motivate us to love each other. It's exactly the same argument Paul's using. If we have, since we have any comfort that comes to us through God's love, then we ought to also express that in love and unity with one another. The third reason for our unity has to do with fellowship. You see it there in verse 1. If or since any fellowship with the spirit. The word fellowship literally means a partnership. We have a partnership that is based in a common experience with the Holy Spirit. The Bible teaches that when you come to know Jesus as your Savior. If you have trusted Him and His death for the forgiveness of your sin, the Bible teaches that the Holy Spirit comes to indwell you. In other words, He comes to maintain and abiding forever presence with you. He is always with you and that forms a unique partnership, a fellowship. You have a literal partnership with the Holy Spirit. He has come to be your comfort or your counselor or your helper. So He partners with you to live life. And you don't have to live life on your own. You have a partner who's helping you every moment of every day. He's always with you. But that partnership is shared with every believer. And we recognize that partnership. Those of you who went to the flood ravaged areas of Rupert and the Raynell area this week, you met some incredible people, didn't you? You met some people who love the Lord. You met some people who may not see everything exactly the way we do it. We helped one church that's not a Baptist church and it may be a little off on some doctrine or maybe we are. I'm not sure. But anyway. But there are brothers and sisters in Christ. And incredible people, people who love the Lord. And you can sense, you don't have to be with them long. Do you day and or jam or others of you who went through the week. You don't have to be with them long to recognize there's a partnership there. There's a fellowship that we have with them. Our hearts beat the same because of the Holy Spirit living within both of us. It's very real. You can sense that no matter where you are, no matter what culture you are, no matter what country you're in. When you find other people that know Christ, there's this instant bond because of the partnership we have with the Holy Spirit's presence. And then there's a fourth reason for our unity, Paul says. And that is if or since there's any tenderness and compassion. These are very strong and graphic words, tenderness and compassion. When we think of tenderness, we may have an image in our mind of something kind of nice and gentle and kind. In the Bible times, the word literally meant to have a gut feeling for. In fact, the word that Paul uses here is literally a word which referred to the region of the body, the bowels. If you have a King James version, really, that's the most literal translation here. It says, if there are any bowels and mercies. He's literally talking about the way people in that time expressed feeling for one another, tenderness, deep compassion for one another. Because you see today, we still use a bodily organ to express our fondness for one another. Don't we? We use the heart. Well, that was unknown to them at that time. They didn't express love in that way. They express love through where you really feel it in the gut. And so that's how they express their love. I really feel compassion in my gut. And they would also talk about the kidneys. That's common in the Old Testament. Remember that expression? My reins are moved within me, R-E-I-N-S, and you're looking thinking he's on a horse and he's got the reins in his hand. I don't get this. The reins was a word for kidneys. And so they expressed love and compassion in different ways. And I know it doesn't have quite the same sound to it. You say to your sweetheart, my heart has really moved in me when I think of you. It doesn't quite come out the same when you say, you know, my bowels are really moved in me when I think of it. I'm not quite the same ring to it, but that's how they express love in those days. And we say today, I love you with all my heart. You know, Bible times they would say something like, I love you with both my kidneys. It doesn't sound quite the same, but that's how they express deep feeling in that day. And so what Paul's talking about, those deep feelings for one another that we can literally feel in the gut for each other, that we literally express with bodily feelings. You know, today our heart may flutter and Bible times they would say, my liver quivers whenever I think of you. And I say, it's different, but it's really the same kind of idea. You feel deeply inside. You know, that's what we share in common in Christ. We have a deep tenderness and compassion for one another that literally moves us. And it moves us to where we actually feel it inside for each other. I know again, some of you were moved to tears when you saw people. I only had one opportunity to go up this week. Many of you went almost every day this past week. But I had not been there five minutes. We got there and some of us walked across the street from faith Baptist Church where we were coordinating efforts. And some of us had to use the restroom, mostly women and older guys. And so we were standing in line waiting for the restroom. And the guy walks out of the store and he looks at me and says, are you all a volunteer team? That's come up here to help. And I said, yes, and told where we were from and why we were there. And he thanked me and then you started tearing up and crying. And he said, I lost both my parents in this flood. I hadn't been there five minutes and already I'm just gut-wrestled. And so I said, I can't believe you. Are you serious? I wouldn't try to wrap my mind around what he was saying. And he said, yeah, he said we couldn't get a hold of them all day on Friday. And finally on Saturday morning we got to the house and they were both dead in their beds. Because of the flood. Those kind of stories, many of you have heard over and over again this week. And when you hear stories like that, when you see someone that has the kind of need, your gut, you feel it and your gut. And that's what Paul's talking about here. We have that same tender feeling inside and compassion for each other because we love Christ. And so if we have those things, since we have these spiritual realities in Christ, then he goes on to make his point. These are the reasons for unity. Now notice his description of unity in verse two. He says, since you have these four spiritual realities, then make my joy complete. Here it is by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. There are three descriptions of unity here. Unity is not lockstep. Everybody looking the same, smiling the same way, dressing the same, speaking the same way. There are some churches that feel like that's unity. That's not even healthy, much less biblical. Unity is focused around these three things. This is a biblical description of unity. First of all, it's unity of direction. Do you see it there in verse two? Make my joy complete by being like-minded. The word literally means setting your mind on something, having the same view of something, having the same outlook and disposition, and worldview and passion about life, about what's important in life, about people, about the lost, about fellow believers. It means having the same mindset and outlook in those areas, having the same direction of life. Now that's what biblical unity is and that's what Paul calls us to. He's not saying now, not now, he's not saying that we all share that, but he's saying we all should share that. We all should have, this is what he's calling for us to be and do, to have the same unity of direction, to set our mind on what's really important in life. What is important in life? The things, the Bible places value on. And so those are the things that we ought to have unity on, a unity of direction in life, we're headed the same direction focused on the same things that God says are important. And then secondly, it's a unity of love. He says, make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love. Paul says unity is loving the same things. And there are things that we should all love. We should love God. We should love His Word. We should love His work. We should love the lost. We should love fellow believers. We ought to be living with the same love. That's where our unity is. It's not that we all think alike on every issue or that we look alike or we all say the same pet religious phrases. That's not unity. Unity is that we love what God loves. That's unity. And then the third description of unity is unity of purpose, the end of verse 2. He says being one in spirit and purpose. Being one in spirit means the heart agreement. Our hearts are in agreement about what purpose, spirit and purpose. Our hearts are in agreement about what God's purpose for us is in this world. That's the kind of unity God wants us to have. Is for our hearts to be in agreement on what God's purpose for us is. We have identified and preached and taught and tried to model as a church. The fact that we believe there are at least three purposes that God has for us as a body. One is to love Him. That means that we seek for people to come to know Him so that they are eternally grateful to Him for the forgiveness of their sins and express that in loving worship. Heart felt worship and praise to God. We believe that's a major purpose of every believer and every church. Secondly, we believe it's a major purpose that God has for us to grow in Him. There are so many commands in the Bible about growing, growing in the grace and knowledge of our Savior, growing in our faith, growing in our understanding of the Bible. Not just so that we know more, but so that we know more what we're to be like and so that we become more like Christ, but growing in Him. That's a major purpose. We believe that's so important. And then we believe that God wants every Christian to serve Him not to be just content to receive, but to give to serve in some way. And so those we believe at least those three, there may be more, we're not saying that's exclusive, but that's what we want to focus on as a church. And so as a church, Johnson Chapel, we call one another to unity on the basis of this is what we are about. Let's all pull together to love, grow and serve Christ. That's our unity. Unity in the church is not robots walking in lockstep. Unity is a group of Christ followers who despise all of our differences in background, whatever else it may be. We love one another and we put one another's needs first and we submit our personal agendas to the good of the body. And we love God. We want to grow in Him and we want to serve Him. That's what unity looks like. That's the description. But then notice there is as Paul says a key to unity, one key that he focuses on. How do you get this kind of unity? One thing he focuses on. He'll describe it with the example of Christ in verses five through 11. So really it has to do with being Christ like, but there's one quality above all others that he focuses on in this passage. What is that one quality of Christ's likeness that leads to unity? Is it love? Is it patience? What is it? There are lots of good qualities we might focus on. But the one that Paul talks about here and the only one that Jesus talked about when he described himself. Do you know there's only one place in the gospels where Jesus describes his own character? He describes a lot about his work, his relationship to the father, what he was sent here to do. But only one time he describes who he is as far as his character, his personality and so forth is concerned. It's in Matthew chapter 11 verse 29. He says, take my yoke upon you and learn for me for I am. Here's the description. And gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for yourselves. Gentle and humble in heart. Put those two together and it's what's described in Philippians 2 verses five through 11. Put those two together and you'll find the one quality could be described in this word. Selflessness. A willingness to sacrificially, humbly, gently put others before yourself. That is the key to unity. And so in order to have unity, the way that the Bible talks about it, we have to deal with the opposite of selflessness, which is selfishness. So we've got to deal with self and selfishness. There are four elements of selfishness that we have to deal with in order to have unity as a church in order to have unity of direction, unity of love, unity of purpose. We've got to deal first of all with self ambition. Self ambition. Look at verse three. Paul says, do nothing out of selfish ambition. What does that mean? What does selfish ambition mean? Well, you know, the New Testament was written in Greek. This is a Greek word and concept. The word that's used here, the Greek philosopher Aristotle used in this way and kind of set the tone for what it meant. He used it of the greedy grasp for public office through any unjust means. He used it of politicians who are fueled and motivated by selfish ambition. The greedy grasp for position, no matter what you have to do to get it. That's the way Aristotle used this word that Paul is talking about. And so relate that to us and to the church. It is any attempt motivated by an ambition for self agreed that for ourselves to look good, any greedy attempt to gain the upper hand on someone else. That's selfish ambition. Paul suffered from it himself and he was suffering from it when he wrote these words. Remember, he's writing from a Roman prison. Back in chapter one, he talks about two groups of preachers that were preaching the gospel, preaching Christ, but doing it out of different motives, serving the Lord, but with different motives. He said one of those groups is doing it in goodwill and love for me. But in verse 17 of chapter one, he says the former, the other group, preach Christ out of selfish ambition. Same word, not sincerely supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I have in chains. This group of preachers is taking advantage of Paul's being off the scene to gain the upper hand. That's selfish ambition. Trying to say, well, Paul's in prison, so he can't do that much. Maybe I can get the upper hand now. Maybe I can get a following. Maybe I can get people to look my way rather than this old apostle over here. This selfish ambition, even in ministry, and Paul says that will wreck the unity of the church. Got to deal with selfish ambition. Do nothing out of selfish ambition. He says the second element of selfishness we have to deal with is self glory. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or here it is. Vain conceit. Vain means empty. Conceit means pride. It's empty pride that lifts oneself up at the expense of another. It can come through being critical of everybody. It can come through finding fault with others continually. It can come through picking others apart or it can come through just promoting yourself constantly. Projecting an inflated opinion of yourself. Any number of ways this can happen, but self glory. Lifting yourself up at the expense of others. Or even just so that you'll look better. It racks unity in the body because it calls attention to you. It gains a following for you. And everybody's focus becomes on you rather than Christ whom we are to all be following. And so self glory. We've got to deal the death blow to the third element of selfishness that we have to deal with is self importance. First three. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or Vain conceit. Here it is. But in humility. Consider others better than yourselves. Now does that mean I always ought to walk always ought to walk around saying, oh, I'm nothing. I'm no good. Everybody's better than I am. No, that's not what he's saying. The key to understanding this is the word consider. The word consider means to evaluate the facts honestly and come to a conclusion based on those facts. And what he's saying we should honestly evaluate and conclude is that others are better than us. Not necessarily in everything, but what he's doing is he's countering our natural tendency. Let's face it. I know that it's probably more true of your neighbor and your family members than an issue. That's a given obviously. But all of us all of us have this tendency to compare ourselves to others with the goal of seeing what they do wrong. Or don't do as well as we do so that we can kind of value what we do or what we're like that. That's our natural tendency. It's comes out of a human nature that's corrupted by sin. Paul says let's flip that. Let's flip that. Let's do this. When you when you look at someone else and it's inevitable that we're going to do that. We're going to notice other people when see other people. We're going to see what they do what they don't do. Whenever you look at someone else stop and consider. Start evaluating the facts of that person's life. And here's what I want you to look for Paul says. Don't start looking for things that are negative that you do better that you're more faithful at. But look for the things that you can learn from from that person. You may have to look hard and along. You may only find one or two things but you can find something that person does better than you or that something about that person's character that can sharpen you and help grow you and you can learn from. And Paul says when you're thinking about other people that's the way to think. Consider others better than yourself. In other words, way the facts of that person's life. Find what you can that you can learn from and improve on. And then focus on that. Say what if I did more of that it would sure it would sure help my outlook on life. If you did more of that, maybe it would yours to. Paul says self importance has to be dealt with. And then finally self interest. Verse four. Each of you should look not only to your own interests. But also to the interests of others. Now by interest, he means not things that are interesting about you. But by interest, he means things that you value and you put your effort toward. The things that you're interested in, things that claim some value to you and you want to put effort toward. You know what you enjoy doing? What's important to you? You will put time and energy toward. We all do that. And so what he's saying is is focus on that which is a value and important to others and put your energy that direction. Now there are three kinds of interests or values in life and he mentions all three of them in this letter. The first one is well he mentions two of them here. Others interest and your own interests. And then in verse 21, he'll mention the interests of Christ. That which is a value to him. Now obviously if we're going to rank interests, things that are a value to us that we're going to put energy and effort toward. The interests of Christ ought to come first. But then when you come down to the other two, what he's saying is put the interests of others before your own interests. In other words, look for that which is a value to others and highlight that focus on that. I mean, really isn't that what love is all about? If you love your husband or your wife with what the Bible speaks of as a self sacrificial giving of yourself for the good of that person, a gope is the word. If you really love them like that, you look out for their interests before your own. That's what Paul's saying here. That others interests ought to be paramount to us. I think God gives us children to teach us this lesson. It's not the only way we can learn it, but certainly children teach us this lesson. You like nice clean clothes, walk out of the house on Sunday morning with a baby in arms. And before you can get to church, there'll be all kinds of bodily fluids over your nice clean clothes. You like a nice clean, orderly table. Well, have two or three or four kids sitting at the table. And you have your piece sliding off a knives onto the floor and milk been turned over and chaos. You learn a lot about my space, my territory, my way, my, you know, you're like a nice clean car. All of a sudden, your kids have left crans in the car and they melt into the fabric of the seat or M&Ms have been left in the seat. You sit down on them. You know the rest. Yeah, I believe God gives us children to teach us that there are other interests beyond our own. The same thing is true for a church or an individual for that matter, but we're talking about church unity this morning. Who's interests do you look out for? Well, this is my room. This is my ministry. This is my team. This is my age group. Really? Is anything around here mine? Is anything around here yours? Oh, it's all Christ. It's all his. He's the head of the church. He's the Lord. He's the master. We must be willing to give to put the interests of others first before our own interest before my eye mine. It's yours. You. What interest? What is value to you? What's important to you? Now obviously that's within the context of biblical values. Obviously those come as the priority. But you know, a church really is like the family or a team unity is essential to success and health. If we're going to be successful in forwarding the work of Christ, we have to have unity and thank God for the unity that we do have here. Sometimes when I talk to other pastors, I am grateful for the unity that we experience here. When I hear about fights that go on in churches, some of the stories are incredible. I'm grateful for the unity we have. We've got to keep that. We've got to maintain that and we've got to grow that in order to be successful and to be a healthy church. It's unity. Not an outward external forced unity, but a biblical unity like we've seen in Philippians. And in order to deal with that, in order to have that, we have to deal with selfishness. When we come to this table this morning, let's remember we're coming to this one table. You can imagine if you will, what Paul said about one loaf, but the purpose, the symbolism here is not only of the death of Christ, but also of the unity that we share in the body. And so as we come to this one table, let's remember that we are a family. We are to be unified in Christ. Let's think about that and focus on that this morning.