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Brotherhood

The Fifth Gospel

“…provoke one another unto love and good works:” (Heb 10.24)

What if there were a verse in Revelation 3 that read “and until the angel of the church of Douglasville write” …

(2Cor 3.2) While many have not read the first four gospels, the fifth gospel is read everyday by people… we are the fifth gospel that the world reads everyday.

The write of Hebrews encourages us to be faithful to gathering together to serve with each other. It is encouraging to realize that we serve together in a local body of believers who are living out the kingdom that Jesus announced.

Let’s remember that our church serves a soon returning King. And let’s remember we should “…hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.” (Rev 3.22)
‪#‎brotherhood‬ ‪#‎wearethefifthgospel‬

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Brotherhood

Our village and His Kingdom

Adam’s Kingdom

Gen 2.15,19-20

  • Adam was given dominion over God’s Creation (PS 8.4-6)
  • The kingdom was not a future hope, it was the world God had created
  • Adam gave up his regency by turning from God

Jesus, the King that Adam was not

  • MT 4.17 Jesus preached a kingdom that we live in today – it is not just a future hope
  • MT 25.33-35 the kingdom involves real people, helping in real ways
  • Jesus has shown us the way to be the divinely created humans we are supposed to be in His life on earth – He is the way, the truth, and the life (JN 14.6)

Kingdom of God

Col 1.13 we ARE CURRENTLY in the kingdom Jesus preached in MT 4.17

Jesus Victorious over Powers of the World and Death

  • Col 2.15 the cross was where the world thought Jesus was defeated, but it was where Jesus was victorious over the world
  • Col 1.20 Jesus has reconciled everything to God in the cross… the kingdom Adam gave up has been reconciled to God and
  • Dan 7.13 and Acts 1.9 Jesus sits as King over creation at the right hand of God
  • 1 Cor 15.26 the sin introduced by Adam has now been resolved, and the death that resulted has now been conquered

Jesus victorious in the cross, vindicated in the resurrection, sanctifying His kingdom citizens today, coming for them soon in His return, our glorious resurrection, His region fulfilling the David Covenant, and finally, bringing to God all of creation – all of this in Jesus. In Jesus ALL THINGS are reconciled, the separation in Genesis 2 (and all that follows) is resolved in Jesus.

Our Village in His Kingdom

Col 1.19 God’s Will for His creation, us, everything, is resolved and dwelling in His Son Jesus

Our church began in 1916, in the midst of village and its mill. Our bell rung out to sound the call to worship and its echoes reminded the people of the gospel. God has preserved us for 98 years. We are called to serve in His kingdom today, just as Paul served in his time. The kingdom is not just a future glorious hope – it is before us today. The kingdom is not just a spiritual kingdom inside of us. Jesus healed real people who were blind, lame, and stricken. We are called to our world today. What we do here and now matters – our service is in the service of our village and His Kingdom.

We are to be the feet to carry the gospel, we are to be the lips that speak comfort and truth, we are to be the hands of compassion – in our time, in our village, where He has placed us in His Kingdom!

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Brotherhood

Brotherhood – June 2014 – Back to Basics: Prayer

back to basics: prayer

Brotherhood Purpose: ministering to our church through prayer

Brotherhood is simple and missional. It is ministering to our church through prayer.

Past Themes:

Growth:                             horizontal more people, branches = more fruit; vertical glorifying God and people deeply rooted
Healing:                             spiritual, emotional, physical
Fulfilling God’s Word:      Jesus Word realized, covenant
Resurrection:                    renewal, promise
God will work:                  now matters, continuity with eternity

 

Have we consistently prayed for these things AFTER Saturday morning?

If our purpose is to minister to our church through prayer – this is one important measure of our success.

Summer Camp 2014

Philippians 4:6 KJV – 6 Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.

PRAYER

John 11:41-42
Jesus comes to the grave of his friend – put yourself there in that moment. To understand this prayer, you have understand the stakes involved. The tension would be almost overpowering – Jesus was about to have a moment that could be disastrous for His mission.
While the crowd stood back, faces covered to protect against the stench of death, Jesus stood closer. We must struggle to read ourselves into that experience, to forget that we know the outcome, and to experience the events as if we were in the first century, standing there (hopefully with enough faith to be close to Jesus and not back with the crowd!), and feel the weight of that moment. Because if you don’t understand that this prayer is impossible, that it goes beyond just medical science, that this prayer to God would be asking for something that they understood could not happen. The resurrection, when it occurs, would be for all people, at one time (God’s Judgement), not for one person, in their time.
Then, He prays. And what a prayer! Thanks! He begins in absolute certainty that His Father had heard Him, and then just to make sure we all get it, He says with no doubt, no question, that He knows that His Father always listens and hears Him. Now, stand there in that moment. This prayer was so specific, it demanded a response so immediate, and it required no special revelation – either Lazarus would walk out of that grave in victory or Jesus would walk out that town in defeat. Knowing the ending does us little good here. We know Lazarus rose. What we could miss is that this prayer was impossible, and yet it was prayed in complete faith.
God didn’t become man and walk this earth as our example in order to show us impossible things. He showed us how to be the people of God. So let us watch Him pray, and aspire to His faith and pray like Him.

 

John 12:28-29

If we are not careful, we distort what prayer is like. That is why it is worth looking at how Jesus prayed. Here are 4 words, that   challenge the conventional depiction of prayer. We always here about prayer being either some kind of intense struggle, or exploding with emotion, and most of all centered on us.

Jesus prayed this short prayer about His Father. Too short to match the examples above. It wasn’t a night spent supplication, or a walk under the sky entreating, or even closet where He wrestled with God. It was short, simple, and focused right on His Father.

God responded. Not just to Jesus – everyone around Him heard. There is nothing wrong with the prayers that get held up as examples to us. But, they are unfair – because these are not the prayers of everyday life. And if we are not careful, we end up assuming that these grand prayers are THE model, and other prayers are somehow not good prayers. Let’s watch Jesus pray. Listen to Jesus pray. In His prayers let us find the true model of our prayers.

John 17:20-24
Prayer is how we commune with God. We have here an brief look into the intimacy between Jesus and His Father. And in this time, between two who are so close they are One, we find ourselves. The Almighty God and the Lamb are talking about us. And the prayer expresses this incredible (and incredulous) desire that God wants to be so close to us, that someone looking at us would see only one. Then our prayers wouldn’t be petitions sent up like the smoke of incense in the tabernacle, they would be more like the intimate thoughts we within ourselves or the whispers between those embracing one another.

 

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Brotherhood

God will work

brotherhood – May 2014ministering through prayer 

God will work

Phil 2.13

As we wait for God to work in our church and our lives, let’s find assurance in His Word that He will work

Now matters, We matter

Psa 8:3-6 KJV –

… 6 Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all [things] under his feet:

God’s good creation is given to us…He will work in our lives because v6 is the answer to the question of what God thinks of man (v4)

Trust God to work

Jhn 17:23-26 KJV – 23 I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.

God will work because He is in our lives and is bringing us closer to Him each day

 

Continuity with Eternity

1Co 15:54-58 KJV –

58 Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.

Paul’s great passage on our bodily resurrection ends with the point that now matters into eternity & we are working with God today toward a purpose that we will see completed (Rev 21.2)
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Brotherhood

Jesus fulfills God’s Word

Brotherhood – Apr 2014

Jesus fulfills God’s Word

Luke 24.13-31

PALM SUNDAY

(MT 21 / Zec 9.9)

  • Messiah comes as promised in the Abrahamic & Davidic covenants, King comes to Jerusalem and the new Kingdom begins

PASSOVER

(MT 26.26-29 / Ex 12.1-13)

  • Jesus shows the disciples HOW he is tying together of ALL of history
  • GEN 3 & EX12 to the ONE way God was going to fix it all – He is the sacrifice that restores fellowship with God

 

CRUCIFIXION

(MT 27.35-37 / IS 53.1-12)

Where:

  • sin is paid for,
  • we are restored to God
  • the Fall of man in GEN 3 is reversed
  • sin & death are conquered

RESURRECTION

(MT 28.17-18 / EZ 37.1-28 /

1Cor 15.53-57, Rev 21.1-5)

  • The Messiah is exalted
  • spiritual rebirth now,
  • promise of our BODILY resurrection
  • resurrection of the ENTIRE UNIVERSE
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Brotherhood

Healing

Brotherhood – Feb 2014

healing

IS 53.5

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed

 

spiritual

Jesus announced his ministry as a healing of the spirit

Lk 4:18

The Spirit of the Lord [is] upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,

 

 Physical

first act after preaching the beatitudes – healed one person whom no one else would want to heal

 

Mt 8.7

And Jesus saith unto him, I will come and heal him.

 

emotional

Jn 8.11

She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.

 

 healing is coming

1Cor 15.54

So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.

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Brotherhood

Growth

deep roots and broad branches

growth

 

HORIZONTAL  ⏪  ⏩

more branches = more people =
more fruit = more glory to God

 

JN 15.8
Herein is my Father glorified , that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.

 

VERTICAL  ⏫ ⏬

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2BCNews Brotherhood Ministries

Brotherhood – Jan 2014

Brotherhood 2014 was off to a soggy start.

Brotherhood

The weather could have been better today – torrential rains, a thunderstorm warning, overflowing gutters, and 25 yd visibility. The turnout didn’t look promising, and it wasn’t the way we envisioned Brotherhood starting off in 2014 after a hiatus.

But God is good. Men came, the food was amazing, and the fellowship was good.

 

For those wondering what Brotherhood is about, we covered that today. It’s time when the men of the church gather to pray and have a meal and time of fellowship. Each meeting has a focus that is specific to our church and its needs. Our faith in the power of prayer is lived out. The greek term in the new testament for brotherhood has its root in a word that means connected from the womb. As Christians, we are all spiritually reborn of the same Spirit – brothers from the same womb. Brothers praying in the same spirit.

Today we spoke about the Growth of our Church. Our church is like the tree in Luke 13.6-9, the tree that has been prepared and the owner of the vineyard is ready to see fruit. We have prepared our church and are excited to see it grow.

  • Horizontal Growth – more families to be the branches of our tree, to bear fruit as in Matthew 13.31-33
  • Vertical Growth – strengthening the roots of each member and helping them grow deeper Colossians 2.7