If you would, and if you want
to, turn in your Bibles to the book of 1 John. The first epistle
general of John. And the first chapter. And I want to read verse 3. Let's
read verse 3 through verse 7. 1 John chapter 1 verse 3, that
which we have seen and heard declare we unto you that ye also
may have fellowship with us. And truly our fellowship is with
the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. And these things
write we unto you that your joy may be full. This, then, is the
message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that
God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that
we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie,
and do not the truth. If we walk in the light, as He
is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood
of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanseth us from all sin." I'm just going
to stop right there for a moment. I do have a title, it's called,
We Declare to Fellowship. We Declare to Fellowship. John wrote this epistle and the
first part of this chapter, basically this whole first chapter, is
about the fellowship. It's important. The fellowship
is important to us. And there's an order here laid
out by the apostle to let us know about the fellowship and
even this order of the fellowship. Our fellowship is ordained of
God. It's given to us. It was chosen
to be done this way by God. I got a free e-book the other
day. The title of this e-book is only
20 pages long, but I still didn't read it. Well, you'll know after
I read you the title. Five bad habits that kill church
growth and how to break them. Well, to be honest, I told Debbie,
I said, I'm going to get this book because I want to know if
one of them, well, the bad habit you need to break is actually
preaching the gospel. Because that seems to be what
happens. You preach the gospel, people leave you. And they don't
come. But no, this number one is a
lack of investment in staff and volunteers. Number two, I love this one,
you have not identified your target demographic. This is marketing 101 is what
this is. This is what church has come
to in this country. Bad habit number three, you don't
have an outreach strategy for that target demographic that
you haven't defined. Bad habit four, you haven't prioritized
teaching about, here we go, folks, generosity. And you're not meeting people
where they are digitally. Well, I'm going to tell you something.
This is a marketing strategy this guy's got. And it's a good
one because it's going to want you to teach more about generosity.
And then number five, how to reach people digitally. Okay,
you use his app on your phone and you can donate to your church
on this app. And don't worry, he don't get
much of it. That's what this world has come
to. That's what they're thinking
of in the terms of fellowship. I don't know if our church has
a Twitter feed. I hope not. I know we have a Facebook page.
But on that Facebook page, you will actually find sermons that
have been preached here. On our YouTube page, you will
find sermons that have been preached here by myself, Walter, and others. John writes it plainly here. That which we have seen and that
which we have heard declare we unto you. That's the foundation. From our point of view, from
our perspective, this is where it starts with us. Are we hearing
the truth of God? Is the truth of God being declared? Now Paul is very, I'm stuck on
Paul, it's John. John is very clear here. Well,
you can get the two mixed up. They're the two everybody wants
to get rid of. John is very clear here. In the very first verse,
I skipped over this, but I do have to go back to it. That which
was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have
seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands
have handled of the word of life. He's talking about Christ. And
he's talking about those who have seen Christ physically. Handled him touched him walk
with him were disciples of him That's who he's talking about.
That's the first we here For the life was manifested this
is verse 2 and we have seen it and bear witness and show unto
you that eternal life Which was with the father and was manifested
unto us then he says that which we have seen and heard those
that walk with the Lord Those Touched the Lord those that heard
Jesus Christ with their own ears We declare this to you That's
who this way is Paul is being inclusive here and exclusive
at the same time This is what's known as the apostles doctrine
If the apostles didn't preach it. It's not the apostolic doctrine
There are apostolic churches all around us. They use that
name all the time. But I'm going to tell you something.
I don't know the one that has apostolic doctrine on the sign
that has the apostolic doctrine from the pulpit. And this is
where Paul is right here. He is writing of Christ, the
one that we have handled, the one that we have heard, the one
that was seen. In the beginning, we heard of him. In the beginning,
God. Moses time we heard of it Then
the Messiah actually came and we saw him and we handled him
and we heard him with our own ears The scriptures are very clear
we were told about Christ the Messiah Long before he became
flesh and dwelt among us And he did come and he became flesh And he was manifest in the flesh
He became flesh. He was made flesh and dwelt among
us. And he still has that flesh right
now. There is a man seated at the
right hand of the Father, the God man, certainly. But that same Jesus that went
away is the same Jesus that's coming back. Guess what? That's
the apostolic doctrine. Not only did they see him while
he was here, they saw him go. And they were told this same
Jesus that you see go is going to come again in like manner
as you've seen him go. Now the other part where I wanted
to say this is inclusive and exclusive is the we here is those
that saw him and heard him and didn't leave him. Because there
were those who saw him and they heard his message and they left. John's not including those. These
are the ones that didn't leave him. And it says, declare we. That which we have seen and heard,
declare we unto you. We've got four Gospels. We've
got all these epistles. We've got the book of Revelation as a declaration of the Lord
Jesus Christ. We have been given the word of
God about the word of God. This word declare, we, is actually
one Greek word and it means to announce. To declare, to report,
to proclaim, in particular, as a messenger. The preacher is not to be the
message. He is to be the messenger. Who hath believed our report?
is away. And it's our report. It's been
given to us. But all we do is report it. I'm
not here to make anything up. All I can say is, thus saith
the Lord, what these holy men of old, moved by the Spirit,
wrote down for our edification and declared unto us. I'm going to get this. I will, with John here, try to be in
that fellowship. You understand, just as there's
only one message, there's only one gospel, there's only one
report, there's only one fellowship, true fellowship. And that's the
fellowship with these who had looked upon and handled the word
of God. And they declared it unto us. And we are declaring it unto
you. Declare we unto you the word
that was in the beginning, the word that was with God and that
was God. that one the word became flesh
and dwelt among us that one whose hand whose voice created the
universe came down and dwelt with men this is what John has
declared unto us and others and he declares it unto you that
ye, you who read this, you who believe
this, you who want this, you who desire to know this declaration,
our report, is declared to you if you want
it, if you have an interest. There are those who don't. There
are those who've left. And they left because of the
Declaration. They can get mad at me. They
can get mad at Walter. They have gotten mad at me. They have gotten
mad at Walter. They got mad at Earl. But what they're leaving is Jesus
Christ. The truth of God as it is in
him. They don't want to come and hear what John and these
others have declared. They don't want to know what
John has declared. They want to know. Now, I'm not going to go into what
they want to know, because they want to know what they want to know. They want to know what they have
to do, or what they can do, or give me something hard to do,
or give me something easy to do. And the declaration is God
has done. In the Old Testament, the declaration
was God is going to do. Jesus Christ was coming, is coming. He came and the work of redemption
is done. Now there is this. hear the word
of your salvation, the good news of your salvation, the declaration
of the apostolic doctrine as it is. This declaration is directed
to those who have ears to hear it. It's declared publicly. We don't keep anybody out of
this place. We don't have to. The gospel keeps people away.
The public declaration of the truth will cause some people
to leave. It already has. But this declaration is declared
unto you that ye have fellowship with us. There's only one fellowship. John was writing to these people
that they would have fellowship with him and the others who had
seen and heard and handled and touched the Lord Jesus Christ. He was telling them, you can become part of us. This fellowship is one with another. Yes, it's more, but it's only
in Christ. It's only in Christ. It's only
by hearing this declaration that we know Christ and that others know Christ.
But you can have fellowship, it says, unto you that ye have
fellowship with us. And this is what this declaration
is for, that ye. It's going to happen to some
degree or another that ye have fellowship with us in Christ,
in Christ alone. Why? Because God ordained this
also. First John, verse chapter four
and verse six, A page stuck together. We are
of God. He that knoweth God, heareth
us. He that is not of God, heareth
not us. Hereby know we the spirit of
truth and the spirit of error. Those that will hear what we
declare are of God. It's the messages of God. And
those who are not of God will not, will not, will not hear
us. They won't hear me and they won't
hear you. They won't hear Walter and they won't hear you. Why? It's got nothing to do with talking
with you, but it has to do with who you're talking about. I spent part of an afternoon
yesterday talking about dogs with people. Walter and I had
been by ourselves for a while. We were talking about Christ.
We were joined in the subject chain. That's all right, it worked
out better that way, because there might have been a fight
or an argument. If not, it wasn't the time or the place for it.
But this is the thing. They'll bring up their church
membership. They'll bring up, they've done
this for 15 years, they've done that for 10 years, but they never
named the name of Christ. I'm going to tell you something, that ain't
fellowship. That's conversation. That's conversation
and in some cases it might be family. Physical family. But that ain't the fellowship.
That's not what John's writing here. And the fellowship is sweet. The fellowship is good. But that's
only because that fellowship is in Christ our Lord. We heard a little bit of the
truth preached yesterday and we were rejoicing in it, happy
about it. Some people mentioned it and
they were happy about it. Other bunch never mentioned a
word about what was said. If they did, hearing it went
right over their head. It's just like going to church. Now, I don't think they heard
it, because if I think they heard it, they'd have gotten mad. But that's the difference between
fellowship and conversation. Our fellowship is in Christ. And John here, I'm going to do
it again, John here said, you have fellowship with us. There's
only one fellowship, and that fellowship's in Christ. And our fellowship is with the
Father and the Son. Our fellowship. You may have
fellowship with us, but he didn't stop there. And truly, our fellowship
is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. Our fellowship is with the Father and the Son
because our fellowship, our conversation in our fellowship, our guidance
in our fellowship, our reason for our fellowship is the Father
and the Son. I like talking about Christ.
I like talking about Jesus Christ the Lord. And I like talking
about him as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. And I
like talking about him as the good shepherd which laid down
his life for his sheep and he took it back up again. I like
talking about him as the one who came to save his people from
their sins. And I love talking about the
fact that He did save His people from their sins on the cross
while He was here and that part's done. I love to talk about the
Father who will not impute sin to the blessed man. God will not impute sin to a
man. This is where our fellowship
is. This is where our conversations are to lie in this fellowship.
This is who we fellowship with. We fellowship with each other,
but it's only because of Him. See, not only is He the head,
He's the central hub. By him all things consist, even
our fellowship, even our acknowledgment of it. And we have been called to this
fellowship. 1 Corinthians 1 and verse 9,
this is Paul writing. God is faithful by whom you are
called under the fellowship of his son Jesus Christ our Lord. We declare to you that you have
fellowship with us and that fellowship is with the Father and the Son
and what's it say? God is faithful by whom you're
called to this fellowship. We just declare. I'm not calling
anybody to the fellowship. Guess what? That's God's job. We declare it. Jesus Christ is
Lord. Jesus Christ paid the debt, obtained
eternal redemption for us. And he ascended unto the Father
and he's coming again. And when Stephen was stoned,
he saw him standing at the right hand. And when Paul was on the
road to Damascus, Jesus spoke to it. That's what it says there
when you read that account It says Jesus spoke to him. He didn't
say the Lord Jesus. He said no Jesus whom you persecute
The revelation Paul said who art thou Lord The one you persecute the one
you think and that man became the apostle to the Gentiles and Why? He was called under the
fellowship of his son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. And he was
called by God. He that knows God hears us. This is the we right now. In Philippians 1 and 5, Paul
wrote, Thanking God for the Philippians, for your
fellowship, but in the gospel from the first day unto now. So our fellowship's with the
Father and the Son. We are called into it by the
Father, into fellowship with the Son. But our fellowship together
is what? It's in the gospel. It's in the
good news of Jesus Christ There is no fellowship outside of the
gospel Just as there's no fellowship outside of Christ Because Jesus
Christ is the gospel He is the good news of your salvation our
salvation is in a person Our salvation is a person then this is the message we heard
of him and declare unto you God is light and in him is no darkness at
all John didn't think any of this
up John didn't make any of this up. I don't care what people say. John was not on the Isle of Patmos
old and delusional. There are people who say that.
There are people who say that. He received his doctrine from
the Lord Jesus Christ. He wrote as he was inspired by
the Holy Spirit. And he wrote the truth. He wrote it down for all other
believers. He that is of God, heareth us. That was not boasting. That's
a statement of fact. It's just a flat statement. He
that is of God hears us. If you hear the truth, if you
love the truth, if you know the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ,
that is a blessing. That is a gift of God. And he that heareth is those
that are of God. He that is of God heareth us. This is the way Christ said it Himself. It's
a Pontius Pilate of all people. John 18 and verse 37, Pilate
said, Therefore unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered,
Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for
this cause came I into the world. that I should bear witness, what?
Unto the truth. And he made this statement. Everyone
that is of the truth heareth my voice. It ain't my voice you
gotta hear. It's not my message you have
to hear. It's his. I may mess up terribly some days. Sometimes I think I have. But the message is him. I'll
do my best not to, but don't. What does this word say about
him? Because everyone that is of the
truth heareth my voice. That's also a fact. Jesus Christ said it. That makes
it so. And believers hear His voice. And that is why we have the fellowship
we have been given. It's because we hear His voice. Him being declared in His gospel. Him being declared in the music
we sing. Him being declared in our conversations
with each other. It's all part of the fellowship
that we have been given, that we have been called unto of the
apostolic doctrine that has been delivered to us in this book
about our Lord Jesus Christ. Because everyone that is of the
truth hears His voice. The Good Shepherd says, my sheep
by name and they follow. And guess what that means? That
means he calls his sheep by name and they follow. That's the deeper meaning there.
They're my sheep and I call. And he calls us into fellowship
with him and with each other. but it's with him first. But we've been given this gift.
Enjoy it. Use it. Wallow in it if you want. Our Heavenly Father, thank you
for everything you've given to us. For all that you've done
for us, all you've done in us, to us, around us. We know all things work together
for good to them that love God, to them that are called according
to His purpose. Thank you. In Christ's name we
pray. Amen.