| Introduction In the first installment of the movie The Lord of the Rings, all the good guys get together at Elrond's place and form the Fellowship of the Ring. They swear to one another on their lives that they will do whatever they can to get the ring to Mt. Doom to be destroyed. They are bonded together in bond of life or death around the ring. It is a powerful scene and sets up the rest of the movie. Christians are also part of a fellowship. But this one is not about a silly ring. This is a much more powerful bond. This is the Fellowship of the Son of God, Forged on the cross of Christ by his blood. In this fellowship every Christian is united to Christ and to each other for all eternity. I. A Review from Last Week: Holiness, Unity, and the Glory of Christ. A. In the first three verses of this letter, Paul gives us the three-pronged theme of the whole book: Christ has redeemed and sanctified you; therefore, live holy and united lives for the glory of Christ. B. Paul deals with them in a pastoral way. A. We are going to come back to it in a few moments, but notice that God has called us into the fellowship of his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, 9. B. Paul is thankful for the members of the Fellowship of the Son who are in Corinth, 4. C. The grace of God that is given to those who belong to the Fellowship of the Son is not just an invisible thing, 5. D. This grace for today is foundationally established in the testimony of Christ, 6. III. The Fellowship of the Son and Grace for Tomorrow, 7b-8. A. Our union with the Son, not only enables us to live for the glory of God right now, but it also preserves us to the end, 7b. B. God will preserve us to the end, 8. IV. The Fellowship of the Son and the Faithfulness of the Father, 9. A. All this is true because God is faithful. B. We are called by him to be in fellowship with his Son because he promised his Son that he would give him a people to be his. C. God is never going to go back on his Word to us and to his Son. D. So we can be confident this fellowship, the Fellowship of the Son, will never be broken. E. God will not give up on any Christian – he will keep him/her till the day of Christ's coming. Conclusion Charles Hodge, the great Princeton theologian, said, "We are called to be partakers of Christ; partakers of his life, as member of his body; and therefore, partakers of his character, of his sufferings here and of his glory hereafter." We have been called into the Fellowship of the Son and because of that we live holy lives, are united to each other, and whatever we do, we do for his glory.  | |||
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Friday, June 8, 2012
The Fellowship of the Son - 1 Cor. 1:4-9
