Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Transforming Together

Acts 2:42  They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
After Jesus ascended into heaven, the disciples were faced with the prospect of continuing on without him.  So long as Jesus had been physically present, he had been at the center of all activity.  Now that he was gone, what were they to do?  Would they go their own ways and return to their former lives? Would they launch a violent revolution?  Would factions emerge?  All of these were very real options and each would have been an understandable, if misguided response to Jesus’ ascension.  Fortunately, the disciples settled on  a different course of action.  Rather then drift apart, they banded together and grew into the people Christ intended them to be.
Similarly, when John Wesley became a pastor, he found a church that had lost touch with its people.  Few attended and those that did were rarely transformed by God’s grace.  Thus, he launched an effort to revive Christianity in England- not by building more and bigger churches, but by gathering small groups together so that they could contemplate God and hold one another accountable.
The early disciples and the early Methodists hit upon one important truism-  its very difficult to embark on the Christian journey alone.  Its too tempting to allow other influences to distract you from the path when you are all alone.  This is one of the reasons we come together in worship each Sunday morning.  However, as John Wesley discovered, Sunday worship is generally not enough to foster real growth. It doesn’t allow for extensive sharing of the struggles and joys of your life.  It generally doesn’t allow for conversation that can help one to perceive God a little clearer.
In a small group, friendships can grow.  In a small group, we can hold one another accountable.  In a small group, we can give space for a person to work through their grief.  After all, isn’t this the model Jesus taught us?  You gather together a group, maybe of 12 or so, do God’s work, and transform the world.

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