More Than Sunday: Fervent and Fruitful | Part 2

Welcome to the Awakening Church podcast.

We pray this message encourages you and provides the hope and light of Jesus Christ.

Thanks for tuning in.

So today we are finishing a short two-part series called More Than Sunday.

We started it last week, we're finishing it today, and we're really talking about how so much of our discipleship as Christ followers happens within the context of community.

It happens outside of just a Sunday.

And this morning I want to focus on friendships, the friendships that we form in our communities and what Christ-centered, God-like friendships that He wants for us, what those look like.

So let's pray.

Lord Jesus, we just pray for a focusing of our minds on you.

God, I pray that you would move me aside and just use me to speak to your church, whatever you want to say, point us back to your word, your truth, and your love.

Amen.

Amen.

So I have a question to throw your way to kick this off.

I want you to think about, no need to raise your hand.

I want you to think about the people in your life.

And if you would consider yourself to have one, two, maybe three people you'd consider good, close friends.

That's true of you.

And then I want you to think about that person, whoever that came to mind, if someone did come to mind, why?

Why would you consider them a good or close friend?

Is there a reason that's very comes up to you right away?

Do you have to sit and think about it?

What is that reason for you?

Statistics have shown, as as recent as this year, that half of Americans would consider that they do not have even one close friend.

Isn't that so heartbreaking?

And for the half that do, that would consider themselves too, I wonder, what do they use to define what good or close means?

The great philosopher Aristotle has three criteria, what he would call three different types of friends.

I want to take us through that right now.

The first is what he would call a friendship of utility.

This is more of an accidental or you know a coincidental friendship.

It's a friendship that occurs because there's some mutual benefit that you can get from each other, or maybe one-sided even, right?

Think about if you're in the workplace, if you want to further your career and your networking, that would be like a friendship of utility.

Maybe you know someone in your life who has a certain skill set that you wish to glean from.

That's a friendship of utility.

Oftentimes these friendships start and end when the utility kind of ends, or when that exchange, that mutual benefit kind of ends, the friendship will end.

And there's no good or bad here, but these are just right the categories of friendships.

The second, similarly, is kind of coincidental.

It's a friendship of pleasure.

And it's just that friendship of pleasure.

These are the people who bring a source of entertainment, fun, maybe even a source of escape from the day-to-day stressors in your life.

Friendship of entertainment and pleasure.

And usually with these friendships, I want you to think about like if your kids are on the same soccer team, maybe, right?

The kids are bonding over that mutual hobby and the parents are bonding over their kids being on that team.

Maybe you're in college and you're a part of a club, or you geek out over a cool hobby like Dungeons and Dragons or something, right?

Those are friendships of pleasure.

The third is a friendship of virtue, a virtuous friendship.

This is what Aristotle says that we should try to cultivate.

What a friendship of virtue is, is it's a shared appreciation over mutual virtue or character in one another.

And the cool thing is that there is some overlap between these, right?

So a friendship of utility can lead to a friendship of virtue, and vice versa, but really the one that we should try to be intentional about is this friendship of virtue.

Now, I think Aristotle has amazing wisdom here, but as believers, our ultimate source of wisdom is Jesus Christ.

Am I right?

Amen?

Yes.

So what does Jesus have to say about this?

This virtue.

If I were to think about how Jesus would define virtue, I would think that it's this concept of looking more like Jesus, right?

Having his attributes, having his character.

I remember asking my mom when I was younger, when I was a teenager, mom, what makes us look different as Christians?

And for context, I didn't grow up Christian.

So my parents became believers when they were 40.

I was 10.

And so for us, this was a really big deal, right?

To go from, you know, it mattered to us.

Like, why do we look different?

What makes us look different?

This was a question that we like really cared about, why, right?

And I'll never forget her response that's always stuck with me.

She said, What makes us look different is the fruit that's being produced in our lives, right?

The fruit that's produced in our lives, the virtues or the attitudes that the Holy Spirit produces in our lives, thanks to Jesus Christ.

And I love how Paul says it in Philippians.

This is the first verse in your bulletin that we're gonna focus on this morning.

He says, May you always be filled with the fruit of your salvation, the righteous character produced in your life by Jesus Christ.

For this will bring much glory and praise to God.

And the cool thing is the you in this verse, I guess it's awesome for us individually, the you is actually plural in the Greek.

So Paul is talking to the church.

This is a collective for all of us, right?

The people watching online right now, all of us under this tent right now, all of us as believers, this is what Paul's exhortation is to all of us.

And so when I think of this righteous character or this fruit, I think of having a sense of steadfastness or fervor, right?

And I want us to focus our time this morning on how Christ-centered community is the context in which this righteous character is developed.

Christ-centered community is the context in which this righteous character and this fruit is developed in us.

And this happens outside of just a Sunday church experience.

If you are with us at any point during 2021, the first six months, you know that we were going through the book of Acts.

We spent a long time diving into the life of Paul, who he was, what he did, all about him, the just the deep impact that he made on Christianity as a belief system, right?

And this morning I want us to continue looking at Paul, but specifically his community.

Two friends that were in Paul's life and he had money, but two friends in specific who played an instrumental role in, I believe, his formation as a disciple of Jesus and what we can learn from them.

I don't know about you guys, but I kind of used to like gloss over those portions in the Bible where it would start with like, I'm gonna butcher, but something like, praise be to Theopolis, da-da-da-da-da, right?

Like my brother, da-da-da.

And I'd be like, why is this in the Bible?

I'd kind of like gloss over to like Colossians and Ephesians.

And then the more that I studied the Bible and the more that I'd been learning about who these were this was written to, why, the context, who wrote it, I realized, wow, this is intentional.

These excerpts are like little breadcrumbs that Paul's leaving for us to show us who he chose to surround himself with and why, and how they deeply impacted his formation as a disciple.

And these two men have very similar names.

It's kind of uncanny.

Their names are Epaphras and Epaphroditus.

So I'm gonna do my best to distinguish them as best as possible.

So let's dive into the life of Epaphras and their friendship first.

This is in your bulletin if you'd like to take notes.

So Epaphrus was a native of the town of Colossae.

This was an Asia Minor, that's modern-day Turkey.

And as a refresher, if the name Colossae sounds familiar to you, that's because the letter to the Colossian church, to the Colossians was written to the church in Colossae.

There isn't too much known about Epaphoros before he meets Paul, but commentators have researched that he probably met Paul in Ephesus, and he was trained by Paul and by Timothy in Ephesus, where there he became really like a church planter and filled with knowledge and great zeal to go and be a church planter.

What Epaphras is most known for is the instrumental role he played in discipling the Colossian church.

Fun fact that most people don't know, and I didn't know until I started studying for this message, is Paul never met the Colossians.

Paul wrote the letter to the Colossians in your Bible right now.

He never met them because he was in prison.

And so the amazing thing about their friendship is Ephrus is the one that delivers the Colossians this letter.

And in this day and age, it was really like this moment where this letter was developed.

They would read it all, like imagine, like in a town square, kind of like this, or in a church, this letter of encouragement and great, like just like empowerment to the church body.

So, with that historical context, kind of knowing that Epaporus was this like early church planter for that church, I want us to look at two verses in Colossians where Paul talks about their friendship.

And I think it's really interesting that the book of Colossians is kind of bookended by Epaphras.

We see him in verse um in chapter one and in chapter four.

So let's look at chapter one, verse seven.

Paul says, You learned it, it being the gospel, from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ.

I love Eugene Peterson's translation in the message version.

He says, He is one reliable worker for Christ.

I could always depend on him.

And then let's jump forward to chapter four.

Paul concludes Colossians by saying, Epaphras, who is one of you and a servant of Jesus, is always wrestling in prayer for you.

That you would stand firm in the will of God, mature, and fully assured.

The King James Version says for wrestling in prayer, another way of saying that is laboring fervently for you.

I love that word fervent.

It's so powerful and no pun intended, it actually means holding great power.

Another definition for fervent is to be intensely devoted to, to be steadfast.

Can you think of someone in your life who prays for you that way?

Like a steadfast prayer.

So let's look at some observations here, right?

In those two verses, we have a lot of meat there to unpack.

We see someone who is faithful, we see someone who is reliable, dependable.

That's kind of hard to find in this day and age, right?

Just being real.

Someone who's wrestling in prayer for the church body, for his brothers and sisters, and desiring them to be mature in their faith.

There's clearly so much fruit there that we see produced in someone's life, right?

And I think about it for us as a church.

Have you ever been around someone that just maybe exudes peace, right?

Or they just like have this joy about them.

And the more time you spend with them, that kind of you're just like, I want this.

Like it rubs off on you.

Many of you are like that for me sitting here right now.

And there's this contagiousness about it, it begins to permeate around you the more time you spend with that person.

And so my question for you is do you have an epaphrase in your life?

Do you have someone wrestling in prayer for you, encouraging you?

And I asked this question because we all need this church.

We desperately need for life to be spoken into us, right?

We live in such a world that just is drowning us in its noise.

It's drowning us in the chaos of what we should focus on.

I think just spend 30 minutes scrolling on Instagram, you immediately are depleted.

Am I the only one, right?

We need this just being spoken into to keep on keeping on.

And so for Epaphrist, just standing firm in faith that he's talking about, this requires for us to let people speak into our lives.

It requires us to have the humility to let people that we trust speak into our lives.

And we need that reminding, right?

Because oftentimes we can forget.

I remember being at a coffee date with a close friend about a month ago, and this is someone who I consider an amazing little sister in faith, and just in my time of knowing her and awakening, I deeply, deeply love her.

And like many of us, during this season, she was in a season of serious doubt and discouragement in her faith.

And so during this coffee, we were just talking, and I just was like, kind of this like, you know, big sister, like, I see so much in you.

Like, keep fighting, you know, like come on, keep fighting.

And there was such a special moment of as we were chatting, there was this a pause.

And I, in my own, like, you know, not wanting there to be an awkward silence.

It wasn't even awkward, but I wanted to fill it.

But something in me was like, no, Nassim, just pause.

And there was a moment of silence.

And about a minute later, she looked up at me with tears streaming down her face.

And she said, You see so much in me, but what do you see in me?

And I thought that that childlike humility and rawness just to ask, What do you see in me, was so powerful in that moment.

And isn't that true for so many of us, right?

Maybe we don't say it, but we're thinking it.

Like, but what do you even see in me?

Because we can't see it ourselves.

And in that moment, there was such a powerful moment of just me being able to just pour encouragement into her.

Like, this is everything I see in you, right?

Because oftentimes we can see glimpses of God at work in someone's life when they can't, right?

We can see glimpses of God's character in someone, maybe they're blind to it.

And we're called, church, to be that for one another.

We are called to be voices that speak truth into one another.

And I'll I'll never forget when we were leaving, there was another moment of pause.

And I asked her, you know, like, what are you thinking?

What are you processing?

And I'll never forget this.

She said, I just don't want this to end.

I just don't want this moment to end.

And I'm so glad you asked me to get coffee.

And I'll never forget that, right?

And there's this power in us being voices of encouragement to each other, right?

This heart of a paphris to have each other be mature and firm in our faith.

This happens when we allow each other to speak life to one another.

And we need that as well.

I think about for myself the past few days, the amount of texts and calls I've gotten saying that praying for me for this message, that's been fuel for me.

Right.

I think about our small groups.

Our small groups right now are going through this affirmation exercise.

Um, shout out to the Monroe family for creating this for our church.

This is available for anyone in a small group, by the way.

But our small group did this on Tuesday, and it was just a sweet time of being poured into and being affirmed in your identity in Jesus.

And you might think, you know, us on staff, maybe we don't need it.

We need this so bad.

Like we need to know what you see in us, right?

Like we all need this for each other.

And I shared this last week with our um startup attendees.

You know, this is why we have small groups at Awakening Church.

We don't have small groups just to give you a night to go bowling or I was gonna say like wine night.

We don't all, we don't, whatever.

Some people, some groups do, I don't know, but you know, they don't exist just for social things, right?

But they exist because we believe, we hold this conviction for Chris and I who co-lead this ministry.

We believe life change happens in communities centered around Jesus.

Amen.

We believe that life change happens in small communities centered around Jesus.

And so we hope that you would be in a midweek group, in a community.

Maybe you attend awakening or not, wherever you go to church.

I don't say this, you guys hear me every week talking about like fill out the connection card.

I don't just say that in an automated way.

I say that because I deeply, deeply believe in the power of being in a small community focused on Jesus.

And so you'll notice in your bulletin, I've left you with reflection questions at the end of every section.

And I'm leaving you with these because I really believe that you might remember this message, you might not, but questions like this help us as we're processing throughout the week, right?

And I hope that you take these questions and let sit with them, right?

Let them ruminate.

You'll notice that these questions are also twofold.

Because as the adage says, to have a good friend, we're called to be a good friend.

So this message today, I wanted to focus on who we're becoming, but also who we're allowing to speak into our lives.

So here's some questions for you.

Who are you fervently praying for?

Who in your life are you praying for regularly?

And who is praying for you?

Who are you allowing into your life to speak life over you?

Who do you trust in your life to allow to speak life over you?

And church, this needs to be said that letting people speak life over you, this requires a wisdom, a discernment, and a discretion with who we let in.

And I could do a whole other sermon on this, but I really wanted to just leave you with three practical tips.

If you're kind of wrestling with like, how do I know who to let in or who to trust?

Here are just a few tips for you.

Look for someone who's present with you.

Who is present with you, who's attentive to you?

Who is an observer in your life that might see a pattern in your life that you don't see, right?

And that you won't get super defensive if they speak that into that.

Who's patient with you?

Who is not looking just to jump in with their own advice, but really who is pointing you back to God's truth?

Who is pointing you back to God's truth?

Chris mentioned this in his sermon last week.

Who's opening up God's word with you?

Right?

For many of us, that doesn't happen.

Oftentimes we hang out with friends.

Sure, we we talk about life and stuff, but who's opening up God's word with you?

Who can lead who do you trust to lead you back to God's truth?

All right, so that is Epaphras.

Now we're gonna move on to Paul's second friend.

Does anyone remember his name?

Very close.

Epaphroditus.

There we go.

Okay, we're awake.

Cool.

Okay, Epaphroditus.

So we meet Ephroditus in the book of Philippians.

This is just flip one chapter back, one book back from Colossians.

We meet him in Philippians, that's modern day Greece.

And when we meet Epaphroditus, Paul at this time is under house arrest.

He is awaiting trial before Caesar in Rome.

And Paul, being as amazing as Paul is, while he's under house arrest, he's also still so focused on the spiritual well-being of the church in Philippi.

Paul's just so cool, right?

It's so great.

And so because he could not go to Philippi himself to deliver the Philippians message, he sends Epaphroditus.

So here we have another beautiful missionary and messenger that takes the book of Philippians to the church.

And I think it's just so cool, right?

Like, let's just take a minute to pause.

Like the book of Philippians and Colossians wouldn't be in our Bibles if it weren't for these two men.

Isn't that amazing?

I didn't realize that until I was writing this sermon.

I was like, that is so cool, right?

We often focus so much on Paul, and Paul's amazing, but we forget that taking a bird's eye view, there's so many people that he was connected to.

This is the beauty of community, right?

They helped his mission come to fruition.

In addition to this, in addition to Epaphroditus delivering this message, before that happens, let's throw back a little bit of time.

Because he's under house arrest, the Philippian church wanted to support Paul financially by sending him financial support, money.

And so Epaphroditus is the one that takes this money to Paul and he's under house arrest.

Now, there was no Venmo at this time, right?

There's no Venmo.

For maybe some boomers in the room, there was no wire transfer option.

There was none of that.

Love you guys.

This was a journey.

This was a journey.

Commentators have said that this was about a 729-mile journey on foot.

This would have most likely taken 57 days.

And don't forget that people in this day and age were not in a rush.

They honored their Sabbath day.

So even on this 57-day journey, there was a day of rest where they would stop and pause.

So Paul Epaphroditus brings this money to Paul.

And then at that point, Paul is like, You're such an asset to this church.

I want you to be the one to take this letter, the Philippians, back to them and be with them and pastor them.

So let's look at the text, knowing that context.

Okay.

This is a longer verse, so track with me.

I have bolded a few things that I want us to focus on.

This is Philippians 2, 25 to 30.

Paul saying, I think it's necessary to send you back Epaphroditus, my brother, co-laborer or co-worker, some translations say, and fellow soldier, who is also your messenger, whom you sent to take care of my needs.

For he longs for all of you and is distressed because you heard he was ill.

Indeed, he was ill and almost died.

But God had mercy on him, and not only on him, but also on me.

Therefore, I'm all the more eager to send him so that when you see him again, you would be glad and that I would have less anxiety.

Welcome him in the Lord with great joy and honor people like him because he almost died for the work of Christ.

He risked his life to make up for the help that you yourselves could not give me.

There's a lot I want to focus on in there, but really quick, the point where it says he was ill and almost died.

Let's talk about that.

So in this day and age, right, we don't know which season this journey was done in.

Think about this was in the winter, getting pneumonia, getting sick, not knowing where you would spend the night, where your next lodging would be, uh, weather conditions, food, maybe getting food poisoning or not even having enough to eat.

And then just think about traveling with a large sum of money, right?

Like the fear of it being stolen like by bandits or something.

I haven't said that word in a long time, but it sounds right for this context.

Like bandits on the road.

I don't know, maybe.

So there's a lot.

So it's very clear that Epaphroditus wasn't in this friendship for utility or for pleasure, right?

He was in this because he believed, one, his calling from the Lord, and two, in his ministry partner that was Paul.

That's what he was in this for, to further God's mission.

And I also want to focus on I love how real the Bible is when it comes to emotion, right?

That line in there where Paul says that I would have less anxiety.

Isn't that so beautiful?

I'm sending him back to you that I would have less anxiety.

It reminds me of like the people in our lives that feel like home, right?

The people that we find comfort in, convent to, those safe people for us.

I love that Paul talks about that.

And it makes sense, right?

Because these three descriptors, my brother, co-laborer, and fellow soldier, that's what he uses to describe their bond.

So let's define what that looks like.

Let's define what that looks like in context for their friendship and for us today.

The first, a brother or a sister in faith.

I think about rugged commitment to one another, this judgment freeness, right?

If if you have a brother or sister, there's kind of like if you have a healthy relationship, but there's no, there's no like fear of like you won't like me anymore.

You have to like each other, like your family, they can speak into your life.

And Epaphroditus, the same way, took care of Paul's needs with such selflessness, with with the with such servant heartedness.

And when we talk about rugged commitment, I really think about speaking the truth in love.

I think that's something we're missing today.

And as Christians, as something we're called to by Jesus to speak the truth and love to one another.

This kind of not having a fear of having the truth spoken in love to you and also being able to be bold to do that for the people that you trust.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer talks about this so beautifully.

On the note of speaking the truth and love, he says, Why else then has God bestowed Christian brotherhood upon us?

Why else?

So that in faith, the humble person would speak, would stick both to truth and to love, that he would stick to the word of God and let it lead him to his brother because he sees nothing for himself and has no fears for himself.

He can help his brother through the word of God.

Isn't that powerful?

Let's be that for one another, right?

That's a brother or a sister in faith, a co-laborer.

I think of someone working towards the same goal, being on mission with us.

It could be a literal co-worker, right?

But for others, it could be who are you on mission with?

I think about many of you sitting here today who serve on different ministry teams.

I think about our kids' ministry, our leaders, right?

You guys are on mission together to awaken children of the next generation to God's truth, right?

There's power in that.

I think of our connection team.

You guys exist to welcome people to the body of Christ, to make them feel known and loved within the church.

So whatever your mission or purpose in life is, who is on mission with you?

Who's running the race alongside you?

Who are those partners in faith that you have?

And finally, a fellow soldier.

You know, this language, we know that Paul was not in the Roman army.

This is metaphorical language.

And this is so powerful because we are in a spiritual battle, right?

As Christians, I'm gonna talk about more in a second, but we're in a spiritual battle and we need these soldiers kind of standing in the fight with us, right?

Having our back.

I think that it's such a, there's a character shaping that comes with that, right?

And Paul and Epaphrodis were so like this for one another in their friendship, which is so special.

And sometimes, church, there's people in our lives, and maybe as you're reading this, maybe there's someone in your life that fits the bill on all three of these.

Maybe there's other people who, there's one person in your life that is that brother, another who's the co-laborer, right?

And I think it's so beautiful to look at this in the context of God's word.

I thought it would also be helpful maybe to give you a practical example in my own life.

And as I was just writing this message, it was just so obvious who this is for me.

And I feel so blessed to have someone in my life who is actually all three of these for me.

And that's my friendship with Chris, who's on staff here, who's such a dear friend of mine.

And just to kind of give some context to that, when I think of as a brother, I think of someone who, when Chris joined our staff three years ago, there was an immediate interest to know me outside of just someone I work with.

There was an immediate interest to know my family, and vice versa.

His wife Allie has become like a sister to me.

They're one of my closest friends in my life right now.

And in turn, the investment they made to get to know our family, right?

The investment they made to get to know my brother, which is so special to me because many people at Awakening don't know my brother.

They don't know that we're a family of four, not a family of three.

So that is so dear to me.

Our parents are now friends.

Our parents have taken an interest to pour into one another, his mom with me, my parents with them, right?

So when a friendship kind of like when you know one another's family, right, it goes beyond just friendship, right?

There's a depth to it of like you really know us.

As a co-laborer, right?

We work together, so we're literal co-workers.

But with that, there's this such a cool God pairing in our gift set.

There's a really cool complimenting that goes on with the way we're able to tag team on so much ministry together.

And it just makes it so fun.

It makes it so much.

I love going to work every day, right?

I love our entire team just so much.

I love being on mission with a team like ours.

And finally, as a fellow soldier, right?

There's this, there's this reality that ministry is lonely.

It can get lonely.

And to have a ministry partner to go through the good, the bad, the ugly with all of it, is just so valuable.

To have a fellow soldier that for, you know, both of us, I could say that Chris and I know that our purpose in life is to shepherd and disciple.

So whether that's that awakening now or 10 years from now, wherever we all end up, there's that kind of shared unbreakable bond of we're existing in ministry together, right?

And I would just say that to summarize it, I know that as a friend, he wants not only the best for me, but he wants God's best for me, right?

So who is that for you?

As I'm talking, can you think of people in your life?

Who are those people that are sharpening you?

Who are those people that are speaking life to you?

And I really want to focus right now on this concept of fellow soldiers, guys.

I would argue that right now in this day and age, as a community, this is the most important thing that we're called to be for one another because we're in a battle.

We are in a battle that might sound like superheroe or weird or whatnot, but that's the truth, right?

We live in a world, unfortunately, that's ruled by darkness.

We have a very real enemy, Satan, who wants to sow seeds of deception and lies into our lives.

So when we're fellow soldiers for one another, we come alongside and we battle for one another, right?

This is spiritual warfare.

One of the biggest ways the enemy wants to lie to us is by isolating us, by sowing seeds of deception into your heart into your life, into your mind.

Thinking things like, you can just come and go on a Sunday, right?

You don't, you can just, you know, come and go and don't talk to anyone.

You're fine on your own.

Or this is just a really busy season for our family.

We can't invest in people right now.

Or even I can't tell my small group I'm struggling with this sin, right?

This is too bad of a thing.

I can't tell anyone.

And friends, the more that sin sits in, because we're all sinful, right?

In the first ten minutes, the more it sits in isolation, the more that darkness grows, the more that we become more deceived in our minds.

But the power in community is when we confess to one another in community, that brings the darkness to light.

Amen.

That light is able to just be flooded when we confess to one another with God's grace.

We're able to pray for one another.

As a church, we're able to bear one another's burdens for each other, and that's when miracles happen.

That's when God work starts to happen, right?

And so that's really what I want us to just take that to heart as you leave here today, too, is the reality that we're in a battle and who are those fellow soldiers in our lives.

Dr.

Gary Bruce talks about how the number one tactic of the enemy is to lie to us by being this voice of the accuser, right?

Accusing, you're not worthy, right?

No, you're you're not like um the list goes on.

I could list so many things, right?

But you're not wanted, you're not chosen, all these lies.

And the one way he says to combat that is we speak voices of hope, right?

We speak voices of hope and truth over the voice of the accuser.

And we pray in faith and we know we're more than conquerors in him who loved us first, right?

So as you reflect in this section, we talked about so much, but just a few things to focus on.

Who is pointing you back to God's truth?

Who is a brother?

Who is your co-laborer?

Who are those fellow soldiers that you're speaking hope over and that you're allowing to speak hope into your life?

Right?

Because again, it's twofold.

It's who are we doing this for and who are we letting in?

Many of you who know me know that I am Iranian American, and my Persian culture is very, very just important to me and a part of who I am.

And there's really something really cool about the Farsi language is there are some phrases that exist in Farsi that don't exist in English.

There's no English equivalent.

And one of my favorite things is teaching my American friends these concepts because they're so deep and almost poetic.

And I wanted to teach you one this morning.

It's this concept that's jot chali.

You want to say it with me?

Jot Jot Hali.

The K H is hard.

It's a ha sound.

Jot khali.

And so, really, what this means, if I were to give an English equivalent to it, it would be like you were missed in the past tense, right?

Like if we were hanging out and Kristen, you couldn't make it, and I would say, Kristen, yeah, we missed you.

Jot Halibud, right?

You were missed.

The beauty here is that this doesn't really just mean you were missed.

The depth of what this literal translation of this phrase is, is that the space that you would have occupied was void by you not being there.

So think about a dinner party.

If we were all there and if Kristen wasn't there, the space, Kristen, that the chair that you would have occupied at that six-person table, that chair was left empty because your presence was missed there.

Right?

There's that depth of we thought of you and your presence was missed up in that seat.

And I don't know, friends, there's some, as I was writing this message, that's a word for someone here today that you need to hear that, right?

Someone needs to hear that, that whatever community, circle, or sphere in your life that you're kind of opting out of right now, you are missed there.

Right?

Maybe your prayers that you were bringing to that space, maybe that's something that someone was holding on to.

Maybe your encouragement and your presence there is what that person needs most.

Maybe you're that safe space for someone and you don't even know it.

And so I challenge you to opt in to community.

I challenge you to pray through that as we worship.

Christian philosopher Francis Schaefer says that our relationship with each other is the criteria the world uses to judge whether our message is truthful.

Christian community is the final apologetic.

So everything we've looked at this morning, friends, how we suffer for each other, how we love one another.

This all happens in community, right?

This all happens when we opt in.

This fervency, this fruitfulness has developed.

But what I want to leave you with and what I want to hope that you just take away with you is none of this happens apart from Jesus Christ.

Amen.

None of it.

This is not a message about self-help or self-improvement.

This is not like, you know, leave this message and take these tips and all be good.

No, because we can't do this on our own.

We can't do this on our own.

Note the verse, it talks about in Philippians, it's the fruit of our salvation, right?

So this fruitfulness occurs because we have Jesus Christ.

This transformation happens when we're abiding in him.

So as we worship, I encourage you just to close your eyes for a moment and just take a breath.

And I want you to think about in your life, what do you need to make room for?

What do you need to make room for?

Do you need to make room to invite Jesus back in?

To surrender to him, to let him develop this fervency in you again?

Do you need to grow in humility to let people in?

Do you need to let people speak over you?

Do you need to let people speak hope over you when you feel lied to, when you feel accused?

What does that look like for you?

Jesus, we thank you that you are our faithful, fervent friend first.

God, thank you, Jesus, that because of you, that's why Paul had the impact that he had.

This is why Epaphroditus and Epaphras were the friends that they were.

It's because of you, Jesus.

And so, Lord, as we pray right now, as we close, we just pray that we'd make room.

We'd make room for how you want to speak to us.

And God, we just thank you that none of this is doable apart from you, Lord.

So may we just be people of virtue.

Amen.

Let's worship church.

We hope you are blessed by this message.

Please subscribe to our podcast for access to every episode as they're uploaded.

And hey, we'd love to connect with you.

Take a next step by filling out our virtual connection card at awakeningchurch.comslash card.