Part 4:Worship and Fellowship-Life Together [Hebrews 10.24–25; John 4.23–24]
Sermon Summary
Individual faith, when lived in isolation, inevitably cools and loses its vitality. The journey of following Jesus is not a sprint but a long obedience in the same direction, requiring rhythms and habits that sustain us through every season of life. True discipleship is not about short bursts of enthusiasm or isolated acts of devotion, but about a sustained, active engagement with Jesus, shaped and strengthened by intentional community. Over the years, it becomes clear that those who endure in faith are those who are most deeply committed to genuine fellowship with other believers.
Fellowship is not merely about socializing after church or sharing a meal; it is the context where hearts are transformed, encouragement is given, and accountability is practiced. It is where we share what God is teaching us, confess our struggles, and spur one another on toward love and good works. The Christian life was never meant to be lived alone. Just as a coal removed from the fire quickly grows cold, so too does a believer separated from the warmth and challenge of community.
Scripture and prayer, while deeply personal, are disciplines that flourish in the context of fellowship. When we gather, we multiply our engagement with God’s Word, wrestle with its truths together, and pray for and with one another. This shared life is not always easy—many carry wounds from past church experiences or fear the vulnerability that true fellowship requires. Yet, biblical fellowship is not about perfection but about intentionality: paying attention to one another, provoking each other to love and good deeds, and refusing to neglect gathering together.
Practical steps include recommitting to corporate worship, seeking out intentional spiritual friendships, practicing encouragement, and serving alongside others. These rhythms are not optional add-ons but essential for sustaining faith over the long haul. As the day of Christ’s return draws nearer, the need for encouragement and accountability only increases. The world’s pressures and the daily grind can wear down even the most passionate disciple, but in community, we find the strength to persevere. The choice is clear: remain connected to the fire of fellowship and stay spiritually vibrant, or risk growing cold in isolation.
Key Takeaways
1. Long obedience in following Jesus is sustained by intentional fellowship, not isolated effort.The Christian life is designed to be lived in community, where encouragement and accountability fuel perseverance through every season, not just moments of spiritual excitement. [00:54]
2. Genuine fellowship goes beyond surface-level interactions; it requires vulnerability, intentionality, and a willingness to both give and receive spiritual encouragement.This means sharing not only victories but also struggles, and actively seeking to spur others toward love and good works. [20:11]
3. Spiritual disciplines like scripture reading and prayer are most transformative when practiced within community.The natural result of engaging deeply with God is a desire to help others experience the same transformation, making isolation contrary to the very nature of discipleship. [19:26]
4. The pain and disappointment some have experienced in church community should not lead to abandoning fellowship, but to a rediscovery of biblical fellowship as God intended.True community is not about perfection but about mutual commitment to growth, healing, and encouragement in Christ. [14:54]
5. Sustained faithfulness is rarely the result of extraordinary moments, but of ordinary believers consistently showing up for one another.The ones who endure are those who commit to the rhythms of gathering, sharing, serving, and encouraging—becoming coals that keep each other burning hot for Christ. [38:58]
Youtube Chapters
[00:00] - Welcome
[00:22] - The Danger of Isolated Faith
[02:11] - Series Introduction: A Long Obedience
[03:39] - Personal Story: Coaching and Long Obedience
[05:25] - The Value of Ordinary Faithfulness
[07:55] - Discipleship Beyond Spiritual Highs
[09:48] - Seeing Jesus Clearly and Spiritual Disciplines
[10:41] - The Power of Prayer and Community
[12:22] - Fellowship: More Than Socializing
[16:14] - Hebrews 10: The Call to Community
[19:26] - Spiritual Disciplines Flourish in Fellowship
[22:50] - The Campfire Metaphor: Staying Hot Together
[26:03] - Grace for the Isolated and the Need for Empathy
[28:46] - Practical Steps for Building Fellowship
[31:33] - Intentional Spiritual Friendships
[33:00] - Practicing Spiritual Encouragement
[34:47] - Serving Together and the Urgency of Fellowship
[36:29] - The Cost of Isolation and the Call to Action
[39:51] - Next Steps: Embracing Fellowship for the Long Haul
Bible Study Guide
Bible Reading
Hebrews 10:19-25 (ESV) — 19 Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus,
20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh,
21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God,
22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.
23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
24 And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works,
25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.
Observation Questions
According to Hebrews 10:24-25, what are believers specifically instructed to do for one another?
In the sermon, what metaphor is used to describe the effect of isolation on a believer’s faith? [[24:44]]
What are some practical ways the sermon mentions for believers to “stir up one another to love and good works”? [[31:33]]
What does the writer of Hebrews say is the reason for increasing encouragement as “the Day” approaches? [[34:47]]
Interpretation Questions
Why does the writer of Hebrews connect the work of Jesus (verses 19-23) with the call to community and mutual encouragement (verses 24-25)?
The sermon says, “The coal that stays connected to the fire stays hot. The coal that's removed grows cold quickly.” What does this metaphor reveal about the nature of Christian faith and community? [[24:44]]
The passage warns against “neglecting to meet together.” What are some reasons people might neglect gathering, and how does the sermon address these reasons? [[14:54]]
How does practicing spiritual disciplines like prayer and scripture reading in community differ from practicing them alone, according to the sermon? [[19:26]]
Application Questions
The sermon challenges us to consider if we are trying to maintain faith in isolation. Are there areas in your life where you are keeping others at arm’s length? What is one step you could take this week to move toward deeper fellowship? [[38:00]]
Have you ever experienced “spiritual cooling” after withdrawing from community? What did that look like for you, and what helped you return to spiritual warmth? [[24:44]]
The sermon talks about the pain and disappointment some have experienced in church. If you carry wounds from past church experiences, what would it look like to seek healing and rediscover biblical fellowship? [[14:54]]
Who in your life encourages you spiritually? If you don’t have someone like that, what is one practical way you could seek out an intentional spiritual friendship this month? [[39:51]]
The sermon suggests that encouragement and accountability are essential, not optional, for sustaining faith. How can you intentionally encourage someone in your group or church this week? [[33:21]]
When you gather with other believers, do you tend to keep things surface-level, or do you share both victories and struggles? What is one thing you could share with your group this week that would require vulnerability? [[32:30]]
The passage says to “consider how to stir up one another to love and good works.” What is one specific way you can serve alongside others in the coming month? [[34:16]]
TRANSCRIPT
Individual faith, separated from the encouragement and challenge of other believers, tends to grow cold.
Are you trying to maintain faith in isolation, wondering why your spiritual fire seems to be cooling? Are you convinced that you can sustain decades of discipleship without the regular encouragement and challenge of other believers? Are you just attending church? Are you just doing ministry but avoiding deeper relationships where long-term spiritual endurance is built? Are you keeping people at arm's length because you're afraid of the commitment that genuine fellowship requires or that genuine fellowship reveals?
Here's what I have learned over 20 years of pastor ministry: The people who sustain their faith over the long haul are the ones who are the most committed to fellowship.
Intentional spiritual community means sharing what God is up to in your life and what He's teaching you. Intentional spiritual community means talking about where you're struggling also and maybe how you want to grow. Discipleship gets harder, not easier, as time goes by. Long obedience requires community.
The coal that stays connected to the fire stays hot. The coal that's removed grows cold quickly. So which one will you be?
And I want to thank you for—
Good morning.
If you haven't already, open up your copy of the Scriptures you have with you to Hebrews chapter 10. Maybe grab something to take notes with if you're joining us for the first time or maybe the first time in a while. We are in a series entitled *A Long Obedience*. We're in week four of the series.
For those who may be familiar with the writings of pastor and scholar Eugene Peterson, you may be familiar with this phrase, "a long obedience." It's a phrase that Eugene Peterson uses to describe what discipleship to Jesus simply looks like—that it's this idea of a long obedience. Being a disciple of Jesus is a long obedience because it is the active engagement to live life as Jesus did in response to all that Jesus did.
Right. The idea of long obedience is—it should be motivated by this idea to live life as Jesus did in response to all that Jesus did. Not just for a season or when it's convenient, but over the long haul.
And so this is kind of the bottom line here today, and I'll just put it up here on the screen: Being a disciple is the act of engagement to live life as Jesus did in response to all that Jesus did over the long haul.
Now, I don't have this in my notes, but I was just talking to Todd, and I just feel like I need to share this because there's something really, really cool that happened this week. You know, this idea of long obedience.
And I don't like—I’m not trying to brag. I was telling this to Nate, Christina. We were all hanging out with them last night. And some of, you know, like the soccer season—I’ve been at Osseo High School. I've been there since 2014 coaching, right? And you all know the story from 2014 to, like, 2022, right? I was just kind of like the soccer coach.
And the story goes like, I, you know, at some point I'm like, okay, God's not—I started it because I was hoping that God would do something there that would allow me to be a light there. And my idea of that was like, you know, leading kids to Christ and Bible studies and prayers, like, kind of stuff.
And I was just showing up week after week, season after season, doing a good job being a soccer coach, but that was kind of it. And at some point I'm like, is anything really spiritual happening? Like, anything really good happening?
And so I decided to quit one year. And then the year I decided to quit, I had to kind of go back. And then that's when God began to open the doors for opportunities to lead a Bible study with—started with just three students, one of my sons being one of them, and then the other being two sons of another coach who's a Christian, right? It just started with three.
And now, you know, here we are again with 60, 60 plus students. Every morning we're going through the book of Romans, by the way. We just went through—we just finished Romans 1 and 2. That was interesting, especially in light of everything that we've had.
And so that was—it was a really good, really good time with students talking about, like, Romans chapter one, and what does all that mean? And the end and all that. It's really, really good.
But anyways, I just want to give, like, a praise report. Like, here's what God can do in my life. And I am by no means someone who—I just—I’m normal, I think. I really do. I don't think there's anything absolutely super special about me.
And I was talking to Michelle this morning. We were just talking about how, like, sometimes we want, when we feel like God's killing us, to do something. We feel like the fruits of what we put our labor into should manifest something right away. Like, we should do it, like, right away and then—
But no, I think it's about a long obedience in the same direction. And because that's—I think that's how the normal people—I was just pointing to the TV. It's like, you know, we, as a culture, we celebrate the aberrations, the 1 percenters, right? We look at the football players and go, like, look at that catch. Isn't that amazing? Why? Because that person is 1% of 1% of people, right? And we celebrate that.
And so we look at people who, like, do things for the Lord, and all of a sudden, things like go, well. And you're like, that's special. And then we're like, oh, if we can only be like that.
But then the reality is, like, that's just the 1%. That is amazing. And it's what God is doing. But I don't think that's the natural flow of the everyday believer. I think the everyday believer lives a life of long obedience in the same direction where God is working His hands and He gets to see what's happening in the immediate, but we might not get to see it.
And so, anyways, what I want to get to is—so this past week, and don't tell anybody this—I’m not going to put it on podcast. I’m just—I’m floored by what I'm excited about this series because spiritual disciplines, yes, it's prayer, it's Scripture reading, all that kind of stuff.
But sometimes it's all the things of what it means to be disciplined into the long obedience of following Jesus. And I just want to let you know, like, God can do this. I'm a normal guy. I lead—look, this is the church I lead. I'm normal.
And if you feel normal at some times, maybe to some people, I might be subpar. And if you ever feel subpar, listen, God can do some really amazing things to people who are just open and willing to have long obedience in the same direction.
So that wasn't in my notes, but I just—I thought that might be encouraging. I don't know. So, yay, God. I don't know. So ask me about it as the year goes on. I would love for you to ask me, like, how's it going? If my life truly is in Christ and I am in Him and He is in me, I gotta believe that God is wanting to be in Osseo High School. And so I'm excited to see what God does there.
So He's doing the work, and He can do it in your life too.
Now, over the past couple weeks, back to my notes, we've been exploring what it means to sustain a lifelong commitment to following Jesus. We discovered that discipleship isn't about short bursts of spiritual enthusiasm. We've all had that. If you grew up in youth group, you know what that's like. Yay, I love Jesus. Yay. Three weeks later, you're grounded again for doing something stupid, right? That's that thing, you know?
And so we want to say that discipleship is not about that, but it's about developing rhythms and habits that help us remain faithful to Jesus through all seasons of life.
And if you remember, we started by exploring why spiritual disciplines matter, how God uses rhythms to train us in godliness over time. Just like Zacchaeus discovered when Jesus transformed him, right?
We looked at Zacchaeus and Donald S. Whitney in his book about spiritual disciplines, which I really, really love. I recommend it. He uses the illustration of Zacchaeus to say, like, look, if we could just be like Zacchaeus. Like, we know Jesus is someone that we want to see, but sometimes you're like, ah, I'm too sure.
But sometimes we just get saying, oh, I got to do whatever it takes to just be in front of Jesus. He didn't expect that Jesus would say, "I'm coming to your house today." But that's just—that's the pleasant surprise when we just say, look, I'm not asking Jesus to come to my house. I just want to see Him.
And so if we position our life in ways that help us see Jesus more, that's why we started Clarity Church. In fact, that's why we call ourselves Clarity Church, because we want people to see clearly who Jesus is. Because I think when you see clearly who Jesus is, the rest of it, what happens in the heart begins to take place.
Why? Because His truth breaks in; it does not return void. So that's what we want to do.
We also learned about the well-worn road to God through reading Scripture, right? How Romans 12 calls us to be transformed by the renewing of our minds through God's word. And so hopefully you've begun that process.
If you've fallen off the wagon, I want to encourage you, it's okay. You can start reading the Scripture again this week. Get into it. If you need accountability, reach out to me, okay? Trust me, I'm not too busy. There's not a lot of people here asking me to help them. So if you need help with that, let's get in the Word together. I would love to do that. It would be my honor.
Or you can get together if you're a guy. I know the guys are getting into the Word. Like, if you need some accountability, get together with Gary, get together with Tristan, show up at the breakfasts, and they're starting this idea of like, oh, what does it look like for us to get into the Word? And so there are these opportunities. You don't have to be alone, right?
And last week we talked about the importance of prayer, following Jesus' disciples who ask Him, "Lord, teach us to pray." And I just want to let you know, I've been working with Michelle. We're trying to start this thing, I'd say, idea of like prayer ministry.
And I just met with the pastors last week from all the different churches that I'm kind of in a group with. And at the beginning of February, we were praying like this huge—we're going to, as churches, like six churches all together, we're going to do this series through prayer, and then we're going to have like this, hopefully this big prayer worship gathering.
And anyways, this idea like prayer is important, right? As Pastor Ben from Northridge Prayer Church would always say, nothing of spiritual value happens without prayer. And so we want to be people of prayer, but mostly we want to be people of prayer because when we pray, God changes things.
If there's any reason why you need to pray, like, yes, we get to know Him more, we get to relationship. Yes, yes, all those things. But if you believe that we need God to change things, then we need to be the kind of people who pray. Because why? When we pray, God changes things.
That's what we talked about last week.
But here's what I've been thinking about as we've walked through these foundational, foundational disciplines: How do we sustain these practices over time? Like, how do we sustain these disciplines over time? How do we maintain consistent Scripture reading, faithful prayer, and growing in godliness—not just in seasons of spiritual enthusiasm, but through the ordinary, the difficult, the complicated, and then sometimes maybe mundane years, months, you know, decades of following Jesus?
And the answer is this: It's fellowship. Fellowship.
And that's what we're going to talk about today—how fellowship becomes essential for long obedience.
When we talk about fellowship in the context of long obedience, we're not talking about coffee or donuts after church or even chili, though there's nothing wrong with food, okay? I like to joke, we should have been Calorie Church instead of Clarity Church, right? Because we do like to eat. We like to eat.
But we're talking about something so much more fundamental to sustaining faithfulness and joy in Jesus over a lifetime of following Him.
Fellowship is the context where worship-transformed hearts help each other maintain a long obedience. It's where we find the encouragement to keep going when discipleship gets difficult and the accountability to keep growing when discipleship maybe might, I dare say, seems comfortable.
Before we go any further, let me address something. I know that many people think when they hear about fellowship with other Christians—maybe you've had bad experiences with church community or you felt like you could maintain your relationship with God just fine on your own. That's something you hear, right? And I get it. I really do.
I've sat with enough people over the years to know that churches and Christians have sometimes been sources of pain rather than sources of encouragement.
In fact, this whole week, as I was preparing for our chili cook-off thing, I was sitting with people that, who even called our church. I'm like, hey, come back. I haven't seen you since—haven't seen you since COVID. And you know, and other people that I know.
Like, just at the high school, I was talking to this lady and I was inviting her and her husband. I know that they were—she was actually on staff at a church. They graduated from Bethel. And they don't go to church anywhere. They don't go to church at all. But they're followers of Jesus. But they just got baggage, right?
And in fact, our whole conversation was like, they'd left. They'd left the church that I used to work at, like four years ago. And it still cuts deep. Like, I was talking for 30 minutes about still the hurt and still the pain.
And I was like, you know, I was like, Heidi, come on, just come. And they've been here, I think, once in a while. But you're like, come on, we're not that church. Trust me. We're nothing. Like, you know, right? And I know that.
And you know that you have these conversations too, right? It's church fellowship. The idea of being with church people can be painful. It can be something that people don't want to be a part of.
But here's what I want you to consider: What if the problem wasn't church community itself? What if it wasn't that? What if it's rather a misunderstanding of what biblical fellowship is supposed to look like? Like, what if the issue isn't, like, church people are terrible, but it's actually a misunderstanding of what biblical—like, what the Bible has not just prescribed, because I think we can all agree on, like, what it's supposed to be, like, unity. And I don't see it. No judgment, no. Everybody's judging.
But, like, what does the Bible tell us is the story of how followers of Jesus obeyed the commands to unity, to love, to love? Like, what does that story look like?
To help us understand what biblical fellowship is, I think I want to turn to a passage really that beautifully connects not only the idea of fellowship and what our life should look like, but actually also ties in this important—and we're not going to talk about it in depth—but this idea of, like, worship. Like, worship. And how does worship and fellowship tie with each other?
So turn with me to Hebrews, chapter 10. Some of you already know where I'm going with this, but it doesn't matter. We need to hear it again.
In verse 19, it says this:
> Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have boldness to enter the sanctuary through the blood of Jesus,
> He has inaugurated for us a new and living way through the curtain, that is, through his flesh.
> And since we have a great high priest over the house of God,
> let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith,
> with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience,
> and our bodies washed in pure water.
> Let us hold on to the confession of our hope without wavering,
> since he who promised us is faithful.
And let us watch out—and I just got to say this before we get to verse 24 and 25—these all things are things that, like, when we think about the life in Jesus, these are the things that we look at. Yes, the living flesh and, yeah, and we have a great high priest and we're going to draw near to Christ.
And yet these are essential to the life of following Jesus, right? But what some people miss, especially now in the fractured nature of what is our church and so much division and a lot of people thinking that all spirituality can just be had out in my own way, in my own will, my own way—they forget that the writer of Hebrews, in connection to all of these very, very, very foundational truths of what it means to be a follower of Jesus, right?
Nobody disagrees with this, right? Like, we have a new way of living, you know, through this great high priest, cross, you know, true hearts, full assurance of faith, hearts sprinkled clean from the evil conscience, our bodies washed in pure water, we have this confession of faith, wavering, His promise of faith, right? We believe all this stuff. Nobody who is a Christian says, like, this stuff isn't true. This is definitely true.
But then we get to verse 24, and this is where we're like, oh, well, maybe for you. And then definitely 25. And like, well, don't tell me what to do. What am I ever talking about?
Verse 24:
> And let us watch out for one another to provoke love and good works.
So this idea, there's this responsibility of this new life in Christ that now means it's not just about you. It's about how you show up for others. Like, if you're not showing up for others, you're not really living this life that has been deeply impacted by the truth that the veil has been torn and access to the Father has been granted to us immediately. And the washing, all this stuff, right? And so we have to understand.
And then in verse 25, it says this:
> Not neglecting to gather together,
> not neglecting to gather together,
> but encouraging each other,
> and all the more as you see the day approaching.
And what we tend to forget is this little part that I skipped, right? What did I skip? It says this:
> Not neglecting to gather together as some are in the habit of doing.
Okay. Notice how this passage flows, right? The writer starts with what God has done. Jesus has given us access to worship God directly, intimately. And because of Jesus, we can draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith.
And as the writer says, and this connects directly to what we've been learning about spiritual disciplines, right? Scripture reading and prayer aren't just individual practices. They're not. They're disciplines that actually flourish in the context of community.
And when we truly engage with God's word and allow it to transform our thinking, when we develop consistent patterns of prayer, a natural result—consistent patterns of prayer is the natural result when we do that—is not isolation.
When you are a person of prayer, when you're a person of God's word, the natural result, the actual result of being that is not isolation. The result is the desire to help others experience the same transformation.
Look at that phrase in verse 24:
> And let us consider one another.
Consider one another in order to provoke love and good works.
The Greek word *consider* means to observe carefully, to study, pay attention with intention. I like that. Consider. Pay attention with intention. Don't just come say, "Hi, how's the weather?" Answer question of the day. It means it's going to require something.
And then the word *provoke* is a word that literally means to stir up, to incite, to incite like a riot, so to say, or to spur on. It's an active word. It's an intentional engagement with each other's spiritual growth.
And I know this is hard for us as Minnesotans because, like, I don't want to get in your stuff, right? You know, I don't want to. Your spiritual growth is your spiritual growth. And you know what? My spiritual growth is my spiritual growth. And if you're excited by my spiritual growth, it's fine. I'm going to tell you about mine, but I'm definitely not going to, like, try to incite—I'm not going to provoke in you. Oh, right.
But this is what fellowship is: believers gathering with a specific purpose and attention of spurring each other towards love and good works. Whether you feel like it or not, whether you feel like it's Minnesotan or not.
This is, remember, we are a new royal priesthood, a new—we have new citizenship. We're born into a new family. And God is patient. Don't worry. He understands that. But we got to believe that. We got to live in that.
And here's the connection between spiritual disciplines and fellowship that we often miss: While Scripture reading and prayer are practices that often have great potential to transform us individually, fellowship is the fuel that helps us maintain those transformative practices over the long haul.
For one, fellowship multiplies our engagement with Scripture by creating space for us to share what God is teaching us, to wrestle with difficult passages together, to encourage each other to stay consistent in our time in the Word.
Right? And second, fellowship strengthens our prayer lives by providing opportunities to pray with others, share our burdens, and praise God for what He's accomplishing in and through our lives.
Now, I think it's funny today that we— you know, Todd talks about this idea of, like, you get older, now you're just wanting to sit and do bonfires, right? I recently got a Solo Stove, and some of you, you know, saw me, like, every once in a while I'll post a picture of it. Just one. I think Solo Stoves look cool, but I just love sitting, like, by the fire and just watching it.
And, you know, one of my favorite things to do—yes, I'm going to talk about the Boundary Waters—is one of my favorite things to do when I go to the Boundary Waters is actually making fire. I love building fire.
And one of the most basic things you learn when building a good campfire is that you can't rush the process, right? You can't rush the process, especially of making good coals.
Too many times I'll take people up to the Boundary Waters and I'll watch them create a fire, and they'll, you know, they'll create a coal from a small piece of wood. You know how that is? You know, one will say, "Start." And they go, "Oh, there's a coal." And then they think they've got enough now to start a large pile of sticks on fire.
So they got this little coal, and they're like, "Let's bring all the sticks on there." And what usually happens, right? Snuffs it out. Just snuffs it out, right?
The problem is that while a very skilled wilderness survivalist could make fire out of a single coal, or the really good ones, if you watch alone, can do it out of an ember, right? They're really, really good.
Most people realize that a single piece of coal from a piece of wood that has caught fire isn't enough to start a healthy campfire. To start a campfire, you actually need a healthy collection of coals that, when combined with enough oxygen—right? If you have—we call the blowhole, whatever you have, like, what is it actually called? It's a bellows. We have this bellows, like when you blow enough oxygen into the coals.
When you have enough oxygen, even the dampest of wood will catch on fire. But you gotta have a healthy bed of coals.
Now, this just isn't really a forced metaphor just because I like talking about the Boundary Waters about community. This is actually how God designed the spiritual life to work.
Think about it this way: A single coal doesn't lose its fundamental nature when it's all by itself. A coal by itself is a coal. It's still a piece of burning wood. It still has heat, at least for the time being.
But without the combined heat energy created by other coals, a single coal will struggle to maintain the intensity of flame needed to accomplish its intended purpose of creating a full-blown campfire.
And here's what's interesting: If you take a single coal out of a fire, it will begin to cool immediately and it eventually will begin to lose its ability to create heat.
But if you take that same coal and put it back in the fire with other burning pieces, within minutes it'll be blazing again.
That's just how it works. Fire would be restored not because I did something magical, but simply because I put it back where it belonged.
Individual faith, separated from the encouragement and challenge of other believers, tends to grow cold.
This is what you need to know—not because individual faith isn't genuine, but because God's design for us was to grow in community.
Now, how does this—I’m looking at us like we're here—Phil, what are you trying to tell? Like, this is what I want to encourage you.
We are surrounded by people who say they follow Jesus but are not in community. Our lives are full of this.
I am trying to help you understand that there is grace for these people. And in fact, I would hope that you would have extreme, now, empathy because they are believing that their life can be sustained without community.
And I would hope, I would hope that you would grow in your heart for people. Like when I meet with the people at Osseo like that, I know they're Christians, say they're Christians, but they're not in community. Like, my heart breaks.
I don't go like, well, shame on you, you're not really a Christian. And we have to have some grace.
Why? Because at the end of the day, I'm not going to convince them to have a healthy spiritual life anymore outside of getting community. Like, I can create all this stuff, like I'm going to do this Bible study, you should come to it and blah, blah.
But at the end of the day, if I can put them back where they need to belong, that's going to be the thing.
And hopefully our prayer and our hope for people in our circles of influence would grow in that sense.
And so that's the thing that I really want to help us understand: that long obedience doesn't actually happen accidentally.
Also, we sustain faithfulness to Jesus over a lifetime through intentional rhythms that consistently put us in a path of transformation.
And so we have to live that out, but then we have to help other people figure that out too.
And one of those crucial rhythms is fellowship, right? Not just being around other Christians, but acting actively, engaging in life with other believers committed to discipleship over the long haul.
Think about it this way: Right when we were learning to drive, you didn't just read a driver's manual and then take a test. Or maybe you did. Don't tell me about that.
What did you do? You practiced with someone who could see your blind spots, correct your mistakes, and encourage you when parallel parking felt impossible.
And even after you got your license, there were probably times when having an experienced driver in the car helped you navigate difficult situations.
And I think that's what my wife thinks she is in my life still. Honey, honey, honey, right?
But long obedience works the same way. We need people who can see our spiritual blind spots, lovingly correct our course, and encourage us when following Jesus is difficult—not just for a season, but for a lifetime.
So what does this look like practically? Like, how do we build the spiritual habit of fellowship?
Well, here are a few observations that we've seen in the life of the church since it began on the day of Pentecost, right? When Peter preached the gospel and the church exploded from a few hundred followers of Jesus to 3,000 within a day.
So what did he need to do?
Well, first, we need to recommit to corporate worship.
Remember, Hebrews 10 says, as some of you are already doing, look, right, we need to encourage people.
And maybe this is not a message for you because you're here, but has God not put you in the life of other people who are on this journey of becoming fully engaged followers of Christ?
Say something. Encourage them. Don't make—you don't have to guilt them, but like, hey, you should. You should encourage them. Help them to recommit. Help them understand that this recommitment to worship is something important.
Help them to understand that they don't have to be tempted to believe the lie that regular gatherings for worship with other believers are optional for a thriving life in Jesus, or that our worship gatherings are just services people attend.
Help them understand that they're actually opportunities to be part of the coal fire, that pile of coal that keeps burning hot.
Encourage them to come expecting to worship God with their whole being and in doing so be part of encouraging others to increasingly learn to do the same.
And maybe for you, maybe when you're here, right, when you sing, sing in a way that encourages the next person to you to engage with God.
When we pray together, like really pray, don't just listen to others pray.
When the Word is being taught, engage in it in a way that shows others like, this matters to you.
I always pray, "God, bring His people."
And so I hope that when people visit us that they see people who, like, as I'm talking or whatever is talking, someone's talking, that they're looking not only at the person, but they're looking at their Word.
And maybe they have like all these—everybody's taking notes and they're serious about this thing.
Well, I've never seen this kind of church before. I don't know.
I just—I’m casting a vision for us. I feel like God's preparing us.
Because corporate worship is one of the primary ways we consider one another in order to provoke love and good works.
Because when we gather, we're modeling for each other what it looks like to respond to God with our emotions, our will, our reason.
Second, how else do we do this? How do we—a spiritual habit of fellowship?
We engage in community and start intentional spiritual friendships.
You know, this means looking for opportunities to regularly gather with other believers where the focus is specifically spurring each other on towards love and good deeds.
This might be one of our formal communities that maybe my wife and I or Todd and Victoria and I lead, or might be regular meetings, as I said, over guys with prayer breakfast.
Some Perkins on a Saturday who are committed to talking about what God is doing in their lives, genuinely hearing what's going on.
Or it's a women's thing, right? So it's whatever it is.
And it doesn't even have to be a—listen, doesn't even have to be a Clarity Church thing.
The fact that you're getting together with other believers and putting yourself in the context of actually going deeper than just saying, "Well, how about them Vikings?"
Just so I'm clear, here's what I mean by intentional: Don't just meet to hang out and catch up on life. There's certainly time for that.
But meet with the specific goal of encouraging one another in your faith.
Okay?
Intentional spiritual community means sharing what God is up to in your life and what He's teaching you.
It's not just Bible study. It's actually talking about what God is doing.
Intentional spiritual community means talking about where you're struggling also and maybe how you want to grow, challenging others to take next steps in following Jesus.
Intentional spiritual community means humbling yourself and asking for prayer as well as stepping out in faith with courage and praying for those who've asked for it.
Third, we need to practice the art of spiritual encouragement.
Start paying attention to how God is working in the lives of other believers around you.
And this is something I think, I think we all should listen to.
Like, we miss out on this where we're so self-centered.
Like, how—but have you been really interested in like how someone next to you, like, how's their faith going? Have you asked them?
And when you see someone serving or notice growth in someone's character or witness someone making a difficult but faithful decision, tell them you notice it.
I see that.
And speak life into their journey with Jesus.
We need that. That's encouraging one another.
I mean, think about your own life where you're working really hard, you're serving God.
How much would it be worth for someone just to come alongside of you and say, you know what? I see. Thank you, thank you for serving the Lord. Thank you for being obedient.
This is what it means to consider one another.
I believe we're not just casually observing each other's lives. We're looking intentionally for ways to affirm what God is doing and challenging each other to grow.
And then last but not least, look for opportunities to serve with others.
Don't just serve God individually.
Find ways to serve alongside other believers.
This is maybe volunteering at church stuff like kids ministry, or maybe it's serving in community with others.
Maybe it's going on a mission trip to Honduras, right?
But getting alongside with other people and saying, hey, we're going to take this Jesus that's living and active inside of us and together we're going to be Jesus. We're going to be the hands and feet.
And you know, you already know this. You know this when you do that together with other believers, when you serve, isn't it amazing whether it's a simple trip to Honduras or even if it's like something like that everybody does is Feed My Starving Children.
There's something special that happens there.
And here's the amazing thing that happens when we serve alongside each other: It's not as much about what we accomplish together, but it's—listen, it's more about getting to see God work in ways that encourage our faith and multiply our effectiveness that He only does in the context when the people of God serve with each other.
And here's something I want you to notice about the Hebrew passage: The writer ends with a sense of urgency.
In Hebrews 10:25, he says, encourage each other all the more as you see the day approaching.
What day is he talking about? He's talking about the day Jesus returns and establishes His kingdom fully on earth.
And listen, we are today closer than we were yesterday.
Jesus—I know we've been saying this for years, but it's true.
And if it doesn't stir our heart, you need to check your heart.
Jesus is coming.
And the more He—the closer we get to that day, the more we need encouragement and accountability that comes from fellowship with other believers who are also committed to long obedience.
Why? Because discipleship gets harder, not easier, as time goes by.
The initial excitement of following Jesus eventually gives way to the daily grind of choosing obedience when you don't feel like it.
And if there's one thing that no one disagrees about, it's this: The world around us is increasingly hostile to Christian values and the temptations to compromise or give up.
Yeah, and the temptation to compromise or give up—it accumulates over time.
This is why so many people who start following Jesus with great enthusiasm eventually drift away.
They try to maintain their faith in isolation.
And then, like that coal removed from the fire, they gradually lose heat they once had.
And this is because when we try to follow Jesus in isolation, we're not just missing out on encouragement.
We're attempting something God never wanted us to do alone.
We're trying to maintain long obedience without the community that actually makes it possible.
But when we commit to fellowship, when we regularly gather to worship God together, when we engage in intentional spiritual friendships, and we make ourselves available to both give and receive spiritual encouragement, over years, over decades, we position ourselves to sustain faithfulness to Jesus for the long haul.
So where are you in your journey of long obedience? Like, where are you?
Are you trying to maintain faith in isolation? Wondering why your spiritual fire seems to be cooling?
Are you convinced that you can sustain decades of discipleship without the regular encouragement and challenge of other believers?
And listen, sometimes I just want to encourage you.
Sometimes we can confuse ministry for fellowship, like, "I'm doing ministry," but you can actually do ministry and still be in isolation.
See, the difference between fellowship and ministering is that you have to receive and give.
And if there's one encouragement that I always hear when I go to conferences as pastors, it's like, pastors, you've got to be in fellowship.
Just because you're around church people all the time doesn't mean you're fellowshipping. It just means you're giving.
But who's speaking into your life? Where's the iron sharpening iron?
And so like, where are you?
Are you just attending church? Are you just doing ministry but avoiding deeper relationships where long-term spiritual endurance is built?
Are you keeping people at arm's length because you're afraid of the commitment that genuine fellowship requires or that genuine fellowship reveals?
Are you ready to embrace fellowship as essential for long obedience? To position yourself in community with other believers who will walk with you through the seasons of life, helping you remain faithful to Jesus over time following Him?
And listen, here's what I have learned over 20 years of pastor ministry: The people who sustain their faith over the long haul are the ones who are the most committed to fellowship.
Just—you cannot convince me otherwise.
The ones who have sustained faith over the long haul are the ones most committed to fellowship.
They're the ones who show up to worship gatherings consistently, not just when they feel like.
They're the ones who engage in small or spiritual friendships that last for years.
They're the ones who are both willing to be vulnerable about their struggles and willing to speak truth into the lives of other people season after season after season.
And here's what else I know: The people who eventually abandon their faith, who give up on following Jesus after years or even decades of following Jesus, always do it.
It always happens as a result of isolation. It's what happens.
They disconnect from the body of Christ.
And like that coal I pulled out of the fire, they gradually lose the heat they once had.
And what started as temporary distance becomes permanent separation.
Long obedience requires community.
The coal that stays connected to the fire stays hot.
The coal that's removed grows cold quickly.
So which one will you be?
I want to challenge us all to take maybe a specific step this week.
If you're not currently in a small group, which is probably not all of us, but getting one or intentional spiritual friendships, maybe that's the encouragement.
Like, do you have a friend that encourages you spiritually? Not just one that you encourage, but someone who encourages you? You need to find that. You should have that.
If you've been inconsistent in your life, just start showing up.
If you've been holding back in relationships that you do have, maybe commit to being a little bit more vulnerable or commit to actually paying attention.
Just stop talking, ask questions, be concerned.
Don't wait till you feel ready.
Don't wait until it's convenient.
Don't wait until you've got your individual spiritual life perfectly figured out.
The time is now.
As the writer of Hebrews reminds us, we need this fellowship all the more as we see the day approaching.
