Stand Up Sunday is just two Sundays from now! I am really excited about this big day, because we always have people ready to join lifegroups, and I am sure people will be investigating yours.
Do you have your table plan in place for that day? Maybe you should talk about that right now.
Do you have capacity in your group? Some have expressed that their group is “full,” and can’t handle any more people. (I’m looking at you, Breshears group!) Is that really a Christlike, or a Biblical position to take? How do you think they handled this issue in Acts 2, when literally thousands of people were coming to Christ at a time? Maybe your table plan isn’t as important as how we are going to “love others,” and “make disciples?” Maybe your group should talk about that right now?
On Stand Up Sunday, we’ll be asking people to partner with us for one year. You can partner early online right now! (Is that called “pre-partner?”)
Who is all this for, anyway?
What is your goal for coming to lifegroup? What do you hope to get out of it?
Does everyone in your group have the same goal?
Some people seem to get involved with groups out of very immature, selfish reasons. You know these people, right? They seem to love getting with others to gossip, to incite, to create drama. They just love to “stir the pot.” Have you seen this?
Let’s look at a different set of expectations for being involved with others:
And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 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.
Hebrews 10:24-25 ESV
This is a very different type of stirring one another up, isn’t it? How is this stirring different from the immature, selfish way of stirring?
Look at this next verse to see a description of what those acts of “love and good works” might be characterized…
But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!
Galatians 5:22-23 NLT
That might just produce a whole different set of results. What would it look like to stir each other up in THAT direction, rather than the drama and gossip direction?
I had lunch with a friend who works in a pretty high-stress manufacturing job. When the manager quit out of stress, my friend was promoted into his now-open difficult job position.
Apparently, everyone in the plant was pulling their hair out over the ongoing pressure and strain of the looking deadlines, lack of resources, and employee shortages. Stress was very high, and morale was very poor.
My friend decided that he would be intentional every day to interact with people in a positive, affirming way. He says he spends much of his time pointing at individuals on his team, and saying, “you are awesome.”
After doing this for several months, he found that when his day is difficult, and the pressure weighs on him, his employees will often go out of their way to stop him in the hallway, just to point at him and say “you are awesome.”
It sounds to me like he has stirred his people up to good works!
Isn’t that so much better than stirring people up in the wrong direction?
Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. Let us not become conceited, or provoke one another, or be jealous of one another.
Galatians 5:25 NLT
So, you may be thinking… How can I do this in my home? At my workplace, and in my lifegroup? The Apostle Paul gave Timothy some advice on this…
This is why I remind you to fan into flames the spiritual gift God gave you when I laid my hands on you. For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.
2 Timothy 1:6-7 NLT
Paul urges Timothy to “fan into flames” his spiritual gift. The word here is not the same as “stir up,” but it does have similar meaning… It means to “rekindle,” to “revitalize,” or “renew.”
I think we stir up others to good works by rekindling or revitalizing the gifts that God has given us! In other words, you and I serve each other the way God designed us to, and it will be contagious.
How should that change your goals for being involved with lifegroup?
If you sit and soak without serving, then your faith will sour and your life will suffer.
-Doug Fields
Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.
Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ. This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ.
Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won’t be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church.
He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.
Ephesians 4:11-16 NLT
It sounds like the best way to defeat immaturity is for us to all serve with our gifts together.
Do you know your spiritual gifts? You have them! Here is a free, simple Spiritual Gifts Assessment that you can take online.
Do you have your Until Unity book yet? We’ll start this together the week of February 13. It is an awesome book about this very same topic.
You can get yours in paperback, Kindle, and Audible version on Amazon right here:
I HIGHLY recommend getting the study guide as well. Sure, it is a little more of an expense, but what an investment this will be as we do it together! Get yours in paperback or Kindle right here: