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| I am fully convinced that when Jesus eats and drinks, he is happy and joyful to be with. |
“We proclaim to you
what we ourselves have actually seen and heard so that you may have fellowship
with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. We
are writing these things so that you may fully share our joy” (1 John 1:3-4, NLT).
What Apostle John and his
friends “we” saw and
experienced was so powerful that they simply could not keep it to themselves. They
were bursting to share the Good News about Jesus with other people (Do you have
that bursting factor?). Once they had experienced this new life themselves,
they wanted to share it with others. Keeping the Good News to ourselves limits the joy we can get compared to the joy we get when we share the News with others! John wants to share his new life in Christ with others. Christian goal is, according to John, “so that you may have
fellowship with us.” The word fellowship means “to have in common,” to be close, and to have a group of people who
accept and care for us.
Most people, I assume,
hate the feeling of being lonely (This is different from being alone or in solitude, which can be a positive thing at times). To be lonely is to feel cut
off or rejected or abandoned; it is a sad, depressed feeling. Thus, what is so
amazing about this “fellowship”
we can have in Christ as believers is that it is not only with each other,
which is certainly Good News, but also a fellowship with God and Jesus, His Son
– sharing life in common. God promises that we will never be
alone in this life or ever. So, even if we feel cut off from other people we
know that we are never really lonely. God is with us, no matter what!
Our fellowship, then, has
two dimensions – with God (vertical fellowship) and with other believers
(horizontal fellowship). As believers, you and I, are united with God forever;
and we are also united with each other because of our common faith in Christ. Now
let me make it clear that not all of us will have close relationships and
fellowship with everyone, but we all have the potential for this fellowship. For some of us, sharing and being
open come naturally. For others, being personal (sharing our thoughts and
feelings) is kind of scary – so we hide it by being silent or avoiding or keeping others away from us. Don’t be like this.
John writes this matter of
fellowship by saying that he is writing this letter to make his joy complete. In
other words, he witnessed the Good News: the life, work, death, and
resurrection of Jesus Christ. Then he responded to what he had seen by devoting
his life to fellowship with God through Jesus Christ. And now he was going to
have his joy completed by sharing this joyful fellowship with the church of all
believers. God wants us to be joy-filled in the deepest sense of the word – a satisfaction
that cannot be found anyplace else but in Jesus Christ. Such joy is not based on how many friends we have on Facebook or Twitter, but
on the fact that God loves us as we are. God loves us – nothing more, nothing
less. He sees through us with x-ray vision; our innermost thoughts and feelings
are known to Him. And despite all of this. God really cares for us, just as
we are. And on this basis, as we accept God’s love, we can experience the
deepest kind of joy. We are loved, no more lonely – we belong!
Friends, all of us will have
times when we will feel discouraged or depressed (At this writing I feel sad because
some people misunderstood me). That is part of living. But those downtimes don’t
need to shatter us; instead, we are equipped with the strength, love, and joy
that God gives us. It is a joy that keeps on growing not only in this life but
forever – “no one can rob you of that
joy” (John 16:22). And this joy is not a phony-selfie-kind of joy
that pastes a smile on people’s faces and makes them ignore their true
feelings. Christians can be real
people whose joyfulness becomes greater and greater. The aim of being Christian
is to enjoy, be joyful in, and by enjoying Him forever. Our God, I believe,
does not try to make us miserable or odd; instead, God wants us to be the
happiest person in the world. And that’s what the rest of this letter is all
about. Read it!
THINK BIG.
START SMALL. GO DEEP.
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