I want to fully experience church

WELCOME
Pastor Chris Paavola:
And hey everybody, good morning. Good morning, good morning.

Response: Good Morning

Pastor Chris Paavola: That’s better. That’s better. That’s good to be with you guys. You’re in Labor Day mode. I get it. And welcome to you all watching online, wherever you’re watching from, whether you’re at a hotel room or at a hospital room or in your Honda on the highway. Hopefully somebody else is watching and you’re just listening as you drive. But great to be with you guys. I can’t wait to be back in person with you. Please drive safe this weekend and enjoy your Labor Day. We’re thankful that you’re able to be with us this morning, but we are all wrapping up our series. Check all that apply like you heard about, where we’re talking about how you can find the things that you want for you in a St. Mark Small group. And every week we’ve been talking about different aspects of things that we can look forward to.
And I’ve touched on this briefly, but I just kind of want to highlight this kind of principles. We wrap things up that what we’re doing in here is great, but you cannot do everything that well in a small group. There are things you can do in a small group that you cannot do in here. And that’s the secret sauce of Verily Church. These one, another commands. And the early church they met in homes, and I’ve touched on this, but it bears repeating that for the first 250 years of Christianity, there was no church building like this.

THE CHURCH MET IN HOMES
The church for 250 years met in homes, which means you’re alive closer to the construction of the Statue of Liberty than the Apostle Paul is to the construction of the first church building. And up to that point though, the church met in homes. Actually, we have kind of a list of the homes that we know that some of the homes of the New Testament, and unless you’re looking for this, you don’t realize it.
But when you kind of put it all together, it’s pretty remarkable how many homes we have. Take a look at this.

HOUSE CHURCHES IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
These are the homes that are mentioned in the New Testament where people gathered for church, Nympfa’s house, Philemon’s house, Phoebe’s house, Gaius’ house, Jason’s house, the house of Crispus, Mary’s house, Lydia’s house, Justice’s house, and Aquila and Priscilla’s house. And these are the people where church met in their homes and they did life together. And I so wish that I could show you what that looks like. I just wish that we could see that so you could experience that and see what that looks like. And I guess in some way we can.

PRISCILLA AND AQUILA’S HOUSE
Because that last house there, Aquila and Priscilla, we know they were very wealthy. They were just wealthy people and they lived in this town called Ephesus. And it just so happens in the town of Ephesus, which is in the middle of modern-day Turkey, they’ve done some excavations and they just recently discovered a home of a wealthy family in Ephesus, and they excavated the home and take a look.
This is the home in Ephesus, and you’re looking at it and you can piece together that it’s wealthy because there’s mosaics mosaic tile on the floor and stuff. And again, this is from the first century. So it’s highly, highly likely that the house of Priscilla and Aquila looked much like this. It could be their house, frankly. And so there’s this home, and you’ll notice it’s about the size of a modern day apartment. So if you’re complaining about your apartment or your townhouse and that is too small, just realize that you are opulence and wealth. In the first century, most people lived in a house of sticks and stones and the size of your garden shed. That was the home of most people. And so this wealthy home though, you can kind of make the assumption that their servants lived in one of those cloistered off rooms and they had kids themselves.
And that’s probably some type of a living room where the mosaic is now. All right, looking at that picture, looking at that picture, how many people do you think you could fit in that living room for church? If that’s what the church looked like, the church met in homes, how many people could fit in that living room? Realistically it’s, let’s say it’s 10 by 15 feet, 12 to 15 right now, let’s get really generous because they’re super excited. A man rose from the dead and they want to talk about it so that you could maybe fit 20 people in that room, but you’d be tight. But you’d be sitting in a circle with 20 some people talking about the resurrection and what it means for your life. By the way, you would go to this house in the cover of darkness because it would cost you your life to attend.
You’d be imprisoned, you’d lose your livelihood or even your own life. That’s the risk that was associated with it. And these people were willing to do it. And so they’d meet in these living rooms and they’d whisper with one another. They’d whisper prayers, whisper scripture, they had memorized whisper creeds because they didn’t want to be heard by the people outside. They’d whisper hymns with one another. And when you’re in that setting, you can kind of see it. Suddenly the scripture comes alive in different ways. When Paul says things like, be hospitable to one another or be patient with one another, share one another’s burdens. Share your possessions with one another. Well, now it makes sense. He’s not talking to a room that looks like this. He’s talking to a room that looks like that and it just comes alive. These one, another commands. And I so wish that I could show you what that looks like.
Actually, I kind of can. So, I’ve got some volunteers I want to invite forward. They’re going to demonstrate what a small group might look like and what a discussion would look like. So we’re going to make a living room here real quick. Thank you, Blake, Mr. Grant and my volunteers who are going to help out. Come on up you guys. And we are going to demonstrate a small group what church looks like when you gather in a small group like this. Thank you, sir. Come on up. Don’t be shy guys. Come on up. And I have to sit by. You have to sit next to me. And what we’re going to do is demonstrate a small group this morning and demonstrate the kind of church that you can’t do in here. And that what happens in here is good, but it shouldn’t come at the expense of this. And so we’re going to kind of demonstrate small group. Now, every small group is led by a host. We have about 15, 16 small group hosts that are lined up and they all use a discussion guide written that I write following every sermon. So it kind of looks back at the sermon from the previous week. And groups get together once a week, once a month, whatever works for them. And it looks a lot like this. So thanks for being here guys. Sorry for the mess. I’m remodeling.
But yeah, so good to be with you guys. Hey everyone. Welcome to small group. My name is Chris Paavola and it’s great to be with you. Sorry for the mess. I told my kids to clean up, but we’ve had busy summers, I’m sure. So, let’s start with a simple question. Tell us your name and something fun you did this summer. So, my name is Chris and my family and I, we went to Arcadia this summer at Camp Arcadia. It’s up by Frankfurt, and we spent a week glamping up there. It is not really a camp, but that was an awesome time for my whole family. So that’s what we did. What about you guys?
Julie: My name is Julie and there are so many fun things, but actually just yesterday I coordinated a wedding.
Chris: Well, that’s kind of fun.
Julie: It was fun for me.
Chris: Is it a family wedding or
Julie: No, it was a friend.
Chris: Okay, A friend. And then you went to Montana too. Don’t bury the leaves.
Julie: Oh, I got that. Yeah, I went to Montana and camped out in the wilderness for six or seven days.
Chris: I think that was more rugged than what I did though.
Julie: Yes, I wa s in a tent and we had an outhouse.
Chris: Okay. Yeah, definitely more rugged than mine,
Julie: But the bears didn’t show up.
Chris: Okay. If you would rather camp like me, raise your hands if you’d rather camp like Julie, raise your hand. See, we’re a house divided here. Okay.
Julie: Yeah, you can all come with me next time.
Chris: Okay. What about you guys?
Bridget: So, I’m Bridget and I would say one of the things we did this summer, we did a lot, but we went camping, glamping, probably glamping. Glamping for maybe the 12th year in a row to Mackinac Mill Creek. I got to go to Mackinac Island, ride bikes, see horses, eat fudge, all that kind of stuff.
Chris: There you go. Did you do anything without her or anything different? That was fun this summer,
Andrew: Other than baseball every weekend. Every day.
Chris: So, I take it your kids in travel baseball? Yes. What’s your name by the way? We didn’t meet you.

Andrew: I’m Andy.

Chris: Andy! Okay, good to meet you. Yeah. Okay, great.
Chris: So, Andy, you didn’t play baseball?
Andrew: No, I did not play baseball.
Chris: You watched and followed him around. Okay. Well regardless of how your summer plans went, I’m excited for your fall plans that they include this small group. So, thank you guys for that. I know we’re all busy, but I know God is going to bless you for making time to do this in the middle of your busy schedule. So thank you. In our small group, we’ll go into deeper discussions of the previous Sunday sermon using a discussion guide written by Pastor Chris. He’s all right, which means today in our series, check all that apply. We’re going to be talking about how we can find the things that we want for ourselves in the St. Mark’s small groups. So, on Sunday, we heard how the small groups of the early church lived these one another commands in living rooms as they met for church. Today we’re going to look at three of those. One another commands that are really easier to do and distinct to small groups. So, before we get into our first command though, let’s go in a rapid fire down the line here. Name a unique skill or resource that you think that you have. Okay, so unique skill, ability or resource that you have. I’ll start. I have a unique skill of I’m pretty good at grammar and writing. I’ll put that on there. And yeah, that’s mine. What’s yours,
Julie: I love to cook.
Chris: Cook. There you go.
Bridget: I’m going with chaos coordinator.
Andrew: I’m the chaos
Chris: I like that. You’re the chaos. Hi, I’m chaos. Okay, that’s good. Okay, with that in mind, now let’s read our first one, another command. I’ve brought Bibles down here so you can grab one and Bridget want to grab one for you and Andy. And then we’re going to start. Ms. Julie, can you read first Peter four 10? I’ve marked it out there and make it easy so you don’t have to flip in front of a bunch of people. But first Peter four, verse 10, as we get our first one, another command for small groups. First Peter four, verse 10.
Julie: “Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.”
Peter 4:10
Chris: Okay? Whatever gifts you’ve received to serve one another. There you go. So let’s get creative. We just mentioned a skill or resource that we all have. How could now, if we focus just on the four of us, how could you use that skill or resource to serve us? Just the four of us. I think yours is pretty easy. How could you do it?
Julie: I guess I could cook a meal for you.

Chris: You could cook a meal. Well actually one of grant’s gifts is baking. And so grant is going to bring some cookies. Every small group has refreshments. So, we’ve got cookies here. Help yourself because we want to be hospitable. How about you, Bridgette? Any thoughts?
Bridget: I think I could help plan a small group and get us all together and coordinate it.
Chris: We’re going to serve together this in our small group. Yeah, happy Thanks Giveaway. Prosper. The city projects. You’re in charge. Okay,
Bridget: Got it.
Chris: All right. There you go. Alright, so that’s first one, serve one another. Before we move into our next small group one, another command. Let’s set this one up too. What’s a unique lived experience that you bring to this group and what did it teach you? In other words, what’s something from your history that makes you special? So, I’ll start. I went to 10 schools in 12 years. We moved a ton as a family growing up. So that would be my lived. And I also been to four different continents. So, I feel like I’ve traveled a lot and met a lot of people and I’m good at meeting people. So, there you go. That’s mine. What about you?
Julie: Well, I love to organize things and Weddings.
Chris: You can’t do that, that’s her. You can’t do that. Weddings.
Julie: Well, you mean I’m supposed to go on the scene? You didn’t say what the rules were.
Chris: There is no rules. It’s okay. It’s something, a lived experience. Ms. Julie,
Julie: A lived experience, wow.
Chris: That’s unique to you.
Julie: How, do you put me on the spot.
Chris: Okay, we’ll come back to you, Bridget.
Bridget: Well, I was going to say showing pigs at the county fair. That’s a lived experience that many people probably don’t know that I’ve done
Chris: You showed pigs?
Bridget: Yeah.
Chris: Were you a farmer?
Bridget: I mean, I was an urban farmer. I pretended.

Chris: Oh, my goodness.

Bridget: The pigs were at my FFA advisor’s house. So, I would just go there and clean the pen once a week and other people would do it too. But then I got to take it to the fair..
Chris: That’s good.
Bridget: So, I was going to say,
Chris: There you go.
Bridget: Herding people, herding animals, pigs, that kind of thing.
Chris: There is a similarity there. Yes. Andy, what about you?
Andrew: I guess one of my gifts that I can bring forth is I can teach, and I don’t know if anybody knows, I do quite a bit of instruction within my career and within the community. So, I enjoy teaching. I love being in front of people. I love to talk. And just,

Chris: What’s your career? What’s your career, Andy?

Andrew: So, I’ve done about 21 years as city police officer.,
Chris: Oh, okay. Interesting. And did you think of something as we were going down the line there?
Julie: No.
Chris: No? Okay. Well, okay, that’s fine. So, with that in mind, now we’re going to go onto our next one, another commands. Can someone read Colossians three 16? Bridgette, can you read that for us? Maybe Colossians three 16.
Bridget: “Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through Psalms, hymns, and songs from the spirit singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.”
Colossians 3:16
Chris: All right, so you go, there’s our second one, another command in small groups. We can teach one another. Last Sunday we learned how small groups keep this oral tradition of the church alive by reading scripture to each other, reciting it and teaching one another. And a lot of that teaching comes from our lived experience. So how could our unique lived experience that we have give us an insight into scripture that we might read in a small group? I can think of one actually.
Bridget: That’s deep question. Really.
Chris: So, here’s a simple one. If we’re reading about Jesus saying, do not be unequally, yoked, or oxen like my yolk is easy, or Jesus saying feed my sheep, or Jesus saying, my sheep hear my voice. That would be insight that you could bring from your history of working with animals to the group. You would understand things about animals that we wouldn’t know just because you’ve worked with them. And again, that’s just an insight into scripture that you would bring because of your unique experience. Yeah. You guys think of any others? Police officer, there’s some commands there.
Andrew: I would just say that with the experiences I’ve had with my career and different people in all walks of life and just being able to kind of mold my conversation and my actions towards a person almost instantly to help try to talk with them versus trying to intimidate them.
Chris: Right, you almost got to, I imagine in your career you have to respond so quickly to the situation and react and you can’t go in. You can go in with a plan, but it quickly changes.
Andrew: The plan never works out.
Chris: Yeah, right. Very good. Okay, so let’s look at the last one together. Mr. Andy, can you read James five 16 aloud for us? James five 16. This is our third one. Another that we can do in small groups. Go ahead, brother.
Andrew: “Therefore, confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.”
James 5:16
Chris: Boom. So, the third one would be, pray for one another. So, we’re going to go around, and this is what we do in small groups. We’re going to share prayer requests. But look, there are four people here who are committing to praying for you and vice versa. And so, God is going to hear more prayers for your situation in a small group. And the same goes for me too. So, are there any prayer requests that you guys have this morning?
Julie: Well, I have one. I am venturing into something new next week. And Ashley so nicely asked if I would help in the children’s ministry. So, I am going to be doing that for the first time next Sunday. So, you can all pray for me. I believe I’m with first and second graders,
Chris: Is that right?
Julie: Yes.
Chris: Okay, there you go.
Julie: So, help me out.
Chris: All right, we will lift you up. Thanks for doing that. That’s awesome. What about you guys? How we prayer for you?
Bridget:I would say a prayer for patience as we enter back into this season of chaos with back to school, back to routine and just,
Chris: Yeah, I feel that.
Bridget: Slow it down in the rush.
Chris: Big time. Yeah. Anything for you brother?
Andrew: I’m going to be the person that says not right now. I just don’t have anything. I mean the normal prayers you think about, you see the news, you see the what’s going on in the world and you have your own….

Chris:
Well, how about we pray for Minnesota

Andrew: We should pray for that. There’s just tons going on in the world and you just kind of wish that, can’t we all just get along, just relax, enjoy life.
Chris: Yeah, we can pray for Minneapolis for sure. I am going to say construction and I’ll make this really make it about me. I don’t mean to do that, but I have my normal week that I do and trying to lead the church. And then on top of it is all of this construction, chaos. And so it’s like I’m treading water and then someone threw a baby at me while I was treading water. That’s what it feels like with construction. It’s just like something happens and something changes every week. And safety. I want everyone to be safe, the kids to be safe and us to be safe, but also for things to be under budget and ahead of schedule. So anyway. Alright, so we will close today with prayer, but thank you for sharing that. As a closing question today we’ve talked about how small groups help us serve one another, teach one another, and pray for one another. So, in this season of your life right now, which do you most need to be served and to serve others, to be taught and to teach others or to pray for and be prayed for? Which one do you most need? I’ll start and say that I need to serve others. I think that makes me a better leader of this church if I’m active in serving outside of just my job description. So that’s my answer Sir, what about you?
Julie: I think it’s more, I think of it as serving, but just being able to share my faith and my beliefs, especially in a work setting. And it’s proven beneficial in a couple of instances.
Chris: Great. Okay.
Bridget: I’m going to go with pray for one another because I need it just as much as everyone else.
Chris: I love it.
Andrew: I’m going to go with teach because I believe in teaching and I’d love to teach. And at the same time when you teach, you always learn. If you’re not learning when you’re teaching something, then you’re not doing it right. So, I would say teach because that way I will grow at the same time. Somebody else will
Chris: Love it. Alright, well may God give you guys that this season of small groups, thanks for being here again. I thank you for making the time. God is going to bless you for doing so. Now, every small group we try to end with the gospel, meaning we remind ourselves of what God has done, not just what we can do for God. And it’s kind of neat to think about the gospel application of these one another commands because Jesus first did them to us. So, he came to serve us first by giving his life on the cross and dying for our sins. He came to teach us first by teaching God’s word and also fulfilling God’s law. And then he came to intercede or pray for us by interceding for us, for our sins. And he’s doing so right now. And so ,it’s neat to think about how these one another commands before we do them to one another, Jesus has done them for us. Amen.

ANNOUNCEMENTS
So, we’re going to close with an announcement and then we’ll pray. But thanks for being here. We’ll meet next month, same time, same place. Okay, just a couple quick announcements before we get going. Prayer night is coming up on Wednesday. We’re going to actually be praying for kids ministry and youth ministry. So if you’re a kids or youth ministry volunteer, we’re going to pray for you guys. We hope that you guys are able to make it that night because we’re going to pray specifically for you. And then kids ministry speaking up kicks off next week, next Sunday at the nine 30 and 11 o’clock service. And you’ll just drop off down there at our world doors when you come in and kids will have a rocking and rolling time. It is awesome to see all those kids getting together and having fun. So I hope that you kids can be a part of that or kids that can be a part of that.
And then that evening we have our youth ministry kickoff. We’re doing a color war where they throw pantyhose at each other, filled with color powder of some kind. And anyway, it’s a blast. They did a last year. Kids wear whites and middle schoolers, high schoolers show up Sunday night and throw things at each other. So there you go. That’s the color war. And I think that’s the last announcement. So let’s pray.

PRAYER
Heavenly Father, thank you so much for this morning. Thank you for just the way that the one another commands can really just come alive. And we’re sitting in a small group and we pray for our small groups of Saint Mark, God, that truly the one another commands will be lived out and experienced so that we can experience you Jesus. We don’t want to miss out on anything. And so God bless and grow the small groups at St.
Mark’s starting with me. And Lord, we pray for Julie, thank you for just the way you’ve led her into service at Kids’ Ministry. And we pray for all the kids’ ministry volunteers, God, that you bless them with just a special level of energy and joy as they serve and live out your calling for their life. And yeah, I joined Bridget and praying for patience and the whole new schedule of this new school year and balancing, I pray for the Olson household, God, that they would just feel a sense of peace and order among the disorder and God that they would continue to live out who it is that you’ve designed them to be and grow closer to you as they grow closer to each other. We pray for the construction going on. God, keep everyone safe. Keep the workers safe. Keep all the people walking in our parking lot safe.
Keep the family safe as they drop off kids and just all these dump trucks driving around. Give those drivers special awareness as kids walk up to and from our parking lot. And yeah, Lord, just prevent any harm in that same spirit. Lord, we pray for the church in Minneapolis that’s grieving and the families that are grieving this day with just the senseless violence. And God, give them hope and give them peace and let them take comfort in your resurrection in just a very real way. And I pray for our church, God, that you would keep us safe. Let any who plot our harm, thwart those plans. Lord, that you may preserve and protect your church. Just fulfill your promise that not one hair on our head will be harmed. God, yeah. Help us as a church. Take the measures that we need to do in order to be safe as well.
We love you so much, God, and we close together saying together the words that your son taught us to pray, saying:

Our Father, who art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy name,
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
On earth as it is in heaven,
Give us this day our daily bread
And forgive us our trespasses
As we forgive those who trespass against us,
Lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil,
For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory,
Forever and ever. Amen.

Can we give our volunteers at hand? Thank you, guys. Thank you for demonstrating what small group looks like. We’re going to clean up here. Yeah. But thank you guys so much for just giving us that demonstration this morning.