Open up your Bibles, please, to the book of 1 John. 1 John chapter one is where I would like to direct our attention on this Resurrection Sunday in God's word. You might think, Timothy, is it difficult to come up with different Easter messages to preach every year? It shouldn't be. It's been said the Resurrection changes everything. And so it would take me quite a while to give enough messages that would explain everything that has been changed by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So you see when we gather around God's word on Resurrection Sunday, there are a multitude of topics that can be preached. Very often we focus just on the fact of the resurrection by drawing our attention to the eyewitness accounts of Jesus in the gospels or in the epistles that were written to assure us that the testimony of these men who gave their lives for the truth that Jesus Christ is alive after he was dead is in fact historical. But there's much more to Resurrection Sunday than the fact of the resurrection, and so this morning we're directing our hearts towards 1 John in order to explore some of the implications of the resurrection. The resurrection truly changes everything, and I would like to explore a small part of how it does and why it does here as John relates it. Would you bow your heads with me for a word of prayer? Father, as we come now in our service to your word, as we've had the scripture reading, as we've had prayers, we've had hymns and songs, we are so thankful that you are dwelling among us. And we know that you will answer the prayers that we have prayed already, that you would give the preacher wisdom to be able to unfold your word, and that you would give us humble hearts that are ready to receive your word. We know that that is a prayer that you delight to honor, and that we've seen you answer time and time again, and so we have confidence that as we come to the Holy Scripture today that you are going to do just that. We thank you, God, for being with us. We thank you that we are gathered here to remember Jesus Christ, and that though his body is not with us, that his spirit is, and that that is a powerful presence, and that we have fellowship with you, God the Father, and with your son, Jesus Christ, and it's in his name we give you thanks, amen. I'd like to read for you the first three verses here of John chapter one. That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life. The life was made manifest and we have seen it and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life which was with the Father and was made manifest to us. That which we have seen and heard, we proclaim also to you. We'll stop there for now. Here, we're looking into this chapter, and really this book, as this chapter unfolds the meaning and the purpose of everything that comes after it, in regards to this title, The Joy of Fellowship with the Risen Christ. that John had seen, he had experienced, he had touched the Word of Life that was with the Father from the beginning, who was made manifest in time and space in a human body, that he experienced the Word of Life in the person of Jesus Christ. That he tells us about that eyewitness experience By writing down in the Gospel of John, by writing these letters, he passes on what he has seen and heard to others for a purpose, for a reason. And that reason is that we might also have the joy of fellowship with the risen Christ. That's why our scripture reading this morning was from the Gospel of John chapter 21. It was a passage about fellowship, partnership, camaraderie, togetherness with the risen Christ as his friends met him on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. We also are able to have a very similar experience and that's why the message of the resurrection of Christ has been and will continue to be proclaimed. One of the songs of Easter is He Lives. I serve a risen Savior. We didn't sing that one today, but I wanted to make reference to it here in my sermon. And part of the words of that hymn, you ask me how I know He lives. He lives within my heart. And as we heard testimony earlier, that is a valid evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ. that the subjective experience of a relationship, a fellowship with the risen Christ, is the purpose of the proclamation. And it is evidence that the proclamation is true. However, it's not the only evidence, nor is it the most objective evidence. Here, John, in his opening chapter, once again identifies himself as an eyewitness. Notice the words there in verse one. We have heard. We have seen with our eyes. We have looked upon and have touched with our hands. Now he puts that we have heard first because we're talking about the word of life. And more important than seeing the physical face of Jesus or touching the physical hands of Jesus is hearing what Jesus said because he came to speak the truth that he himself is. So that's why he puts what we have heard first. But secondly, he has the fact that he was the eyewitness. We have seen it with our eyes. And this leads to the testimony in verse two. We have seen it and testify to it. Now sometimes when we are sharing the gospel with people, we'll say that we are evangelizing and we'll also call it witnessing. And when we say that we're witnessing, what we mean is that we're telling people about how Jesus Christ died for our sins and rose again. However, we cannot witness the way that John witnessed. We cannot testify the way that Peter testified because we were not eyewitnesses of his resurrection. I was not there to see his crucifixion. I was not there to see his tomb. I was not there to see him eat bread or eat fish with his disciples after he had suffered and died. But these men were. They saw it. They experienced it. When Jesus Christ stood in their midst in the upper room, he said, touch me. A ghost cannot be touched. And I am not a ghost. I'm not a spirit. But I am a resurrected man, a human being who can eat and drink with you. You ask me how I know he lives. Yes, he lives within my heart. But we also have more convincing reasons than that for those who are skeptical. Other faiths can have equally strong subjective internal witness. I had Mormon missionaries come to my door and they were certain that when they read the Book of Mormon that they had a burning in their bosom that told them that the Book of Mormon was in fact the Word of God. And who am I to discount their subjective experience? They might feel that just as strongly as I feel my experience of fellowshipping with God when I'm reading the Bible. But the man who wrote the Book of Mormon did not rise from the dead. And there were no eyewitnesses to the miracles that were done like what we have in Scripture. That God gives us an objective value upon which to base our faith in Him in order to know Him beyond just what we think or what we feel in our hearts. I choose to ground my faith on something more objective than personal experience of God because we are easily deceived. But the objective witness of the apostles and the prophets in Scripture cannot be refuted or contradicted. Now if God's word keeps asserting that the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ is of utmost importance, And if Satan keeps attacking the truth of the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ, beginning from the earliest time, as soon as the gospel was being proclaimed, false teachers arose, who came to be known as Gnostics, who denied that Jesus Christ had come in the flesh, and if he didn't come in the flesh, but only appeared to be a human being, then there was no physical bodily resurrection. If that doctrine was undermined from the earliest time, and it continues to be attacked vehemently by all of the intellectual pseudoscience of our current age, and the postmodern unbelief, then perhaps this is an important doctrine if both God and Satan recognize it as being foundational. I'd like you to turn with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 15. Leave a marker there in 1 John, then come back to what Paul wrote regarding the importance of the doctrine of the resurrection of Christ. This isn't the heart of the message that we're going to be speaking this morning, but it's the groundwork. Because you can't have fellowship with Christ if he's not alive. You can't have a personal relationship with someone who's dead. A woman is married to a man as long as he lives. But death separates that relationship. Jesus Christ died, but he is not dead now. And we are able to be His family. We are able to have a relationship with Him because of the historical fact of His bodily resurrection. Now look at what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, verse 12. You see, it was denied from the earliest preaching. But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile, and you are still in your sins. then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. Many Christians, so-called, gathering in Lincoln or in other places in Nebraska today, they believe that Jesus Christ was a wonderful teacher, that he came and embodied what it means to have a relationship with God. and they love much of what he said, but they don't believe that he actually rose from the dead. Their faith is empty. They're still in their sins. They may call themselves a Christian church, but if they don't believe that Christ has been risen from the dead, then their faith is null and void. If they only hope in this life that by following the teachings of Jesus Christ they'll become better, more spiritual people, then they are of all men most to be pitied. The doctrine of the resurrection truly changes everything and we're going to explore a small part of how it does that and why it does, in fact, change everything. Now, as you come back to 1 John 1, I'd like you to notice that we are proclaiming the risen Christ based upon eyewitness evidence. We are not eyewitnesses, but we have the eyewitnesses. We have their testimony in scripture. And we proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ based upon the eyewitness accounts of Paul, Peter, John, and all who wrote the New Testament. That eyewitness account is the basis of our proclamation, but the basis of our proclamation is not the focus of 1 John 1. The focus of 1 John 1 is the object of that proclamation. Who are we proclaiming? What are we proclaiming? We are proclaiming that which was from the beginning, that which the apostles heard and saw with their own eyes, that which they touched with their hands and handled. We are proclaiming the word of life, which is a title for the Lord Jesus Christ. The life was made manifest. The first several verses here are preceding the main verb where John just repeatedly describes the object of the proclamation. And the proclamation isn't mentioned until you come to verse three. That which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you. Now when the object of the proclamation is described by John in such elaborate ways here, the way that he repeatedly describes it is with the word life. Take a moment and think about why Jesus Christ is described as the word of life at the end of verse one. And the life that was made manifest in verse two. And then also, once again, towards the end of verse two, or in the middle, the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us. What we are proclaiming is life. And life is a person more than a principle. This is why the doctrine of evolution is such a evil, insidious doctrine. It teaches that life comes from nowhere as a production of random chaos. And if something comes from nowhere and is a production of random chaos, then it is ultimately meaningless. And it is an absurd proclamation to begin with because all life that we know is personal. And this personal life that we experience, that we know by our own experience, demonstrates that life itself must also be a person, rather than a thing, or a force, or even an accident. You'll often hear people say things when they're talking about moral issues. It's my life. And that's a lie. Did you create your life? Can you sustain your life? Are you in control of your life? If you cannot create it, if you cannot sustain it, if you cannot control it, then probably it doesn't belong to you. It belongs to the one who did create it, the one who does sustain it, and the one who is in control. It is his life. And instead of saying, I get to decide how I live my life, it is more accurate to say, he gets to decide how I live his life. For the life that I have is a borrowed life. It is a life that is dependent upon the source, and he is the source. He, the one who existed from the beginning, the one who was manifest In Israel, 2,000 years ago, being born to a virgin, he is the author of life. He is the fountainhead from which all life springs, from the worm in the dirt to the archangel in the heavens. It's his life. He's the life. Very significant to understand who life is instead of what life is. And the life that is Jesus Christ is properly determined and described as everlasting life. That the source of life differentiates himself from the life that is produced in the fact that the life that he has has no beginning and has no end. We don't know of any life like this in the creation. Everything is born, everything dies. But not so with the life. He is the one who is eternal life. Come with me to the end of 1 John chapter five. As John begins with a focus on the object of the proclamation, being the person of life, so he ends also with this focus on the person who is life, and the testimony concerning him in 1 John 5, verses 11 and 12. This is the testimony that God gave us eternal life and this life is in his son. Whoever has the son has life. Whoever does not have the son of God does not have life. As it was said, All men die, but not all men truly live. People can be physically alive, but be dead on the inside. Whoever has the Son has life. Whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. Here we are in the day of the walking dead. So many people that have physical life, but sin has emptied their souls of meaning, of significance. of joy, of peace. We're talking this morning about the joy of fellowship with the risen Christ. And the word joy rings hollow to those who are walking dead. Seems like something that you put on a Hallmark card but that has no real correspondence with actual human experience. But instead, human experience is sorrow. Human experience is despondency. Human experience is hopelessness. Human experience is regret, and remorse, and guilt, and anxiety, and fear. Hardly called life. All men die, but not all men truly live. And Paul said, the one who gives herself to wanton pleasure is dead even while she lives. Life is a person, and we are celebrating today the joy of fellowshipping with the life. And that's why he rose from the dead, because he is the life, and the life cannot be dead. Now how the life became dead for three days is a mystery that I will never be able to explain to you. God is amazing. The life became dead, but he is alive forevermore and we are able to have life through him. That's what we're talking about. Look also at 1 John 5, verse 20. We know, what do we know? That the Son of God has come and has given us understanding. This proclamation that has been made, this word that comes to us, the power of God's word, it has given us understanding for a purpose so that we may know Him who is true. And we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and, there we have it again, eternal life. He is eternal life. Little children, keep yourselves from idols. He's the true God. He's eternal life. Beware of the idols. Come back to 1 John 1. Now the goal of the proclamation of the word of life who became flesh, who dwelt among us, and whose glory was beheld by John and Peter and even Saul of Tarsus after his resurrection, The goal of that proclamation is described in verses three and four. Let's read it once again, starting in verse three and then continuing into verse four. That which we have seen and heard, we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us. There's our word fellowship. And indeed, our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete. So you see our title? Fellowship, joy, that's why the Bible was written. So that you can have an experience of partaking in a partnership with eternal life himself. God wrote down what he accomplished in time and history, in the incarnation, in his suffering, in his passion, in his resurrection. This message of the gospel has been testified to, it has been proclaimed so that you may have fellowship with those who have fellowship with God the Father and Jesus Christ. And this is where joy comes from. You know, the word joy doesn't even really get used much in our culture. We talk about being excited. We talk about having fun. Excitement and fun are different than joy. They're ephemeral, they're temporary. You get a buzz, but then afterward doesn't necessarily produce any well-being. But joy is deeper. Joy is longer. Joy is something that comes from having fellowship with God and with Jesus. What is fellowship? Another translation that I would like for fellowship is partnership, being a sharer, partaking together in some enterprise or cause. In the ancient world, it could refer to business partners or people who owned property together. It would be a good word to describe the relationship that existed between Peter and his brother and James and John as those who were partners in fishing. and had their business together on the waters of the Sea of Galilee. They were fellowshipping in their enterprise. Fellowshipping isn't just about saying hello or being friendly. Fellowshipping is being united in a common cause, a common purpose, a common endeavor. That's what we are. We are those who have fellowship. We are in a common cause, in God's endeavor in the world. You see that my job as a preacher is to bring you joy. Because I'm bringing you the message that allows you to have fellowship with God. Now sometimes sorrow has to come first. Sometimes I have to reprove and rebuke according to the scriptures. And the word of God does that in order to produce lasting joy. Sorrow lasts for about an evening, but joy comes in the morning. And the sorrow of exposing sin, the sorrow of confessing your sins, it's a painful experience, but it produces a lasting fruit of righteousness. And that righteousness is where life is found. So let's take a look then in this opening chapter, in the first verses of the next chapter, into how we can enjoy this fellowship with the risen Christ. And John, throughout this chapter and then throughout his book, he elaborates on what I would call four steps to enjoying your fellowship with the risen Christ. And the first one is very simple. Don't sin. A very simple step towards enjoying your fellowship with God is described in verses five through seven. Follow along in your Bibles. I'll read them for us. This is the message that we have heard from him and proclaim to you that God is light and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth, but If we walk in the light, as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his son cleanses us from all sin. Brothers and sisters, don't sin. Stop it. When John describes the message, he says the message can be boiled down. The message can be simplified into this metaphor. God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all. That might strike you as odd. That might not be the way that you would summarize the message of the Bible. But it is the way that the Holy Spirit summarizes the message of the Bible here. What is God teaching us from Genesis, through Exodus, through the conquest of Palestine, through the history of the judges, through the time of the kings? Through the raising up of the prophets who confronted the evil and immorality of the kings and queens of Israel and the sins of the people and their idolatry. What is God teaching us through the writings of the prophet Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel? What is God unveiling to us when Jesus Christ walked among us and went from town to town and preached the truth and did the miracles? What is God teaching us in the foundation of the church in the book of Acts? And through all the letters that were written to those churches by the apostles, he's teaching us that he is light. And there is no darkness at all in him. That's the message of the Bible. And what does it mean? What is this metaphor that God is light? The metaphor of light and darkness is a rich and varied metaphor throughout the scriptures, but here in 1 John, he's talking about the difference between righteousness and unrighteousness. You could say that God is righteous, and in Him is no unrighteousness at all. We're talking about how God is holy, and there is nothing unholy about Him. And if you are going to enjoy fellowship with Him who is light, then you also must walk in the light. God will not walk in the darkness. And if you want to live your life in the darkness of unrighteousness and sin, then you will live your life without God. Human life is dependent upon a right relationship to the divine, which is communicated to us through the divine logos, Jesus Christ. Two cannot walk together unless they are agreed. Remember what the scripture says. Do not be bound together with unbelievers, for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? There's no fellowship between light and darkness. And so if you want to live an immoral, unrighteous life, and you still think, oh, I can have great fellowship with God. I can go to church and sing the songs. I can talk theology for days. I can listen to great sermons. You lie. You can go to church and have no fellowship with God. You can listen to sermons and have no fellowship with God. You can go to Christian concerts and have no fellowship with God, because God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all. Jesus Christ, when he was among us, he said, you must be perfect, as my heavenly Father is perfect. He's not going to change his standards in order to have fellowship with you. you are going to have to change in order to have fellowship with him. But you say, I can't. I can't be perfect. And so I'm discouraged by this message. How am I supposed to have fellowship with God when James says that we all stumble in many ways? Is it impossible then to have fellowship with God? Well, notice what John says. He says, if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and The blood of Jesus his son cleanses us from all sin. God has made a provision for those who are imperfect, for those who commit acts of immorality, for those who commit acts of unrighteousness to be cleansed so that you can have fellowship with God. So when you sin, Don't sin, first of all, but when you sin, confess it quickly. Go back to God. And what does the scripture say? Our second step towards fellowship with God is confess sin. Continue reading there in 1 John 1 verses 8-10. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. Oh, I'm not really a sinner. It's really my circumstances, my situation. If you understood what was going on, then you'd know why I did what I did. I really have a good reason for everything that I said. If you say you have no sin, you're deceiving yourself and the truth is not in you. But if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us. How do people deny their own sin today? How do people avoid confessing their sin today? Well, one way that people do it is that we make God in our own image and likeness. We say, well, God is a feminist, so it's okay if I don't obey the rules of scripture when it comes to men leaving their households. Because really, my God, he sees all people as being equal in every way, and there should be no roles and distinctions between the sexes. Children, guard yourselves from idols. You don't want to make God in our image. You don't want to make God according to societal standards Instead, you want to let God speak for himself. You want to be God who he is. You confess your sin instead of bringing God down to your level and saying, God, you have to conform to my standards. You have to conform to my ways. My culture says this. And so that's who my God is. That's what he's like. If you say that, the truth is not in you. But if instead you confess your sins and you say, I've been conformed to the world, I've been tainted by an unbiblical worldview, I've thought and acted according to things that were lies, and God's word is truth, and you confess that to God, he is not going to punish you. Because he already punished Jesus. He's faithful. He's not gonna punish Jesus for your sin and punish you. Once time has been served, it doesn't have to be served again. Maybe you know someone or yourself struggles with homosexuality, same-sex attraction, and you say, God made me this way. And so you don't confess it as sin, but instead you say, well, you bring God down to your level. You make God in your own image and likeness. Without repentance, without change, Any religious experience is empty and false. If you've got a God who says, come as you are and stay as you are, you don't have the God who is life. You have an idol. You see, contradicting God is serious business. Notice how John puts it in verse 10. He says, God has testified that homosexuality is sin. God has testified that Men are leaders in their families. God has testified that his word is sufficient for sanctification. And if we go around and we start to say otherwise, we are calling God a liar. That is serious. And I call all who call God a liar to repent and receive his forgiveness. Thirdly, we are to love God's family. If you want to enjoy fellowship with God, God has a condition. Notice how John puts it in chapter two, verses nine through 11. 1 John chapter two, verse nine. Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. Whoever loves his brother abides in the light and in him there is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes. You cannot love God and not love the family of God. If you came to me and said, Timothy, let's be best friends, but I'm gonna do everything I can to make the life of your wife and children miserable, Sorry, we're not going to be best friends if you're doing everything you can to make the life of my family miserable. God says the same thing. You can't come to God and say, God, let's be best friends while I do everything to attack your family. That's a good way to get on God's bad side. Notice that John returns to this theme several times in his letter. Turn over to 1 John 3, verses 11 through 18. 1 John 3, beginning in verse 11. Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you. We know that we have passed out of death into life because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know the murderer has no eternal life abiding in him. By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk, but in deed and truth. Number four. Don't sin. When you do, confess your sin. And number three, love the family of God, leads us to the final step on how to enjoy your fellowship with the risen Christ. Keep clear of false teaching. Might not be the first thing that would come to most Christians' mind when they think about how to enjoy fellowship with God, but John thinks this is very important. And I think he has the Holy Spirit. 1 John 2, verses 18 through 27. 1 John 2, starting in verse 18. Children, it is the last hour. And as you have heard that Antichrist is coming, so now many Antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us, for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us. But you, have been anointed by the Holy One, and you all have knowledge. I write to you not because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and because no lie is of the truth. Who is the liar? But he who denies that Jesus is the Christ. This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also. Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you will abide in the Son and in the Father. And this is the promise He has made to us, eternal life. There we come back to eternal life again. I write these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you. But the anointing that you have received from him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you. That is, you don't need new material. You just need to abide in what you heard from the beginning. As his anointing teaches you about everything, and it is true, and it is no lie, just as it has taught you, you abide in him. The goal of the apostolic proclamation was to bring men and women and children into fellowship with God and one another, but there are other proclamations that will hinder or thwart that goal. John sets himself to address that throughout this epistle. In conclusion, I'd like to turn your attention to what John also wrote in the beginning of his book called Revelation. The last book in your Bible, Revelation chapter one, The word of God has come to us. The testimony concerning this life is in the apostolic writings. We cling to it, we obey its instructions, we believe its testimonies, so that the word, the message, is active in our life. And in so doing, we have spiritual connection, spiritual fellowship that is real, that is personal, with the man who rose from the dead. And here you see him in his glory, a vision of Christ standing among the churches. This is a vision of what Jesus Christ is doing now. He's here. This is what he looks like poetically, metaphorically. He's here. And John writes about his presence among the churches in this way. I, John, your brother and partner, in Revelation chapter one, verse nine, Notice the word partner, it's the word fellowship. Koinonia. Again, the testimony of Jesus. I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet saying, Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea. Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands. It was a representative of the seven churches he just mentioned. And in the midst of the lampstands, one like a son of man who is the word of life. Clothed with a long robe with a golden sash around his chest, the hairs of his head were white like white wool like snow, his eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. In his right hand he yelled seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face, it was like the sun shining in full strength. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me saying, fear not, I am the first and the last and the living one. I died and behold, I am alive forevermore. And I have the keys of death and Hades. Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are, and those that are to take place after this. This is the one that we are partners with. This is the one that we are engaged in an enterprise together. And if we are going to be with him, then little children, it has been written to us by John, all that he communicated to us was so that you would not sin. Don't sin. It will destroy. and corrupt and dissolve and send into disrepair the work of God in you, it will interrupt your fellowship, your increasing fellowship, your growing likeness to the one with whom we are in partnership with. It will undermine your purpose in life. It will take away your peace of mind. It will have far-reaching ramifications and spread into other areas of life that you would never anticipate or expect. Children, don't sin so that you can enjoy your fellowship with this glorious Christ. And when you do, confess it quickly and know that the blood of Jesus Christ covers all sin and that he will renew your fellowship. He will restore your heart. He will rebuild what you wrecked. He will continue the work faithfully that he began in you because he cannot deny himself. And little children, love God's family. Be very careful not to tear down the work of God. Be very careful. And become more zealous for the building up of the people of God. When you evaluate your life, when you take time out from your schedule and you have a moment to think, think, what am I doing to help God's family? What am I doing that's good that I need to keep on doing? What am I not doing that I should be doing? What can I do more of? Be zealous to love God's family and you will enjoy your fellowship with God. He will draw near to you. And then finally, abide in the sound teaching of the scriptures. The apostolic proclamation is the means by which God communicates to us his will. And you will be deceived and you will be led astray, tossed about, if you do not abide in God's word. It's not enough to listen to a sermon. You need to have the word of God in you. in your heart, in your meditation, so that you're thinking, how do I do what it says, and not just be a hearer who deceives myself? And help the word of God to convict and confront all of the lies that I have believed, because they speak to my proud heart, and they appeal to my sinful desires, so that the word of God will reprove and rebuke all of that, and lead me in the way that is everlasting.