Fellowship Bible Church Sermons

Clean Hands and a Clean Heart

February 23, 2022 PM, Matthew 15:1-20.By the title of my message, “Clean Hands and a Clean
Heart,” I do not intend to convey that the Pharisees were
right about the ritual washing of hands but just fell short.
They missed the entire boat. Rather:
“Who may ascend into the hill of the LORD? Or who may
stand in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a
pure heart, who has not lifted up his soul to an idol, nor
sworn deceitfully” (Psalm 24:3-4).
Ritual washing of hands is not the issue. Hands that do not
practice sin is the issue... and a heart first washed by the
blood of Christ to break the power of sin and allow the
hands to do righteousness instead of wickedness. The
cleanliness of the hands is like in 1 Timothy 2:8 – a farmer
with dirty hands out in his fields, but who is a good
Christian man, can lift those soiled hands to God in
prayer, and do so in complete fulfillment of this
Scripture.

Who are Disciples of Jesus?

February 20, 2022 PM, Matthew 28:18-20.Matthew 28:18-20 tells us that we are to make disciples, baptize
them, and teach them to obey everything the Lord has
commanded. That is our central mission as a church.
But what exactly is our end product? What is a disciple? What does
one look like? Act like? Think like? How are we supposed to make
disciples if we are a bit fuzzy on what we are making? In today’s
evangelical landscape, this sometimes gets lost in the rush to “get
people to believe” or "make a profession of faith." Discipleship is
reduced to "belief" and "belief" is reduced to head-knowledge,
and true Christianity is emptied of reality.
We talk a lot about
believers but not so much about disciples and this is not good.
Discipleship roughly equals belief + transformation, and both are
produced by God. Transformation refers to the "new person" thing
that happens to someone when they trust in Christ. Their life
changes—from characterized by sin to characterized by
righteousness. The belief part of it refers to accepting that you
are a sinner, that Christ is the Son of God who died for your sins
and rose again, and that believing in Him you will have eternal life.
But if you have fact-belief only without transformation, that falls short of
true Christianity (even the demons believe, says James 2:19). That
half-baked type of "Christianity" is called easy-believism or free
grace theology.
On the other hand, if you claim to have a kind of transformation
apart from belief in Christ then all you have is moral reformation,
which rearranges a person's problems but does not ultimately solve the sin
issue.
In this message, we embark on a study of what the Scripture says
about disciples. These are the end products that we seek.
We ought not to think that we perfectly become such a thing
immediately after coming to Jesus. But we also ought not to think
that our lives look entirely different than this end product. Even a
new believer bears an unmistakable resemblance to what we will
see in the many verses we will visit.
Our Scripture reading was in 1 Chronicles 29:1-30.

Sincerely Caring for Others

February 20, 2022 AM, Philippians 2:19-24.Perhaps you have some “I want to do ____” in your life. Can you
convert each one to an “I trust God that I will be able to do ____”?
First, is it something that you think fit with trust and God? Second,
are you willing to let God carry out His plan about that, even if it
does not match your plan? Third, if you are in a waiting-room type
of situation, are you willing to joyfully wait, like Paul, “to see how it
goes with me”? Fourth, if you are in an activity-required type of
situation, are you energetically pursuing what God wants you to do
while you wait for His disposition of the matter, pressing forward
despite some difficulties that may arise? If you are a Christian,
you are “in” the Lord—in Christ. This impacts everything you do
and how you think. Your hopes, trusts, desires, actions, everything
are influenced by this fact. What does “in Christ” mean? Think of
the opposites—in Adam, in the world, in the flesh, in sin.
Additionally, here are some applications to consider:
A. I am deciding whether to go to church today. In making this
decision, do I think about only myself, or do I think about all the
other people at the church and how I might be a blessing to them?
Do I focus on how they will be a potential detriment to me, or do I
overcome that by faith in Christ and consider if I genuinely care for
them in how I am making my decision?
B. I am deciding how to spend the family’s finances. Do I think of
others in the family, and outside of it, or just myself?
C. I am going to partake in some entertainment. Am I thinking of
others around me and their things, or just my own pleasure?
Our Scripture reading was found in Ezekiel 25:1-17.

Intro to the Book of Haggai

February 20, 2022 SS, Haggai.In this message we open God's word to the our new study in the book of Haggai, led by James Widgeon. This book is technically the second shortest book of the Bible. We ready the entire book which consisted of only two chapters. Our focus of this text is on the following main topic: God neglected - a temple project neglected.

Walking on Water, Part 2

February 16, 2022 PM, Matthew 14:13-36.Christ is able to take care of us here while taking care of our eternal life as well. Direct our prayer toward Christ to ask His help. But do so in faith, trusting that the Lord will help you as He sees fit. Return to passages like this to review so that you do not get too far off base. It is easy to stray away and look at our own things, our own circumstances, our own problems, our wind and waves, and forget Jesus is in charge and is using all of that to improve our character.

Missionary Report: Turning Problems Into Prayers

February 13, 2022 AM, 1 Samuel 16:1-23.The Lord speaks to the prophet Samuel to stop mourning for Saul, but to go to the house of Jesse where He will reveal to Samuel who He had chosen to become king of Israel, a man after God's own heart. Samuel, fearing Saul would seek to kill him, responds to God asking for help. God provides a safe solution for Samuel in the means of bringing a heifer to Bethlehem as a sacrifice to God. So Samuel did what the Lord said, went to Bethlehem, and the elders of that town trembled at Samuel's coming. Samuel puts the concerns of the elders to rest by announcing he has come in peace to sacrifice to the Lord. The Lord's solution to Samuel's dilemma preserved not only the life of the prophet, but the town, the sons of Jesse, and the coming king of the Lord's own heart. This is the guiding principle that should inform our prayer life and its simply this: when we are faced with obstacles on the path of obedience, we must turn to our Lord in sincere heartfelt and specific prayer. We must turn our concern to Him! This demonstrates our total dependence on the Lord and ultimately gives Him the glory that He alone is due. We must turn our problems... into prayers...
Our Scripture reading was found in Ezekiel 24:1-27.

Walking on Water

February 9, 2022 PM, Matthew 14:22-33 // Mark 6:45-52 // John 6:15-21.Christ is able to take care of us here while taking care of our
eternal life as well.
Direct our prayer toward Christ to ask His help. But do so in
faith, trusting that the Lord will help you as He sees fit.
Return to passages like this to review so that you do not get
too far off base. It is easy to stray away and look at our
own things, our own circumstances, our own problems,
our wind and waves, and forget Jesus is in charge and is
using all of that to improve our character.

Feeding 15,000 or more People

February 6, 2022 PM, Matthew 14:13-21.The so-called feeding of the 5,000 is recorded in all four of the
gospels. We focus on Matthew’s account of it, but we examine all four accounts as we study this miracle that Christ performed. Today, where are the multitudes going out to find Jesus? Of course, no one finds Him in person today on this earth. But the analogous situation is this: people must come to true churches if they are to find Jesus. They will find there the message of Jesus, the people of Jesus, the provision of eternal life from Jesus, and the love of Jesus. Do not be frustrated when inconveniences come. Look at the “inconvenient” people who need compassion. Help them by sharing the Word of God, and, if needed, benevolence. It has been well said that the Lord permits us to be
involved in His work by using what we have—as small as it might
be. But it must be done in faith, without doubting (James 1:6).
Remember that the fish and loaves were given by God too—as is
everything else that we have. We use the resources that God gives
us to do God’s work, even if those resources at first seem
insufficient to do the job. The boy with the loaves and fish—and
the disciples too—had to give them up so that the other people
could be fed. We give and often get back…not in the prosperity
gospel way, but in a way in which God’s grace ordains to supply so
that His people have an abundance for every good work (2 Cor.
9:8). We should not be surprised at this historical account
whatsoever, for the Creator of the universe (John 1:3) who used
nothing but His divine power to make all things in six days can
easily use something to create something more. Somehow He used
the loaves and fishes as “seed-starters” because He “broke them,”
meaning that he divided them into portions. Maybe He created the
rest of the food out of pure nothing. One time He used dirt to
create (new?) working eyes (John 9:6). The situation is a miracle,
so trying to find a physics-based or natural-law explanation is
futile. Do not waste the Lord’s provision, whether it was
miraculous or not! (I am not suggesting that the Lord supplies via
miraculous provision today.)
Our Scripture reading was found in 1 Chronicles 27:1-34.

No Complaining! Part 2

February 6, 2022 AM, Philippians 2:12-18.The apostle now is going to spell out some details about what it looks like to obey God’s word, which is the same thing as working out our salvation with fear and trembling. The next exhortations certainly fit the context of humility and like-mindedness, but they are even broader than that, encompassing all that we do in our lives. If the Christians keep holding on, keep believing, keep obeying,
that is, persevering, this will give Paul a reason for rejoicing at the
judgment of Christ because it will mean that his teaching and
preaching work “remained” and did not disappear into thin air.
John 15:16 says, “I chose you…that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain.” That is what the servant of God
desires. It takes energy and toil to do this work. The salvation of souls is not the only goal! Paul wants to present every man perfect in Christ (Col. 1:28). God is working in you… to hold steadfastly to His sound teaching… so you shine as lights in the world… and one result of that is that you will not complain and argue.
Our Scripture reading was found in Ezekiel 23:22-49.

The Lord’s Table: The Joy of Salvation

February 6, 2022 SS, Various.We prepare our hearts in sharing the Lord's table, with a message focused on how Christians are to rejoice in our salvation, that God loves us enough to save us from the second death.
Our Scripture reading was found in Psalm 96:1-97:12.