I suppose there is a tendency with some preachers to stand up and say that if you invite Christ into your life, you’ll never have any problems – everything will always be rosy and you’ll never suffer. Excuse me, but that’s a bunch of nonsense. It simply isn’t true. Christians suffer just as much or more than other people around them. In fact, it’s very possible, at least according to what the Scripture says, that we will suffer because we are Christians. Many people have suffered because they are following Jesus Christ. One of my favorite passages of Scripture in the Good News edition says, "All I want is to know Christ, and to experience the power of His resurrection, and to share in His sufferings, and to become like Him in His death, in the hope that I myself will be raised from death to life." Not very many times do we pray to God and ask, "Lord, enable me to experience the sufferings of Christ. Send us suffering, Lord." We don’t usually pray that way. Maybe we should. I really believe that suffering is one of the things that brings out the best. Suffering helps us realize our own weakness and inabilities and sends us to the cross. Suffering sends us to Jesus Christ. We start trusting in Him instead of ourselves. The fellowship of suffering is the best thing that can happen to us because that’s when we grow.

Jesus Christ’s purpose is all about redemption. The purpose of the body of Christ is all about redemption. I shared a couple of months ago about God’s salvage operation and that likewise, every church is a salvage operation – bringing broken, hurting, messed-up people to Jesus Christ. If we’re not doing that, we’re not doing our job. We’re not fulfilling our purpose. What it’s all about is being a group of people – a fellowship – that is involved in fulfilling the process that Christ has already started in our own redemption, reaching out to other people, giving them a hand, and seeing them redeemed also. That is the fellowship of redemption.

You just can’t help but feel differently about life when you have a hope of the resurrection; when you know the grave is not the end. I think most people who really believe that, are going to live differently in this life. They are going to face that grave with a lot less fear and anxiety than they would otherwise, because there is confidence of that hope of life beyond the grave. In fact, a better life than we’ve ever seen so far. The fellowship of resurrection hope. After I passed a certain birthday, and my hair is white and all that, I’m really aware of the fact that I’m not going to be walking around here too much longer. I’m getting old. Sooner or later old people tend to stop walking. Then you get laid in that "last resting place," as it’s called. It’s not my last resting place! I’m not going to stay there! That’s just where they are going to put this body for the time being. I have that resurrection hope – I’m going to live with Him. That makes a difference how you approach circumstances, how you feel, and hopefully how you live right now.

There is really unity in the body of Christ. We don’t and can’t produce that unity. Only Jesus Christ, through His gift of the Holy Spirit in our lives, produces unity. However, we do have the ability to mess it up. We are not strong enough, or wise enough to do anything really positive, but we can really do lots of damage.

The Scripture doesn’t talk about us producing unity, it talks about us maintaining the unity that Christ gives us. When our focus is on Jesus Christ, when our focus is on adoration, when our focus is on worship, then everyone who has experienced God’s saving grace in their life, can join together and there is perfect unity. You can have perfect unity with people from diverse backgrounds, diverse races and diverse ethnic situations. One of the best experiences of unity that I’ve ever had was when I, and eight other Christian brothers, were in jail for two months in San Jose, California because we were silently sitting in front of an abortion clinic. One of these brothers was a Catholic priest. He and I became close friends and experienced this bond of unity in Christ. It amazes me. We prayed together, we studied the Scripture together, we witnessed to people together. There wasn’t much difference. We both had the same relationship with Jesus Christ. We both experienced the same unity with the Holy Spirit and with each other. I noticed that when he told people about the relationship they could have with Jesus Christ, he usually ended with something about Mary which I didn’t do. But that didn’t detract from the shared love for the Lord, and the desire to exalt Jesus Christ. We had total unity even in diversity. I remember one of the prisoners who was moving in the right direction. (I’m not sure he ever came to be a real Christian.) This prisoner was the one who "ruled the roost" in the jail. (In spite of the guards and correction officers, there is usually some prisoner who does that). I remember I was kind of surprised and shocked when I found that, through a set of circumstances, he was on our side! He was sitting beside me at lunch one day when everybody was talking with a lot of filth and nonsense. I remember Joe saying, "Shut up! You don’t talk like that in front of people like these." It was effective! Nobody did it again. What was amazing is that, just as we Christians sat down and asked the blessing at the meal, after a few days, everyone was bowing their heads and asking the blessing before we ate. It became the habit – the custom. It just happened. When you have that resurrection hope there’s a positiveness about the way you live. There is a power in your living. Resurrection hope is also resurrection power. I don’t like to emphasize the power too much, because we’re such selfish, greedy people, that we’re liable to start focusing on the power. But when you focus on Christ and He lives in you, He does something. I never understand fully what He does, but He produces a sense of power within us that’s real, not phoney. We recognize who we are in Christ Jesus. I always appreciated an evangelist by the name of Skinner. He wrote a little book, and one of the things he said that blessed me, and helped change my life was, "God made me, and God don’t make no junk." That got through to my heart and mind. I realized that because I am God’s creation, because I’m born into the family of God – I’m a representative of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. I can look anybody in this world straight in the eye and tell them. That’s who I am. That is very meaningful to me.

There is joy in this Christian life that is not dependant upon the circumstances! One of the most meaningful illustrations I’ve ever heard was from a missionary speaker who spoke in Asuza, California years ago. I don’t remember the specific details but he was talking about being someplace where the communists had taken over; they had taken some of the Christians to make examples of them. They had them walk across this bridge, and as they walked one at a time across the bridge, they were shot. This one pastor started walking across the bridge, knowing what was going to happen. But do you know what he did? He raised his voice and sang praises to God with a smile on his face as he walked across the bridge. That put me under conviction. I told my wife I would have walked across the bridge because I would have been faithful to Christ, but I’d have probably done it feeling glum and scared. That’s no way for a man of God to operate. A child of the Kings of Kings and Lord of Lords should be able to face any situation, look it straight in the eye, have the joy in his heart and live it out. I believe that is God’s will for us. (By the way, the end of that story is that when the singing pastor got across the bridge, he was still alive and the communists were no where to be seen.)

It’s great to have the fellowship of prayer with other brothers and sisters. This has been on my heart more lately than for a long time, the need to pray with other brothers and sisters, the need to pray together for ourselves, our church, our land, and for the needs right around us; prayer that others might enter into this wonderful life of peace and joy – of fellowship together with Him. We can’t create the qualities of this fellowship, whether it’s joy, unity, or whatever it is, but the beautiful thing is that if we focus on Jesus Christ, and follow Him in obedience, it will happen automatically. However, we can keep it from happening by holding people at arms’ length – not letting anybody get next to us. If we drop our defenses and allow people to really get to know the real person, it will happen automatically. Among Christians these relationships will develop that are closer than any you can have in this world. The bonding is powerful. He can and will do it in our lives! Be open, don’t shut out the Holy Spirit, and don’t shut out other brothers and sisters who would provide fellowship for you, and you for them. You don’t have to do anything other than to be open and let the Lord work in your life. Have a fellowship of prayer. God bless you!