The Household of God

WTW 2022
1 January
The Household of God

Today, we have been taking a deeper look into the true meaning of Christmas.
We have seen the true meaning of Christmas always extends into a transformed life.
A life transformed by Christ extends beyond the fellowship of faith to the public square.

What we need more than ever in this secular society is for the followers of Jesus in 2022 to live more like Jesus and His followers did in the first century in the midst of that crooked, corrupt and depraved generation.

There are two eternal families. The family of God and that of the world.

The first century family of God grew up in a corrupt generation which had not known true relationship with God. In our generation now, the household of God has come up in a society which did know true relationship with God but which has increasingly turned away from Him. This has us now living in a society which is in some ways more like the generation the first century followers came up in. Though our society has a memory which the first century did not have of a relationship with God, the younger generation in our society is coming up in an age more like that of the first century.

Here are some passages about how God’s Family is to live in such a generation.

The Household of God
The Family of Faith

Galatians 6:10
Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.

Ephesians 2:19
Therefore you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of God’s household,

1 Timothy 3:15
If I am delayed, you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth.

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Galatians 6:1-10
1Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently. But watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted. 2Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. 3If anyone thinks they are something when they are not, they deceive themselves. 4Each one should test their own actions. Then they can take pride in themselves alone, without comparing themselves to someone else, 5for each one should carry their own load. 6Nevertheless, the one who receives instruction in the word should share all good things with their instructor.

7Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. 8Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. 9Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. 10Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.

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Ephesians 2
1And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, 2in which you used to walk when you conformed to the ways of this world and of the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit who is now at work in the sons of disobedience. 3All of us also lived among them at one time, fulfilling the cravings of our flesh and indulging its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature children of wrath.

4But because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in our trespasses. It is by grace you have been saved! 6And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7in order that in the coming ages He might display the surpassing riches of His grace, demonstrated by His kindness to us in Christ Jesus.

8For it is by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not from yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9not by works, so that no one can boast. 10For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance as our way of life.

11Therefore remember that formerly you who are Gentiles in the flesh and called uncircumcised by the so-called circumcision (that done in the body by human hands)— 12remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. 13But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.

14For He Himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has torn down the dividing wall of hostility 15by abolishing in His flesh the law of commandments and decrees. He did this to create in Himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace 16and reconciling both of them to God in one body through the cross, by which He extinguished their hostility.

17He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. 18For through Him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.

19Therefore you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of God’s household, 20built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus Himself as the cornerstone. 21In Him the whole building is fitted together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22And in Him you too are being built together into a dwelling place for God in His Spirit.

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1 Timothy 3:14-16
14Although I hope to come to you soon, I am writing you these instructions so that, 15if I am delayed, you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth. 16Beyond all question, the mystery from which true godliness springs is great:

He appeared in the flesh,
was vindicated by the Spirit,
was seen by angels,
was preached among the nations,
was believed on in the world,
was taken up in glory.