[Maximum Joy Series] The Fruit of Fellowship Sample

Fireflies or Roaches?

I remember as a boy we kids would run around with a glass jar catching the lightning bugs, putting twenty or thirty in a jar with holes for air in the top. It was fun to watch them glow. Or even to let them walk around on your arms or fingers. Harmless little creatures. They mind their own business, don’t carry diseases, don’t leave fang marks, not stealth vampires, and they don’t steal your food. Best of all, as the young Wordsworth said, they make “holes in the darkness.” 

My question for you today is, “Would you rather be a roach or a firefly?” What is it that makes some Christians glow in the dark, while others blend in so much that they are indistinguishable from the darkness around them? We are born roaches, but born-again fireflies. So, “How can I be a firefly for Christ?”

John does not only speak about relationship and fellowship with the Father and Jesus Christ. In the section we are entering today, we will learn about the power source which helps sustain the joy we experience when we delight in fellowship with our Father: the Holy Spirit.

John thinks back to the Upper Room promises from Jesus, in particular the promise about a Helper who would guide us into all truth. In order to do so, John will develop the subject in 3 sections:

1. Living with the Holy Spirit (3:24)

2. Looking for the Holy Spirit (4:1–3)

3. Listening to the Holy Spirit (4:4–6)

In the first section–Living with the Holy Spirit, we return once again to our theme of fellowship, not relationship. Notice the keyword of the verse: abide.

“Now he who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him. And by this we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us” (3:24 NKJV). 

The word “abide” is used 14 times in the Gospel of John and 24 times in 1 John! This use of “abiding” began in 2:6 and continues to portray a picture of intimacy and fellowship. So, to abide in Him is to know Him intimately and to know God intimately is equated with keeping His commandments. 

What will be the proof, the manifestation of Him in us? The Holy Spirit will be a sign to us that we are in fellowship with God, when we abide in Jesus. When we abide and enjoy His presence, we are like fireflies. His fruit is in us, and we enjoy being who we are, manifesting the glory of the Lord amid the darkness.