Today we are going to talk about the role of prayer in fellowship. When Luke described the first community of believers in Acts 2 he noted that they devoted themselves to the Scriptures through the apostles teaching and to fellowship through the breaking of bread and prayers. Devotion means to exert great effort to persist in doing something; it indicates an action that is continuous and habitual. Devotion is when something is chosen, when something becomes a priority rather than a requirement. Devotion is what is necessary to walk the narrow way, to deny ourselves, take up the cross and follow Jesus and devotion is what true fellowship looks like. Devotion is seen in the character of God when James writes that there is no shadow of turning in Him; devotion is faithfulness, an unwavering commitment and unmoving and steadfast love. Fellowship doesn’t happen without devotion; it can’t be something we ease into it has to be something we set our hearts upon, that we trust God in and that we believe is necessary for obedience to God, the building of our own character and the glorifying of Jesus to the world around us. We have to understand fellowship as not being about food, not being about comfortable relationships, not being about what makes sense or how we seem to fit together but fellowship is about having God’s character built in us through each other; fellowship is how we reflect God to the world that is watching and fellowship is how we establish unity. Ultimately fellowship is when we gather together because of the love of God and for the glory of God. Fellowship is when the cross of Jesus yokes together those that had previously been unequal and when holding Jesus is common becomes greater than everything that is uncommon between us. It is not fellowship when we have a meal, it is not fellowship when we get together, it is not fellowship when we laugh or when we cry, it is not fellowship when we like each other or even love each other it is only fellowship when our reason for being together is because Jesus has joined us to each other and together we desire to do nothing more than glorify Jesus. As the Moody Bible Commentary has defined it, fellowship is “intimate, not casual, community spirit”. Fellowship in the first church had one common bond, the person of Jesus and one common goal, the glory of Jesus for the salvation of souls. Fellowship is when people gather, whether it is two or three or many more, for the purpose of reminding each other of the beauty of Jesus and to make known to the world around them the glory of Jesus. Fellowship happens across races, across denominations, across nations, across financial barriers, across gender barriers, fellowship crosses boundaries and breaks barriers, it builds bridges because it takes our attention off of ourselves and each other and sets our minds on things above and makes unity with Jesus and because of Jesus the thing we have devoted ourselves to. Fellowship has many faces but only one bond and one goal. I believe the Apostle Paul was defining fellowship when he wrote Ephesians 4:4-6 “There is one body and one Spirit, just as you also were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all.” Fellowship is when the adopted children gather because of their Father, not because of each other and so our fellowship is not about what we hold in common it is about the One who holds us all in common together. Today we are going to talk about the role of prayer in fellowship. It is important that we pray for each other and it is important that we pray with each other but I believe that there is a way of praying that creates and exhibits fellowship. There is a way of praying that is exampled to us by Jesus and by the apostles that we need to take hold of and that we need to learn to apply to ourselves and to our fellowship. I don’t believe we can have fellowship without prayer but just as we talked about with food, just because we have prayed it does not mean that we have fellowshipped. Today I want to explore, what are the prayers the create fellowship and the prayers that are birthed in fellowship?