First, we see through Jesus that God reaches out and invites us to be in a relationship with him. We never reach out to God without God first reaching out to us. The Bible says, it’s not that we first loved God but that God first loved us. When Jesus reached out and invited people to experience the kingdom of God he was saying that we are all loved by God and God wants all of us to be part of his kingdom, his community, his family. Instead of us thinking that we have to be good enough to be a disciple, Jesus says, you are already loved enough to be my disciple. Walk with me and I’ll help you experience more of the life God has for you.
The second thing that Jesus’ inviting people to follow him shows us is that community is important. Creating a community was a priority for Jesus because he knew that his time on earth was limited and therefore people were going to be needed to share his message. From the very beginning, Jesus knew a cross awaited him. He knew that death and resurrection was part of God’s plan, so if the message of salvation was going to continue, it was going to need a group of people who would carry it forward. John McAurhtur, in his book 12 Ordinary Men, said, Jesus knew his earthly work would have to be handed off to someone else.
Community was also important to Jesus because he knew that we are more influenced by relationships than by teaching. Faith is more often caught from others than it is taught by a leader. We understand Jesus more from being loved by others than by listening to a sermon (but keep listening), and for love to spread, for the love of God to spread, a community is needed. Jesus knew that the power to spread God’s love to the world needed not one or two leaders but a community of people who would love.
The power of community in our own personal faith and in faith sharing was made clear to me the summers I worked with A Christian Ministry in the National Parks. The first summer I worked in Yellowstone NP and was part of a ministry team that formed a real community. At the beginning of the summer we all agreed to get both Sunday and Monday off from our jobs so we could lead worship services Sunday morning and evening, and then travel together on Mondays. We started doing this to just get to know one another, but as we spent time together we started having a lot of fun.
Every week we came back from our Monday adventures with amazing stories and soon others were asking to take Mondays off to join us. The fun, and honestly the love, of our group was contagious and we were able to share our faith with many people. Not only did my faith grow that summer but I was able to share my faith and God’s love in powerful ways all through the community.
The next summer I worked in Rocky Mountain NP, that ministry team fell apart. A couple of people never showed up. One person left after a few weeks, and another person decided they didn’t want to work with us in ministry. I was left with one other person in ministry, but he didn’t work where I did so I only saw him for a few hours on Sundays. It was very lonely.
I was also the only employee at the store where I worked who had Sundays off, which meant that other than the worship services in the morning and evenings, I was alone most of the day, and it was my only day off. There wasn’t a ministry team to hike with, sightsee with, or do anything with. My faith floundered and the spiritual impact on the people I worked with was minimal.
That summer I learned how important community is for our personal faith and for the ability to share the love of God. Jesus knew this! He knew that we were created to be in relationships with one another. He knew that our faith in God would grow most powerfully when we are in fellowship with one another, and he knew that we would share the love of God most effectively when we are in community. Jesus knew all of this, so forming a community was his top priority.
Building community was so important to Jesus that he didn’t call just one person at the beginning of his ministry but 4, and not 4 people who didn’t know each other, but 4 people who already had solid working relationships. Jesus called two sets of brothers who knew each other and worked together. Matthew 4:18-22
The first 4 disciples were Peter, Andrew, James, and John, two sets of brothers who all fished from the same shores along the Sea of Galilee. They knew each other. They worked together. The gospel of Luke tells us they were partners. They knew each other’s strengths and weaknesses. They were already a strong working team that would become the core of Jesus’ new community.
Jesus never invited people to believe a certain doctrine or follow specific rules, he invited people to walk with him and live within a community. The entire story of Scripture is the story of God inviting people to walk with him and live in community. It started when God looked at Adam and said, it’s not good for him to be alone. It is the only time in the creation story God looked at something he made and said, this isn’t good. Adam alone wasn’t good, so God created Eve, a helper and a partner. God walked with Adam and Eve in community. It is God’s plan for us to walk with him and live in community.
God then called Abraham and said, I will make you into a large family and a great nation. God then said he would use the nation of Israel to be a light to the world. God’s plan was always to use a community to share his life, and love, and light to the world, so it is not surprising that when Jesus came he also formed a community. Today, if we are going to walk with Jesus we need to walk in community with others who walk with Jesus. There simply is no getting away from being part of the community of faith. For us to fully follow Jesus, we have to be willing to enter into fellowship with one another.
The Apostle Paul reinforced the importance of community when he talked about the church as a body. Paul says, you are the body of Christ and each one of you is part of it. 1 Corinthians 12:27. Being part of this body, the church, isn’t an option for Paul. He said if we follow Jesus we are part of a body and we will only experience the fullness of life and faith when we live as an active part of that body. Each one of us is to be part of the body, the community, which means that each one of us is blessed when we live in the community and each one of us has responsibilities in the community. We have a responsibility to love one another and what that love looks like is outlined in many places.
The bible is full of one another passages. These are places where we are told what our relationships with one another are to look like. We are to:
• Accept one another
● Greet one another
● Serve one another
● Bear with one another
● Comfort one another
● Build up one another
● Pray for one another
● Forgive one another
● Love one another
Think about what our personal lives would look like if we treated one another like this? Our own lives and faith would be so much stronger. We would be more faithful, more stable. Our lives would simply be better! But then think about what our community would look like. We would be stronger. We would be more powerful, more pleasing to God, and most important of all more inviting to the world around us. People would literally be beating down the doors to join our community.
To walk with Jesus means we need to walk with one another in community, and in his book, The Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren says that strong communities require 4 things:
● Honesty
● Humility
● Courtesy
● Confidentiality
● and I’ll add one more - Commitment.
Honesty is vital to a community and yet we often fail to be truly honest with one another. We don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings, we don’t want to appear judgmental, or we don’t want to get involved, so too often we simply stay quiet about concerns we might have, but honesty is important. To build up one another we need to be able to speak the truth in love, and that’s the key, love. Honesty is not rudeness and judgement, it is kindness mixed with concern. And don’t forget honesty doesn’t always have to be constructive concerns, it can be supportive praise. Let’s honestly tell people how much we appreciate them, value them, and are grateful for their contribution to our lives and our faith.
When I first started in ministry, I had two friends who were honest with me in many areas of my life. I didn’t always like what they said, but I knew they were right and I needed to listen. They also affirmed me more than they shared any concerns with me, which reminded me that I was loved and supported no matter what. Most of us long to be loved and supported. We want to know people are there for us no matter what. Most of us also can be honest enough to say that there are areas of our own lives that are a challenge for us. There are areas where we need to grow and change and for us to be able to move forward we need people to be honest with us.
The single most important thing to remember about honesty is that we cannot simply speak honest words and then move on - we need to speak them in the context of a relationship where it will help, support, encourage, and walk with people in the future. Don’t tell me all I’m doing wrong without also walking with me to make changes to do things better. Jesus was honest with people and then he called them to walk with him and others in love.
Honesty also calls for humility. If we are going to speak honestly into someone else’s life we need to do it with humility. We need to evaluate our own lives before we evaluate anyone else’s life. Jesus said we can’t point out the speck in someone else’s eye and ignore the log sticking out of our own. But this doesn’t mean we simply put ourselves down. Humility is not thinking less of ourselves - it’s thinking of ourselves less. Humility means just thinking about other people more often than we think of ourselves, and striving to meet the needs of others before our own.
When we do this, humility will then lead to courtesy - which means being considerate of others. Courtesy means bearing one another’s burdens, meeting their needs, and taking the time to understand their situation. Courtesy goes beyond opening a door, it means taking the time to understand what others are going through, what their needs are, how we can meet their needs, and anticipate their future needs. Courtesy means we respect who people are, where they are in life and faith, and then find ways to walk with them.
Community also requires confidentiality. Nothing breaks down relationships and therefore destroys community more than gossip. In a culture where everything seems to be shared, and where people want to seem like they know everything, and be the first to share everything they know, gossip is a problem. We never find Jesus talking about the disciples behind their back, and the Bible is full of teachings about the destructive nature of gossip. James said we need to tame our tongue, and we do. We need to check ourselves when we want to share information about others, and then love others enough to keep quiet.
When I think of this list of honesty, humility, courtesy, and confidentiality, I realize that when it comes to living this way in the larger community, I will get it wrong more times than I get it right. I won’t always speak up when I should, or I might say the wrong thing to the wrong person. I might not put others first, or take the time to understand where others are coming from, and too many times I will only think about myself and getting my way. When I get it wrong, and when others get it wrong, when I get hurt, and when I hurt others, the answer isn’t to give up but to keep going. The answer is to forgive, ask for forgiveness, and keep going. Being a community takes commitment. It takes hard work. It takes failure and starting over. It takes honesty, humility, courtesy, and confidentiality being lived out over and over again.
If we can commit to this way of life, if we can walk with Jesus and in fellowship with one another - we will experience the true fullness of life. If we walk alone, in time we will find ourselves empty of faith, empty of joy, and empty of life. When we walk with Jesus, we are a community and a family that builds a stronger faith in us and helps spread the love of God to others.
Next Steps
The Walk - Community
Reflect: When have you experienced strength, grace, peace, or comfort because you were part of a larger community? When has the lack of community been a struggle in your life and faith? Why?
Read: Matthew 4:18-20. How does Jesus show us the importance of community in this passage?
Read these “one another” passages in the Bible:
● Accept - Romans 15:5-7
● Greet - 1 Peter 5:14
● Serve - John 13:12-17; Galatians 5:13
● Bear with - Colossians 3:12-15; Galatians 6:2
● Comfort - 1 Thessalonians 4:18
● Build Up - 1 Thessalonians 5:11
● Pray - James 5:13-16
● Forgive - Matthew 18:21-25; Colossians 3:13
● Love - John 13:34-35, 15:12-17; 1 John 3:11, 4:7-11
Respond: Community calls us to walk with:
● Honesty
● Humility
● Courtesy
● Confidentiality
● Commitment
What does walking in this way mean for you today? Which are your strengths and weaknesses? Where can you grow?
Paul used the image of a body to talk about the followers of Jesus (1 Corinthians 12:12-31). What is one thing you can do during this season of Lent to be a strong part of the body? Who can walk with you to be a support?
