Finding Our Way to One Another

well we began a series last week called the beauty of belonging and before we talk about what it means to belong to one another I I think it's worth pointing out an interesting fact that modern researchers uh uh contend that we are living in a day where there are six major Generations alive and active in our country today uh so I I want to put us up on the screen you'll see I mean I say major Generations there are still some from the greatest Generation alive today but there are six Ma major Generations live and active in the country today it's a unique moment and so we put up there the generations the silent uh Boomer Gen X Millennial gen Z and what is uh debatably called uh polars you can see the birthday next to it and the relative ages I do want to point out before we begin that there is some controversy of what are the exact dates of who constitutes a millennial Pew Research indicates their birthdays as 1981 to 1996 if you see the birthdays up there there are some Millennials that have a lot of feelings about that I just want to say it's a it's a spectrum more than it is rigid categories uh but before we talk I just want to do a little test if we can by show of hands of who in the room is from each Generations I don't know if we can see one another but do do we have any from the silent generation here are there any of those I'd be stunned I'd be thrilled and stunned and no okay uh any Boomers in the room anybody hands still on the wheels of power okay yeah listen to that they want you here I didn't tell them to do that uh boomers are here what about Gen X any uh there's like less of us than what where where did we go um we're just silently judging everyone from the back uh Millennials any Millennials in the house hey okay surprising percentage up front interesting I don't know what that means uh gen Z we got J Z in the house okay good okay okay and uh I don't even know if this is an official name Jean twangy identifies this as a name polers those 10 and under we got anyone under the age of 10 in the room right now they're all next door what one back there hey yeah there's some babies okay uh speaking of Jee twangy is a professor of psychology at San Diego State University and uh she specializes in research on generational change and uh her recent work is is a book called Generations that is a Herculean effort of uh compiling and assessing information from 24 different data sets that draw information from 39 million people in America so it's it's the largest data set ever to to evaluate Generations where we are alike and where we are different and what trend lines you can see and uh what's fascinating about her study is is the speed at which cultural change is taking place and many of you know this anecdotally that uh it's completely different experience now growing up now than it was in the 1950s uh or even the 1980s or even in the 2000s uh but sometimes it's hard to really grasp the implications of it because uh we don't have a wide angle lens on on the past 100 years or so but as you look at her research on Generations which which is there's a so much to say you could do a whole series on it maybe we will someday that'd be kind of fun uh but uh she points out that beginning with Boomers there was a mark cultural shift away from collectivist values and towards individualistic values that that really between the silent generation and the boomer generation there was a a massive shift between collectivist values that is a A prioritization or focus on social rules and group Harmony towards individualism centering the needs of self and each subsequent generation has continued along that trend line towards grow greater prioritization of individualism now why that shift uh she has an interesting thesis and that is that most people when they do generational studies mark them by major events that happened in your formative years and they certainly have an impact on Collective Consciousness the assassination of John F Kennedy 911 they impact people but uh she would argue and contend and many now do that that really what changes the way you grew up and the way you live and the way you think is technology that's a far greater influence of what makes the difference between uh different Generations uh technology is what makes individualism possible so why this trend towards individualism it's the shifts in technology now technology doesn't make it inevitable to be more individualistic but it does make it possible which makes sense if you think about it like if in the 1800s if you lived in America and you decided you know what I'm going to strike out alone I'm going to head off on the Oregon Trail that that would would be the last decision you ever made because just the work of harvesting hunting Gathering food cooking it all that was was so difficult to do in isolation you had to be in a community to survive so so Community Values were Paramount just to live in the 1800s but even as you got into the 1900s uh gardening or shopping cooking and preparing food took a day doing laundry would take an entire day the the laundry machine wasn't created until the 1940s uh the electric dryer clothes dryers till the 1960s so think about that drying your clothes took a day and back in those days kids uh cooking and and and cleaning and and doing laundry turned into a communal event you you just had time together so you lingered daily in a collective experience but as technology began to shift we got more and more free time uh and Boomers were the first ones to really experience kind kind of some of these major shifts these labor saving devices and computers provided more time more time to focus on the needs of of self and making it possible to be more independent from other people uh Boomers were also the first ones to experience the television set that now to be entertained I don't have to sit around the elders and hear them tell the stories uh I can just turn on a TV and watch it there and be entertained uh also the new technology of the birth control pill came out in their generation as they came of age and that had a massive impact on American society because people people began to delay getting married and then could determine how many kids they had so the number of kids per family went way down more interest in each one of those separate kids and so there was a massive shift in the demographics of our country as technology changed both medically and in our labor saving devices and and because of all this technological change you see this broad drift towards individualism now let me say this I'm not saying all individualism is bad and I'm not saying all collectivist ideas are good both are good and bad they have tradeoffs so like if you grow up in a a tribe or or heavily uh communal experience uh there were some downsides to that uh less choice of what you got to do with your life uh far less autonomy far far tighter of system and rules but the benefits were uh more safety a clear sense of identity and more connection socially with individualism uh you get more freedom more choice you can be whatever you want and as you ride off into your freedoms the downsides are more social disconnection and its attendant uh effects of loneliness and depression and that's where I think the modern world today we're experiencing some of the effects of individualism that this train that started and again there's so much more you can say about Generations I'm just picking out something that's that's unique about our day we talk about what it is to commune with each other massive shifts in technology have led to the freedom to be more focused on the self and that prioritization of individualism that train has been moving with ever more speed towards an individualistic and thereby disconnected society and as we move into the modern day so much has changed and and the reason why there's so many generations now is because technology keeps changing and it's changing how you grew up I mean if you think about the landline phone it took decades before that was adopted around the world right when the smartphone came out in 5 and a half years more than half the US population had one that's fast technological adoption it changed very quickly Millennials your formative years were primarily dominated by the flip phone uh it's why you're socially more well adjusted than Jen statistically speaking because they were raised not even on the communal TV experience but now we carry all of our own individualistic TV experiences do you see it and so what's fascinating is you look at Millennial data I mean surveys of Millennials you were very happy in your high school years and then uh something dramatically shifted in adulthood massive upticks and depression and massive upticks and suicide and some of them go yeah Millennials were cuddled and then life hit them hard well that maybe the case but also technology hit you hard a new way of interacting through phones and devices right uh gen Z mental health has been much worse and the number of teens and young adults with clinical levels of depression has doubled between 2011 in 2021 doubled in 10 years loneliness depression uh a and some of you go well that's just subjective and self-reporting they're they're more comfortable talking about their feelings well if you pick something objective like hospital visits because of self harm there's been a significant uptick in Pre in teenage and pre-teen girls admitted to emergency room for harming themselves the suicide rate among 10 to 14y olds tripled overall and nearly quadrupled for young girls twice as many teens were taking their own lives in 2019 so this is pre-co twice as many teens were taking their own lives in 2019 than 12 years before and three times as many kids in fourth and Ninth Grade died by their own hands and as researchers are trying to get their hands around this one of the things they're identifying is the more our technology has drawn us to isolate from one another we're missing what has has been the remedy for anxiety in the past and and what has given us comfort and a sense of identity and that has been deeply embedded in a loving community and as children have been isolated in their growing up years it's having a a demonstrably negative effect on their well-being uh Sher turl who's at MIT has a quote that I find really haunting she says concerning life with smartphones she said we are forever elsewhere think about that for some of us how it can sometimes feel physically painful to stay in a conversation a physically embodied conversation with people at some point during the meal you're like and you don't even know what you're looking for just escape from this right uh there's something that shifted in us that was not true of Prior Generations uh it's interesting Jee twangy and I'll get off stats and onto the Bible in a moment but uh let me depress you just to shade further uh Jean dangi talks about this primarily talking about Millennials she says what makes you happy for most people it's spending time with friends and family and feeling like part of a community with Millennials less likely to be partners and less likely to belong to a religious community more are cut off from what have historically been people's main sources of social interaction and contrary to the urban tribes idea friends have not stepped in to fill this Gap in 2019 again pre-co this isn't a CO effect in 2019 22% of Millennials said they had no friends that's one and five saying zero Millennials identified I have no friends compared to only 9% of Boomers that's not their experience perhaps as a result 30% of Millennials say they often or always feel lonely compared to 15% of Boomers she assesses in the individualistic culture Millennials have known all their lives individual freedom is valued over tight social bonds of Institutions like marriage and religion although individualism has many upsides its risks include isolation and loneliness in their bedfellows unhappiness and depression the lone self is a weak foundation for robust mental health humans need social relationships to be happy and fulfilled in life this is especially true as people age past young adulthood this might be why Millennials are happier as teens but not as adults individualism and freedom feel good when you're young but empty when you're older married people in their late 20s are less likely to be depressed than unmarried people they're happier 44% of 26 to 29y old married Millennials said they were quote very happy compared to 23% of the never married it's not a shot at you if you're not married we'll do a marriage series again some other day it's just identification lack of social Bond leads to lack of happiness doesn't mean you have to get married anyway same is true of religion among 26 to 29y Old Millennials 39% of those who attend religious Services once a month or more said they were very happy compared with 26% of those who attend less often marriage and religion are both strong predictors of happiness with more Millennials leaving them behind that might explain why mental health has suffered during adulthood uh psychologist Martin Seligman says the rate of depression over the last two generations has increased roughly tfold and V Murthy our former Surgeon General said loneliness is now a growing Health epidemic it's not just impacting our mental health but physical health as well loneliness is killing us right our technological shifts not all of which are bad have provided the basis for and promoted individualism which is not all bad but the more individual we've become autonoma Sal law to myself the more disconnected we are from others and the more disconnected we are the more sad we've become and so if you're looking and for many people they go I'm sad I'm depressed I have no friends what's wrong with me there's probably a lot wrong with you but it's not all about you you are on a a cultural stream that has been flowing for decades and you are now reaping the results of a move in society so it's not your fault but it is your problem and what's interesting is secular researchers are saying but there's something about being embedded in religious communities that dissolves the sadness and so what I just want to talk about in our last few moments together is I want to show you biblically and then show you how we do it practically I want to talk to us about how to find one another again because we don't know how to do community and I don't have a star-eyed uh view of the past I'm not trying to get us all back to the 1940s I wasn't there and I don't think it was perfect by a long shot and it had tons of problems that I don't want but I'm trying to move us to what did God intend for Humanity and so I'm going to take us to his word and it's interesting uh Todd Hall is a uh professor of psychology he's in a affiliate with the Harvard human flourishing program and uh in his studies of that he has this wonderful sentence about how do we do it how how do we find each other again and um I I love what he said he said we are we are loved into loving one another and what's great about that is he says it's not ultimately a function of discipline there there's discipline involved but it's not like you need to get in community you need to get involved and you to serve people and look them in the face and compliment like he's not telling them like do a bunch of stuff and then maybe you'll be loved how do you enter into a fulfilling Dynamic wonderful loving Community he says you're you're loved in and what's great about that is he's quoting uh the Bible that John the Apostle says in first John we love because he first loved us how do we become a loving Community you can't give what you don't have and so how are we going to really love each other uh the only way we're going to really do it and not use each other uh the way only way we're going to really love each other is if we know what it is to be really loved well who's the source of that if none of us are the source who is well well he is and what's great is in first John 4 he's he's quoting Jesus's last sermon and Jesus last conversation with his disciples is so wild he talks about love so much and he's just talking about how excited he is about introducing them to the father I just can't wait for you to know him can't wait for you to be near him and he just says like the father loves me he's like he loves me and as the fathers loved me I love you now you abide in that love and then love one another and I'm going to send the spirit and he's going to be with you and you see Jesus talks about the father Son and Holy Spirit in Christian theology we call this the Trinity that that God is one there's one God but he's three distinct persons one what one essential set of attributes three who's father son and spirit it's the only way God can be love love requires another God didn't create us because he was needy God is love how because the father celebrates and enjoys the Son and the son celebrates and enjoys the spirit and the spirit celebrates and enjoys the three and God is in himself a party that's good our God's a party and he was good he was fine and then what's interesting is Jesus's last sermon to his disciples is what Paul unpacks to the Ephesians Paul as he's talking to the Ephesians about what God did for you he starts in Ephesians chapter 1 saying blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ why because he's blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the Heavenly places in Christ how just as he chose us before the foundation of the world that we would be holy and blameless before him in love he said the father God made a decision I'm going to take some people and choose them to be with me and be holy be pure I'm taking all their sin and shame away and they're going to be before me in love and then I set out their Destiny I predestined they'd be adopted as Sons through Jesus Christ to myself in whom we have the Redemption the Forgiveness of our sins through his blood so the father says I want to draw you up into my love how I'm going to send the son and he's going to die to remove sin so that in him you can be wrapped up in the Beloved and then he ends chapter one by saying and having believed in him you were marked with a seal the promised Holy Spirit guarantees what to come the spirit indwells you and you are safe you're safe because you've been loved and then in Genesis or excuse me Ephesians chapter 2 he kind of whs it back again says you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you formerly walked like you were a dead person you couldn't fix you but God because of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead made us alive together in Christ by Grace you've been saved he said when you were dead God loved you so much he he made you alive and then he he says not only you he ends Ephesians chapter 2 by saying and he took people that were formerly hostile and disperate parties and he knit you together by giving the Spirit to you both and building you to a temple of the Holy Spirit and then in Ephesians chapter 3 he just prays I pray that you would have the strength to comprehend the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge he said I'm just begging God to give you the strength to even begin to handle how loved you are if I can illustrate it this way I ask some people to jump up here with me this is your moment folks if you want to jump up here we'll do this quick yeah there you go that's appropriate yes to illustrate what I was talking about oh thank you yeah let's go ahead and head over there um without being theologically complex let's just call Tony God the father Yes uh and we'll call Matthew the son and Grace the holy spirit so in Time Eternity Father Son and Holy Spirit perfect love enjoying one another party already in progress eternally in progress they're fine right and yet what happens the father is worth praising he says in Ephesians chapter 1 why because he blessed us with every spiritual blessing right because God so loved the world what did he do he sent his son that you have the father extend out the son in love that he would take on humanity take on our sin bury it in the grave and then rise victoriously and then Jesus says it's good for you that I go away because if I go away I'm sending the Holy Spirit he says I this Trinity that's been curled up in enjoyment is now extending and here's why the spirit comes and he says he's going to convict you he's going to convict you because of sin you are not okay and then he's going to convert you how he's going to convert you by sewing you the Sun but a remedy has already been provided and as the spirit of God convicts and converts you he draws you to the Son and the son says I Delight to bring you to the father and you are wrapped up in a love already in progress and most of us end spirituality there aren't I so loved aren't I so good and so then you just have quiet times with your Bible uh or look for emotionally ecstatic experiences both of which are valid but not sufficient when Jesus was asked what is the greatest commandment he said love God and love each other and so this Triune God continues to extend out and continues to draw people in and what happens he says as I loved you love one another and then he says and I know that's problematic I know all used to call each other names I know there used to be some some some friction I know there was friction uh socioeconomically ethnically uh different tribal Warfare has been a common human experience and yet in the midst of all that the inexhaustible love of a Triune God has fundamentally shifted you for eternity so now get along and do it because you've been drawn near to the flame the light and heat of the Eternal Flame of the love of God given to you in Christ amen thank you guys by the way yeah [Applause] thank so in Ephesians chap 1 through3 which we did not read but I encourage you to do later there's only one command remember first three verses are all here's what God's done on your behalf you don't do anything he does and then in chapters 4 through six there's over 40 commands right because our work is always an effect not a cause he moves first we move in response you see it and so because he moved in US towards love that's why Paul begins in our text which I'll move through quickly he says I therefore a prisoner of the Lord urge you I exhort you I implore you what walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you've been called walk is parapo means walk around live your life your entire Human Experience is now meant to be dominated by this reality what reality of what just happened of the father sent the son who sent the spirit to draw you into communion with himself by his grace you've been saved and now I'm just praying you'd have strength to comprehend the height and depth and the love of God that surpasses knowledge because God has done that on your behalf I want you to walk around in that I want you to live in that I want that to permeate your thinking I want when you wake up when you walk and when you lay down to be permeated by the inexhaustible love of God given to you in Christ I want you to think about that and he says now I want you to walk in a way that's worthy of that it's literally the word for balancing of the scales I want your activity to match that theological reality we just looked at I want it to be in such a way that when someone observes your life and how you treat people and then here's the theology That's the basis of your life they go oh that makes sense if you believed that you would act that way I get it you don't want them to hear you're a Christian and go H really you want those things to fit which is a big call what does it look like to live in a manner worthy of the Gospel of Jes Jesus Christ with all humility and gentleness and patience bearing with one another in love that word bearing with one another in Greek means tolerate each other the try you in God completely extended to rescue humanity and draw you together eternally secured in his love now what do I want you to do I just want you to put up with each other which doesn't sound that dramatic till you read a history book and you realize we have a real hard time doing that we just tend to want to destroy each other uh and whether we do it with weapons that you grip with a hand or tap on on a screen we love to destroy so much easier to tear down in the build and yet he says God built it that's what's great we're we're not building this community in the next verse he says be eager to maintain the unity of the spirit and the bond of Peace who built this Temple the spirit of God did he built this community that formerly desperate parties are now fused together in family locked together by the inexhaustible love of God he built this I just want you to maintain it I I just want you to join God in his work God is the one loving people and drawing him to himself you participate in a love previously in progress and as you do that be eager to do it don't acquest to it I guess I should be in a small group or whatever no that's not eager that looks nothing like eager eager is thinking about it I'm planning on I'm working on it I'm improving it I'm getting efficient at it I want to be great at prioritizing what God prioritized and what did God do he moved all the time and history to knit together a family in love and he says so fight for that family fight for it fight for it against the drift of isolation that is tearing you apart because you weren't made to be alone it's not good for a man to be alone but what's it going to take humility self-seeking and boasting Pride destroys Unity gentleness that means the conscious exercise of self-control it's when you're impatient that you're not gentle right gentleness is the conscience exercise of son you remember when I told you to do that 14 times I meant it each time do you understand that like meaning is you know like that that takes the power of the Holy Spirit to be gentle right with all patience that means to delay the outbreak of Wrath pray pray on that a bit right bearing with one another means endure each other it it will not be easy but bear with one another in love I love that he adds that not bear with one another like whatever with stewing resentment no really care about the benefit of the other care about what would help the other person and be eager to maintain the unity and the bond of peace PE and then seven times he repeats the word one which seven is is a complete perfect number and that's not an accident we're one body and The Trinity shows up again one Spirit just as you were called with one hope that belongs to your call one Lord that's Jesus Christ One Faith one Baptist one God and Father who's overall in all and through all I want you to be one one one one one one one that's what he's fighting for so you do it and here's what's interesting you go well okay Ben you're trying to get us back to collectivistic ideas but will this be the disillusion of self I don't want to lose me but what's interesting is in the gospel you're a part of a community but but you still maintain your individual personality so do you see in the verse next verse verse 7 but Grace was given to each one of us he goes back to individual each one of us has been given Grace according to the measure of Christ's gift that he's he separated us and distributed his gifts Among Us and and then he goes into this kind of theological aside what does it mean that he ascended but that he also descended he's talking about Jesus Christ Jesus Christ was was in heaven Forever Came Down lived a human life perfect life we could not died the death we deserve and then when he rose Victorious over the grave he led captives free that's us rescued from the Dominion of sin and darkness and then he gave gifts to us he's like I set you free and here you get this you get this and you get this he he's empowered us with different gifts meant to serve the body and in First Corinthians he goes into great detail about each spiritual gift that's been given to different people that that are supposed to help us in Ephesians doesn't he kind of moves and goes another way and the gift he talks about here is people he gave the apostles and Prophets The the official amiss series who laid the foundation of the gospel and he gave the evangelists we're all supposed to do the work of evangelism telling people about Jesus but he gave us people who who could proclaim the gospel in a way we understood it and draw drew us to oursel we're all meant to do the work but many of you know evangelists that are just good at it remember the first time I ever heard Billy Graham just watching him in a crowd he went don't run but if you want to receive Christ come down front and about 10,000 people went sprinting down front I was like what H it's crazy but some people are good at it Shepherds those who exercise nurture and care of a congregation get you where you need to go teachers closely link to Shepherds those who explain the word of God and teachers oh excuse me I did that one to equip the Saints for the work of ministry isn't that great what he does is he points to church structure he says God's appointed a leadership structure shepherding coring gift you get over here you get over here teachers let me explain to you what this means right and and they give you these people to equip you so that you'll do the work so if if you're showing up here and being like man this staff needs to get on it how come they haven't started volleyball team you're like hey that's not the staff is meant to equip you to do the works of service to the building up the body of Christ Jesus is saying we are all meant to be a part of helping each other grow we're meant to participate in that together to help one another that's how he rigged it to work so is Staff more important than non-staff is the equipment manager the most important person on the field today at the Super Bowl are you are you trading cards with equipment managers oh look at Ronnie who cleans the helmets like are you no like their whole job is just to make sure you're equipped so you play the game go get them you need some more water that's me right and and and get you some water and you get out there and play that's the idea uh is that we're coaches and we're equipment managers trying to equip you not to just live your single solitary life but to use a deeply embedded communal life where we all use our gifts to help each other does that make sense until we all attain the unity of faith that success that we grow together like a football team you win or lose together and you attain the knowledge of the Son of God we get to know him better together to the mature manhood that doesn't mean individual manhood he's talking about the new Humanity God has built a new humanity and and we all mature together to the measure the stature of the fullness of Christ we look more and more like him one of the greatest needs on the planet today is for the people of Jesus to look like Jesus and look at the result in verse 14 so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves carried about by every wind of Doctrine by human cunning and the craftiness and deceitful schemes he says There Will constantly be cultural shifts and bad ideas and cultural shifts and bad ideas will toss us around like toddlers running a sailboat but if we're together we're stable in the storm and so my kids are able to be overpowered my kids kids are able to be tricked uh my kids are young they're susceptible because they lack strength but Donna and I are working on them and loving members of this community are working on them and it's in community they're safe and they're becoming strong do you see it and it's the same with us he says for many of us we we've been set a drift in society and and again not all technology is bad not all individualism is bad but for many of us as we've been set a drift in the modern societ today and live an isolated disconnected life we are subject to every wind and every wave and every storm and he's saying it's when you prioritize this when you fight the drift and move towards community that you will be safe and you will be strong uh it's interesting um well let me say this and then I'll wrap up verse 15 he says rather speaking the truth in love we to grow up in every way into the head into Christ it's when we speak the truth of God's word to one another in love that we grow and so some of you are like well I got friends so I don't need church are they speaking the truth of God to you speaking the truth in love we grow some you go well I got the truth I got great podcasts I listen to better speakers online you that's awesome thank God for technology that we can do that but is there any one another because you can gain a lot of knowledge and be a be a person completely held captive by your addictions it's only and accountability that you'll find Freedom So speaking the truth and love we and all things grow how are we doing that right now as a church we launched a few years ago with a staff of five and when we launched with a staff of five we grew very quickly to almost 2,000 people coming that ratio is is wonky if you're talking Church Life Five staff to 2,000 people hard to meet the needs of all the Sheep right uh and then Co hit and you know it just everything the wheels on the bus came flying off like we're all trying to figure out like what we're doing and uh but in the midst of that our our costs went way down uh in terms of venue rental and we expanded the staff now we have uh tripled the number of staff and as we've come back online and and many of you have come back and many of you have come for the first time we we've got a better Staffing structure uh I think to to shepher well and in that structure we've encouraged you and some of you know this but some of you we've had hundreds of you come since we made this move here you you don't know how we're structured like like our desire to help you do this the way we've done it no model's perfect but many of you you come on Sunday and you come for the first time and experience worship with us and but it's it's very easy to walk in here meet no one and walk out maybe have a brief eye contact and head nod and then go and that's totally fine we want this to be a safe place for you to bring anybody and then not feel the pressure of any obligation to connect with someone but we want everyone to feel the invitation to take the next step and then next step for us is what happens next week we do it once a month called Welcome to church where you just come into a smaller Gathering we eat lunch together you get to meet a handful of people that are sort of where you are feeling this out and then in the midst of Welcome to church you hear a little bit more about how our community is oriented and you go do I want to be a part of this or not and then from there it kind of branches into two parts we encourage people to be door holders which is what we call volunteers but the word door holder comes from the Psalms of i' I'd rather be a door holder in the house of God than than dwell in the tents of the wicked I I to be someone that is in the house of God and helping others get in the house of God and and so we want you to be on a team and we have multiple teams you can join that have different varying levels of commitment how early you have to wake up how many days you serve like like we vary it to fit human life but you get into a team and now when you show up on a Sunday you're in a team of maybe on that day 10 people and so a room of a thousand becomes 10 and some of them you're just going to have to bear with one another in love right uh and uh but as you do that we'll sharpen each other and we'll grow and and I've seen this happen countless times here when people get in door holder teams that's where their best friends are because you're dwelling together you're shoulder-to-shoulder building together you're you're pulling off church together and you forge friendships that way and in those communities people have found their roommates found their friends they found community and assuaged loneliness and in the same way we have Community groups and and this is interesting for me because people are now beginning to say to me man this church is so big man this church is so huge and I'm from Texas this in Texas this church would be adorable they'd be like oh look at you guys just keep going you know and I'm like is it huge I'm like okay by that you mean it's harder for you to find people that's a modern experience of difficulty and so what we did in community groups is we said our attempt and we're still doing it is to get into every neighborhood so come in here with hundreds of people and then twice a month show up in your neighborhood with 80 people 100 people so now you got that small Church experience in your neighborhood you can meet the Christians in your area and I know we're not in every neighborhood yet so you're like you're not in sha yet we were and the facilities got complicated we're coming back and uh and you you get further out in Virginia like give it a second so we're working on growing more community group options but that's where you show up and and now you get a chance to meet the the Christians in your neighborhood and kind of meet each other and and I want to encourage you prioritize that amen meet the Christians in your neighborhood so that when you go to the coffee shop when you when when you go to your mailbox you you you know people that are a part of your church and and then from there we develop family groups and those are the people that that smallest community of people that you share everything with that there are no dark Corners in your soul and they they speak the truth to you and love and you grow and they pray for you and are accountable to you and and you're accountable to them and and if you look at at life change what what really causes spiritual life change it's interesting modern surveys are bearing this out deep communion and prayer which was our last series call in heaven and deep Community is what really changes people's lives and so this is what we're trying to call you to and let me end here um Jonathan height is a socio uh social psychologist professor at New York University dwells somewhere between atheist an agnostic I'm not sure where but I watched him in an interview recently and he was asking about the ideal childhood what what do kids need today to grow up in a healthy environment and you know what he said we need to raise our kids deeply embedded in loving religious communities that seems to be the ideal childhood and I just love this he's still standing outside but he's going look at how they love one another my K should grow up there and I think he's right and I think the Trinity is extending out to that brother so pray for him but I think God built us to be in us it's not easy but it's good we will not do it perfect here but we're going to try and God has been good to us and by his Mercy there's Beauty in belonging

Channel: Passion City Church DC

Views: 6,736

Keywords: Passion, Passion City Church, Passion Sermons, Washington D.C., Passion D.C., christian, sixsteps, passion conference, passion, passion city church worship, passion church, passion music, worship, jesus, ben stuart, Bible Teaching, 2023 Sermon, Online Church, Faith

Id: 4fFAiBWiVH0

Length: 40min 24sec (2424 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 13 2024