“And you are living stones that God is building into his spiritual temple…” (1 Peter 2:5, NLT). For the last two weeks, we’ve been discussing the church. I’ve locked onto Peter’s description of the church: God is in the process of building this spiritual temple, and we are the building blocks. The church isn’t just a people; it’s a people assembled, meeting together for the purpose of worship.
We’ve realized that our relational God created us in His relational image. We’ve seen that these past two years and the national response to the pandemic have been very hard on our relationships. God is calling us to re-order our lives and re-prioritize relationships.
So, if our plan is to rebuild our community, what is it are we looking for in these relationships? Miguel de Cervantes said, “Tell me what company you keep, and I’ll tell you what you are.”
Fortunately, the Bible, being the practical book it is, gives us some great examples of friendship. We’ll look at three this Sunday.
The bottom line is we need each other. God put us together. He created each one of us that we might become a true friend like Abraham. Like Moses, that we might be real and authentic with each other. Like Elijah and Elisha that we might grow from each other.
This won’t happen only speaking with and seeing each other on Sundays. It just can’t. Relationships with others can certainly start in our Sunday assembly, but growing in relationships with each other happens mostly outside of our meetings. These relationships grow as we gather in homes, over food, in small groups, and in one-on-one encounters.
And relationships don’t grow by accident. They only happen intentionally.
Join us Sunday for, “The Company We Keep,” and we’ll discuss it together.
