Community: The Value of Community

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For more information about Grant Parkway, visit GrantParquay.org.

God, as we gather, we gather for the purpose of your name.

And as we do so, Lord Jesus.

Some of us in this room are full of faith.

Others in this room are full of doubt.

Most of us are probably somewhere in between.

And so I pray, God, that uh not just the songs that we sing and not just the people that we gather with, but also, God, more importantly than any of those things, is your word, God.

Hold us steady and true by your word.

And would you minister to us and allow us, God, to believe these words, just like we just sang.

That we would believe these words by the power of your Spirit, God, for the glory of your Son, because we've been accepted by the Father.

Let us be a people, God, that not just believes things, but lives things, lives differently because we believe differently.

And would that begin now, and that would continue on throughout the week, God, we trust you.

We are thankful for you.

And we love you.

And so I just want to make some space, God, as we uh turn open the pages of your word, just to make space for your spirit to move in us.

And so right now, we all just ask God to just make space in our hearts, God, for whatever it is that you want to put in us and implant in us.

And God, would you let that cultivate and grow?

And when it comes mature, God, would it then sprout seeds and bear fruit?

But all that, God, first happens when we receive the word.

And so we want to do that today.

We love you, Lord, in Jesus' name.

Amen.

You can be seated.

My name is Lance Williams.

I'm the spiritual formation pastor here at Grand Parkway Baptist Church.

Um, and we have uh an unbelievable opportunity over the next month to really dig in uh to what the Bible has to say about our second core value, which is the which is community.

Um, if you are our guests, we've um again last month in June we talked about the gospel and several different topics that would that would kind of be uh affected by the gospel.

And this month we're gonna be talking about the community, and we're gonna start it with the value of community, kind of a play on words because we value it, but do we really value it for what it really is?

Um so we'll we'll talk about that today.

Next week we'll talk about discipleship and uh and the value of that.

We'll talk about then on uh on July the 20th, we'll talk about friendship.

Uh relationships we don't really talk about a whole lot in the church.

We talk about parenting, we talk about husband and wife, um, but little do we really discover the depths uh and the purposes of friendships, uh especially amongst believers.

And then finally, we'll end with your favorite topic.

We'll talk about service.

Um, we'll talk about community and and how the community serves together.

And so that's kind of what we're what we're looking at for the month of July.

But today, we are talking about the value of community.

And we are going to basically just jump off of one verse and one verse only, and then we'll kind of go back and forth between that one verse in Matthew 18, and then we'll kind of camp out a little bit in Genesis 1, 2, and 3 to kind of get our mind around what God really has done in creating uh people.

But again, Matthew 18, and we'll read verse 20.

We'll unpack that context a little bit as we go.

And if you don't have your Bible with you, we are on page 823 of the Bible at the end of your row.

So if you can, open up there and we will get started here.

Matthew 18, verse 20.

Matthew 18:20

Um, and actually, before I get to that, um again, it's it's the value of community and really what what is community?

That's really what we're gonna get down to today.

We're gonna define that today.

Um, Neil talked about earlier in the service that our friend Chase Pogue was baptized in the first service, and Neil asked him what community was all about, and he just said, not going at it solo.

Um, and literally, we could be dismissed after that.

Uh, but there's a rich texture that comes with opening up the word and getting an understanding of what that looks like.

Um, the reality is we were created for community, for deep connections with other people.

Okay, and we'll we'll see that in Matthew 18, and we'll see that certainly fleshed out in Genesis 1 to 3.

But there's also another reality.

We don't prioritize community like we should.

We don't really value it as something that is core to how we live.

And the question is that I came up with a brilliant question, why not?

Why don't I value it maybe like I should?

What are some things that I gotta wrestle through in order to get to valuing that community?

There's four things that just by way of introduction, I want to put up on the screen so we can kind of just go, okay, these are the things that I gotta battle through in order to get to what God has designed me to do, and that is live inside of community, not just with God, but with other people.

The first thing is this our preferences get in the way.

Okay?

Our priorities get in the way.

If there's one thing that I hear more whenever I ask people and invite people into community groups, into Bible communities, into growth groups, and these are kind of the different environments where we kind of gather together in small groups and pursue our mutual spiritual formation in Christ.

These are the areas we do that.

When I invite people into those areas, I usually ask them to come and do that.

And usually the number one excuse is I don't have time.

I don't have time on Sunday night, I got to get ready for the week ahead.

I don't have time on Wednesday night, I got, you know, a bunch of things going on, my kids are little, this, that, and the other.

But let me just say this: we only have time for what we prioritize.

Period.

I can guarantee you, you made time for work this week.

Can guarantee it.

For anybody that wants a paycheck, anyways, I g I yes, I prioritize.

Yep, absolutely.

I'm all for that.

But there's there's a priority, there's preference.

We we we we prefer a lot of different things, whether it be TV, we definitely have room and time for that.

We got time for golf, which is at least four, maybe five, maybe six hours.

We got family time, we got gardening.

These things are not bad, but they're not what God has intended us for.

The second thing that we do, and maybe some some barriers to that community, is people.

Um, you may not want to admit this, but there are people that are inside of this community in this room right now that you probably may have sat on the opposite side of the sanctuary so that you don't have to be in community with those people.

Uh, people sometimes keep us from actually wanting to do community with others.

Um, some of you are smiling about that, and some of you are going, never, I would never.

Yes, you do, and so do I.

But Henry Nowen said this, who lived inside of a community, um, he said this about uh about people.

He said, Community is the place where the person you least want to live with always lives.

Okay?

Put that right around in here.

Community is the place, okay, where the person you least want to live with always lives.

Everybody's got a friend that usually the first name is crazy and their second name is something.

Everybody's got no, you don't have that friend?

Okay, I'm apparently if that's your okay, I'm your friend.

I'm Crazy Lance, apparently.

Everybody's got that friend that you're like, I don't know what's going on over there.

I like to be around that person, but every time I'm around that person, I go a little bit crazy, but that's okay.

People, preference, the third thing, phones.

Phones, how about this?

Your busyness.

We are way, way too busy these days.

Our phones are a huge distraction to actual meaningful connection.

When's the last time you sat down at lunch, coffee, dinner, whatever with someone else where they didn't have their phone up on the table?

Or they were reaching in their pocket and doing this, that, and the other.

I'm a victim to my own excuse.

I went to dinner with some people last night, and in between dinner and dessert, I found myself reach for my phone, knowing that I got an email, and thought, hey, I'll read this email.

And then I thought, what am I doing?

I'm gonna use this tomorrow.

Dang it.

Your phones, did you know that recent research says that multitasking, doing two things at once or multiple things at once, reduces your productivity by 40%?

That's a huge reduction.

And the reason why is because you're never really anywhere.

When I went in to uh have dinner with a couple last night, the last thing I said to my wife, and really it was a short prayer, was Lord, let me be all here.

Let me not think about anything else besides just being all here.

I just want to enjoy these people, I want to enjoy my wife, I want to enjoy the good food, and it was delicious.

Let me be all here.

The last thing is fear.

Uh that may not be how you spell fear, but when you're trying to make it all, you know, alliteration, you gotta go, you gotta go with what you got.

Okay?

Fear.

Um, and so what is this thing called fear?

It's it's it's something that we'll fear that we'll be found out for who we truly are.

That's why we don't connect with people.

Fear that maybe we'll be hurt, fear that maybe we'll hurt someone else, fear that maybe we'll say something dumb, and so we just kind of avoid and put up walls and barriers that really are imaginary, really, only to ourselves are they real, and everybody else are going, dude, just come hang out.

And we've got some friends that live inside the loop, and every time we would come, uh, ask them to come hang out, somebody would be sick, they'd be on vacation or out of town.

We're like, all right, we're apparently we're just not friends.

I don't know what the deal is.

But there's a fear there for them, they just didn't want to talk about what was going on in their lives.

And so they avoided, they isolated, and we'll get into that here in a little bit.

But as we talked about, Jesus placed a huge, an immense value on community that he did not place on our individual walks with Christ.

Sure, yes, he wants us to be in solitude with him, absolutely, but he also wants us to be amongst others.

And that's why we read in Matthew 18, 20 what we read.

And so let's read that now.

It says this very short verse, very easy understanding.

We're gonna get our baseline definition of community for the rest of the month out of this verse.

It says this for where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.

Wow, what a simple statement about community and the purpose of gathering together for Jesus' name.

And so if we just, in its most simple form, Jesus defined community, when we talk about this value in inside the context of being reconciled with one another, when he said those words, for where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.

And when he said this, Jesus promised a different understanding of his presence when we are only amongst that community.

And so if we just a basic, simple definition where two or more are gathered together for the purpose of Jesus' name, for the purpose of his reputation, for the purpose of his glory.

So congratulations, you value community today.

You're inside a community that is gathering for the purpose of making Jesus' name great.

You've made it.

Or at least you've made some of it.

Because it's not just this type of an arena and this type of an area that we were created for community.

See, there's only so much intimacy, there's only so much relationship, there's only so much connection that can happen when we're sitting shoulder to shoulder.

And that's why we gather in small groups, that's why we gather over lunch, that's why we, man, when we're having a bad day, we just want to call our best friend and talk to them on FaceTime if they live across the world or just have lunch or coffee or something, because you gotta connect face to face, much less shoulder to shoulder.

So as I was reading and studying for today and for this whole month, really, uh, there's a guy by the name of uh Joseph Myers, and he wrote a book called The Search to Belong.

And he said there's four relational environments that we were all created for.

And it's basically like a funnel.

So you just kind of think about the wide end of the funnel, and it just kind of goes down to the narrow end, okay, and everything's kind of gonna go down into that narrow end.

And so one of my jobs is to push everybody in this church, or as many as that will allow me, and to pull them basically from the wide end of the funnel into the narrow end of the funnel.

So let me just describe what that looks like.

Um, he says this there's four areas of relational uh communion uh community where we just kind of uh we kind of go in and out.

We need all of them, and yet some of them are more important than others.

The first one is this that this there's this public space, there's this public environment, and that's kind of the wide area of the funnel, and that should be the safe place.

It's kind of the shopping mall, that's kind of the sporting event.

Um, like for me and my family, it might be Home Depot, um, like about three weeks ago.

If you don't know, my wife is pregnant, and um she's due, yes, she's due in August and um August 17th, and so she's got maybe, I think I got on my phone today that I was distracted by apparently.

Uh it was like 34 weeks or something like that now, okay?

And so she's got another six week.

This is maybe three weeks ago, four weeks ago.

So this is about a month now, or excuse me, ten weeks, about two and a half months before she's actually about to deliver.

And we're in Home Depot, and I got my wife, and then I got my two girls, and we're kind of walking through Home Depot, and I've been told I embellish stories by some of you, and so I'm gonna try not to do that.

Uh, but but but uh one of the things that this this guy just came running down the aisle, and I'm gonna try not to embellish his accent, but uh, it's gonna be hard for me not to do, and he said, Hey, you about to go to the hospital, she's about ready to pop.

And there was an anger in me that I hadn't um felt in a while, and I just was so shocked, and my two kids were watching, I was like, I cannot say anything right now, but my wife, because she doesn't have a filter because she's pregnant, she looks at the guy and she goes, Hey, thanks, man.

I appreciate that.

Like, oh, you like a pregnant woman needs to be told that she's pregnant for some reason.

Uh I've never met a pregnant woman that needs to be told she's pregnant, ever.

I've never still have yet to meet that person.

Uh but nonetheless, and so we walk a little bit further and around the aisle, there's a guy standing there just doing this.

Oh, man, on behalf of all men, I apologize.

Just that was, I mean, he's just shaking his head and just, oh my gosh.

That should be a safe place for us, Home Depot.

But apparently, in this public sphere of community, it's not, it wasn't safe.

There was there was somebody that didn't know what to do, and so he just decided to break all social norms, walk up to a pregnant woman he didn't know, and basically chastise her for her size.

Yay, Home Depot.

Uh, but it is one of my favorite places, if nothing else, for me and my youngest daughter to enjoy some uh paint cards.

Uh but that's the public sphere, right?

Uh not like paint chips, okay, people?

And we're not sniffing anything, we're just picking up, we're picking up some free cards.

She loves them.

Uh so that's the public, right?

And then there's the social.

There's the second one of the social area.

That's that's your company party, that's your country club.

If we bring it down to the church, if the public area is this room where we sit shoulder to shoulder, then the social area would be like a Bible community, okay?

Maybe it's the nursery where you're serving, you're kind of accomplishing something with other people.

The third one is your personal space.

This is your backyard barbecue, your small group, what we would call our community groups here at Grand Parkway.

This is where you're gonna gather with small, a smaller group of people, maybe the people that you prefer, or maybe not.

That's never guaranteed.

But hopefully, this is something that we all experienced over the weekend.

In our backyards, we were watching fireworks, we were grilling over the weekend, or whatever it was.

And then the final one, and this is this is where most of the men are just gonna turn me off, but your wife is absolutely begging you not to turn me off at this point.

There's public, there's social, there's personal, and then there's intimate.

There's that intimate sphere of community that God's created us for that we've got to have a little bit of all of them.

We can't stay in the deep end for too long, we gotta come up for air, and yet we can't really live appropriately in the shallow end for too long.

We've got to just kind of venture in and experience what that looks like relationally with other people.

And so, why is it that we kind of try and get people from the from the wide end of the funnel all the way down to the narrow end?

Why is it that we we we we value that so much?

Because in the least celebrated environment of community, that is where you are going to be transformed the most.

Let me say that again because it's clearly not sinking in.

Uh, in the least celebrated environment of community, those smaller groups, those one-on-one, one-on-few, not a lot of those things are celebrated.

I mean, Neil even said in the in the uh in the uh in the announcement about the ladies.

I don't want to go if it's just me and a couple other ladies.

Why?

Why not?

Because there's there's danger there.

You actually might have to talk to some people that you don't know.

But instead, we we celebrate the 70 plus people that are coming, the 80 plus people that are coming, and when we do events like that, that's great.

There's nothing wrong with that.

But there's a time and a place for them, and there's also a time and a place for maybe the more intimate setting, one-on-few, one-on-one, just a small group of people where you can share your heart with them.

They're gonna share their heart with yours, and your life will change as a result.

Let me show you what I mean and tell you what I mean.

Um we led a uh or I led a uh a Bible community not too long ago for new believers.

And uh as we went through the weeks, it was a great week.

Uh it was actually started off really small, and some of y'all go, Oh, well, what happened?

And I would go, nothing.

It was fantastic.

We talked about divorces in there, we talked about custody, we talked about all kinds of stuff in there.

And at the end of it, no one showed up except me and one other guy.

And I think he expected me to cancel.

But instead, I just put my notes away, put my Bible up, and just sat over there at his table.

And we talked for about an hour, hour and 15 minutes.

And this is a guy that's been coming to church his whole life.

This is a guy that's been going to a Bible community because he thought that if he did, then God would still like him.

And he's been doing that for a couple years.

And he never would have known that if we just didn't talk about it.

And I just started to talk to him about Matthew 7, when Jesus just says, Hey, if if I don't know you, you're out.

Away from me, you breakers of the law.

To which he just said, What law?

Not just the Old Testament law, but the law of the heart.

When Jesus says, hey, don't, yeah, you've heard it said, don't commit adultery, but I'm gonna tell you right now, if you lust after somebody in your own heart, then you've already committed adultery.

Or I'm also gonna tell you, don't be uh that you've also heard it said, uh, do not commit murder, but I'm gonna tell you right now, if you've if you've been angry with a brother in your heart, then you've already committed murder in your heart.

All of a sudden, Jesus puts us in this debt that we can't get out of.

And this guy looks at me and he goes, if that's true, then everybody's out.

You can't get in.

And I said, I think you are starting to get the gospel.

And that happened one-on-one.

He'd been in this room, sitting in your seat for two years.

He'd been in up in my room in somebody else's room sitting in your seat for about a year and a half, two years, and yet it wasn't until that kind of intimate conversation where we could talk about what you really believe, and I could invite him into something a little bit different, is his life beginning to change and process and start to understand something different about God and his gospel.

It's no wonder that we value the gospel and that we want to gather inside of community because our lives will change as a result of it.

The least celebrated environment, the smaller one, that's the most transformative and meaningful to your life.

And so this baseline definition that we gotta kind of be reminded of is this again, two or more gathered together for the purposes of Jesus' name, his reputation, and his glory.

And so we get that, and we go, okay, that's a good understanding of what community really is, but why is it that we should value it?

Why is it that it should be a core value, not something that we do just in our free time, but we carve other things away from our schedule and pursue this community.

Why is that?

Why do we value community?

It's right there in the beginning of this verse, verse 20.

It says, for where two or three are gathered, two or more, there's a reason for it, and this is why, is because this there is a different presentation, a representation of Jesus' presence that is displayed when two or more are present.

And here's what I mean by that.

For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.

See, when there's two or more gathered, there's a different understanding of Jesus' presence that he promises, that he doesn't promise when we're alone.

That's reason in of itself to value that.

And conversely, if we are doing it alone, then we're missing a facet of God.

If we're just doing it by ourselves and running solo the race, and we only come into this room and we never really connect meaningfully with other people, we are missing a facet of God that he only promises when we gather together with others.

That's powerful.

And so it kind of gets fleshed out and worked out when we read the Bible, when we read verse after verse after verse, especially in the New Testament, that basically says this you cannot live out the Bible on your own.

If you think you're a believer in Christ Jesus, and yet you have never connected meaningfully with other people on a pretty regular basis, where there's that funnel, where there's kind of wide, big public spheres down to the social and into the intimate, if you're not doing that, then we're not living what the Bible says to do.

There are far too many commands to love one another, bear one another's burdens, forgive one another, pray for one another, be reconciled to one another.

There are far too many of those commands for us to be able to live the Christian life solo.

And instead, to avoid those situations where these things are necessary to love one another, forgive one another, is to avoid opportunities to be obedient to God.

If we avoid community, we are avoiding obedience.

And that's what it comes down to.

God designed us to connect with one another, and so you can see that, and then all of a sudden we read the context of Matthew 18, 15 to 20, and it says this if you want to know why Jesus values this community so greatly, is because he knew our relationships were going to go sideways in a hurry.

He knew it.

He knew exactly what was going to happen.

And so if we read 15 to 20, it says, If your brother sins against you, go tell him his fault between you and him alone.

And if he listens to you, you've gained your brother.

But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two.

Or three witnesses.

And if he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church.

And if he refuses to listen, even to the church, let him be as to you a Gentile and a tax collector.

Now this is where the promise comes in of community and the power of his presence, verse 18.

And truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father up in heaven.

For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.

See this great understanding and definition of community comes within the context of reconciling and making sure that we value one another the way God intended us to value one another, to love one another, to forgive one another.

It is very rare in the Bible that you get specific instructions on how to live.

You get a lot of love one another's, and you kind of go, okay, what does that mean?

There are very few times in the Bible where you get specific step-by-step instructions where you can be reconciled with your brother and live the way God wants you to live.

When Jesus does that, there's something special going on, and I try to pay attention.

That's exactly what he just did right here.

And if you don't believe that relationships will get off the rails and go sideways in a hurry, get married.

Matter of fact, I'm going to sit down with two new couples this week for premarital counseling.

One of them, I think they're getting married in December, and the other one is in October.

And so I'll sit down with them this Wednesday for both of them.

And it'll be the first meeting, and the first meeting is usually a sudden and abrupt stop for them.

They just kind of go, okay, is this the guy we want to continue to do this with or not?

Because he is really bleak in life.

No, I'm not really bleak in life.

Instead, what I want engaged couples to realize is all the bright and shiny hope in your eyes will eventually start to dim.

It just happens.

Excuse me, it just happens in marriage.

Okay, the emotions begin to just fall away, and all of a sudden you're gonna have to make a decision now on how to deal with the stranger you just woke up next to 10 years into marriage, and you're kind of gonna have to go, okay, I don't know that person anymore.

I don't, they don't know me anymore.

What do I have to do?

Prepare now for that day, because that day's coming.

All the emotions will go away, and you will have to relate in such a way that God is being pursued, that his name is being pursued and not our own.

That's what Jesus knew, and that's why he valued it so much.

Why did he value it so much?

Because he knew that he wanted to use God's people to change God's people by God's word.

And not only that, but he was part of this thing that we probably try and we don't talk about enough in the church.

It's called the Trinity.

And it's Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

And they all created us in Genesis 1.

It says in Genesis 1, 26, uh, you don't have to turn there, I'm just gonna read it.

It says, Then God said, Let us make man in our image after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over the livestock, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

And so God created man in his own image.

In the image of God, he created him, male and female, he created them.

We back up just one verse and it says, Let us make man in our image.

Who is the us and the hour?

It's just God talking.

Father, Son, and Spirit.

Our God is a community in and of itself.

And he creates humans in the image of that community.

This is how we were made.

It's not just something that we do, it's who we are.

Community.

We are made in the image of a God who is by nature community, Father, Son, and Spirit.

And so it's no wonder that we were created by community for community.

And so we could keep going in the Bible.

And I told you we'd be kind of going back and forth between Matthew 18 and Genesis 1.

After we read that beautiful promise and that beautiful understanding of being made in the image of God, our image, let us make man.

We all of a sudden see this progression that goes on in Genesis 1 that yes, God created all things, and at the end of Genesis 1 in verse 31, it says, And God saw everything that he made, and behold, it was very good.

He named everything, each according to its kind, and he said, It is all very good.

And then we get to Genesis 2, a little recap of the creation story from a different perspective, and we get to when God looks down on Adam, and it's just Adam and God in the garden, and you would think that's the most perfect representation of humanity some days, on my bad days.

I think, man, all I want to do is just me and God.

Let's just hang out with me and you, and that'll be enough for me.

And some days are like that, and that's okay.

But we were never meant to sustain that over a lifetime.

And the reason why is because in verse 18, God looks down on a perfect relationship that he has with man, and he said, This is not good.

That's profound.

When we think about the ideas of especially American Christianity, when we're just called to be about our own business, and let's just not judge one another, let's just mind our own business, and let's just kind of have this relationship with me and Jesus, and that's all we really need.

And God says in Genesis 2.18, then the Lord God said, It is not good that man should be alone.

See what God defined as a man and God alone, you would think that that's that community would be enough.

But instead, God says, that's solitude.

That's good, but it's not the ex not the fullest representation of what I've created you for.

It is not good for man to be alone.

And so what happened?

If we keep reading in Genesis 2, we see that God put Adam to sleep, put him into a deep sleep, took a rib out, and then created a woman, and the man wakes up and starts to sing and scream.

And I had a seminary professor that said he was just panting.

Oh, oh man, oh this is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh, and just going all over this woman.

I'm like, whoa, man, easy killer.

But I can imagine what that was like.

Because it says in verse 25, and the man and his wife were both naked, and they were not ashamed.

See, if you think community is inconvenient, I would dare say that you have nothing to complain about because it didn't cost you a rib.

Like it did with Adam.

His community cost him something.

And if we are going to pursue the kind of community that God wants us to pursue, it's going to cost us something along the way so that we can become the people that God wants us to become.

And so we would continue to read that he made Adam and Eve, and when he did so, that man should not be alone, and that hopefully one day they got there, and all of a sudden man and his wife were both naked and they were not ashamed.

What was God doing?

What was he all about?

Henry Cloud says this and changes that heel.

He says that God created us with a hunger for relationship with God, with him, and with our fellow people.

At our very core, we are relational beings.

It's who we are.

It's not just what we do.

At our very core, we are relational beings.

And so we got to the point in the story where Adam and Eve were naked and not ashamed.

But before all that, we get to this point where we understand we are created for relationships.

And so let me just kind of throw this out there for all of us in this room.

If week after week you and I come into this room and we sit shoulder to shoulder and we never make meaningful connections, then you're going to leave here and you're going to wonder what is missing.

You're going to wonder, why didn't I over time, not just today, but over time, you're going to realize something is missing.

There's no meaningful connection.

I mean, I go, I hear a good sermon, but I just want more.

There's something else that I need.

If there was just maybe, okay, I know what it is.

I just need different music.

I know what it is.

I'll go find a church that just has different music.

And all of a sudden you go to that church, and all of a sudden you find out that that music wasn't good enough.

And so you go to a different church that has the right youth group.

And you go to that church and you find out that youth group wasn't good enough, and you go over to that church that has this little thing that I was looking for.

My wife and I bought a pool for my kids that I took down over the weekend because it was a hassle.

And I don't mean like a little kitty pool.

I mean like, I mean it was a kitty pool, but it was like, you know, 10 feet in diameter, one of those, like$60 from Academy.

Great little thing, fit on my deck, it was beautiful.

Here's what I realized.

This is kind of how we treat community in the Christian circles.

Um, every day I was supposed to go out there and put my little test strip in the water.

Does anybody have a pool?

Or am I just thinking like I'm crazy?

You put this little test strip in the water and I would pull it up every day and I'd go, there's no way I can make all that match up.

I there's nothing in me that can create uh a sterile environment.

This is all off.

So I just pour chlorine in there.

It's like, well, if there's anything that's good, it's got to be chlorine.

Let's just do that.

So we just I just put all kinds of chlorine in there.

I'd pull it back up, still not enough chlorine.

You've got to be kidding me.

I called the pool guy and he goes, just pour a bunch of bleach in there, man.

You'll be fine.

Bleach?

And then I'm gonna put my kids in there?

Are you kidding me right now?

But apparently that's the answer.

But here's what I figured out is that I just kept pulling up a just a messed up strip of chemicals.

And if I had a different pool, I'd go and put my messed up strip of chemicals in that pool and it'd still come up all crazy.

And we just trying to try and keep testing and keep testing and keep testing until we try and get the chemicals all right and certainly all okay.

And what the reality is that that's just not always possible, especially when we're talking about people and the church and community.

The chemicals are gonna be messed up.

And so we get to this point where Adam and Eve are naked and unashamed.

It certainly wasn't messed up for them, not yet.

But all of a sudden, this definition of community, we get to this point where all of a sudden we've got to have a caveat in this community.

We've got to get we've got to gather for more than just our own name.

We've got to gather for Jesus' name.

See, that's what got messed up.

That's what messed up the chemicals in the pool and what gets us all messed up in the funnel.

We're avoiding the things that really will transform our lives so that we can kind of stay safe in the wider arena of community so that we don't ever really have to be faced with what we need to change.

And so this one caveat, if we can just get back to that definition and that verse in Matthew 18, 20, it says, this one caveat is here.

And it's this for where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.

We've got to gather in the name and for the purpose of the name of Jesus.

And that's it.

See, if we go back and we read a little bit in Genesis 3, what we'd understand is that Adam and Eve began to meet and gather for their own name.

See, there was a tree, two trees in the middle of the garden.

It's in the middle of the garden.

And what happened was there was a serpent that came down, his name was Satan, and he deceived Eve.

It says it's in the middle of the garden, and all of a sudden there was a deception there, and where they were not supposed to be anywhere near the middle of the garden, they put themselves in the middle of the garden.

But that's not where they were supposed to be.

And so Satan just kind of tempts them to become the center of the world, and they give in.

And that's what happens in Genesis 3, and so much so that we read this in verse 6 of Genesis 3, it says, So when the world so when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate.

And she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate.

And then the eyes of both were open, and they they knew that they were naked.

See that beautiful thing that happened at the end of Genesis 2, and the man and his wife were both naked and unashamed, and they just kind of unzipped all their fears, if they had any at that point, which they didn't, because there was no sin in the world.

They were just relating beautifully to one another, and all that went away in an instant.

And now we've inherited this very covered up and very shameful nature, where we're not free to kind of admit our mistakes with one another, because then what would you think of me?

We're not free to speak into each other's lives because then, oh, I might be taking that the wrong way, or they might take it the wrong way, or maybe I'll hurt them, or whatever.

And all of a sudden we get to this part here in verse 7, and the eyes of both of them were open, and they knew they were naked.

And this is the there's three things they do.

They sewed fig leaves together and they made themselves loincloths.

They covered up, they covered themselves up.

And then they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.

And the man and his wife did the second thing, and they hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden, as if that's possible.

And I love the intentional nature of the God who is community and created us for community.

He went after them in verse 9.

He didn't condemn them, and he said, But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, Where are you?

Woo-hoo! And Adam said, I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked.

And I hid myself.

And he said to you, Who told you that you were naked?

Hello?

Have you eaten of that tree which I commanded you not to eat?

And then this is classic humanity, the third thing that they do, they start blaming one another.

And the man said, You see, um, the woman, see, the woman you gave me, let me remind you, you gave me, you gave me this woman.

This woman here, she's the problem.

She's the one that gave me this fruit of the tree, and I ate it.

You know, I ate it, you know.

And then the Lord God said to the woman, What is this you've done?

He kind of goes along with their story a little bit.

All right, so what'd you do?

The woman said, You see, there was this talking snake, all right?

And this talking snake, she he deceived me.

And so I took the fruit and I ate it.

Now, apparently that was a believable story because it literally happened.

And God cursed the serpent and he cursed the man and he cursed the woman.

And all of a sudden, we live in a fallen world as a result of all of that.

And they start blaming one another, they start covering one another, and that's not even really the two that I want to get into.

Instead, what I want to get into is this they hid from one another.

We have become experts in hiding.

We have become experts in putting on a mask, so much so.

I don't know about if any of you, but I grew up on the Jetsons.

Anybody else?

The Jetsons, yes?

There's a few of us in the room.

Yeah.

So um, so this is this is real.

This actually happened.

I looked this up.

Um, there's a Facebook page for Jane Jetsons morning mask.

Okay, and this morning mask was basically all this the Jetsons was basically in the future, and um, and so you know, they're living in the future, and in the future, they have video phones.

Kookie.

Our modern day version of FaceTime.

Apparently, we're in the future, right?

According to the Jetsons, they have this video phone, and it's early in the morning for Jane Jetson, and the friend calls, and she's too tired, and her hair's all disheveled, and she doesn't look very good, not presentable.

And so she goes to the vault and she gets out her morning mask and she puts it on to go talk to somebody on the video phone.

We're hiding.

It's a simple and silly little illustration from my childhood, apparently.

Uh, but it's Jane Jetson's morning mask, and we have an unbelievable uh propensity to hide.

We invent ways to hide.

We hide in busyness, we hide in muchness.

I was uh leading this group of men on Thursday night, and as we did when we were talking about great things in there, uh impending divorces and financial ruin and not planning for for too much.

But one of the guys just, I mean, very tough guy that I would see as a very tough guy.

He said, You know what?

What I've just been struggling with my whole life is that someone told me that a man looks like this, and I said, like what?

And he said, not emotional, always strong, maybe a little bit violent, and never talk or even really think about your feelings.

And at the end of the day, I was like, wow, well, that's that's yes, I can definitely relate to that understanding of manhood.

Let's just go ahead and call that out as crazy and put that out to the side.

And here's why, is because as we're studying David, we get to the end of the study, and after each week it says, the man after God's own heart, blank.

And that same guy that said, you know what, I've just been struggling, kind of living up to this false idea of manhood, said, Yeah, the man after God's own heart, he trusts.

Well, that doesn't fit.

Then you admit you're weak, that you can't do it all, and that God has to do some things for you.

That's exactly what David did.

And so all of a sudden, he's kind of breaking out of that shell of covering and hiding, that he's not his true self.

And he's breaking out of that unemotional, unavailable, whatever, so that he can become what God has said he should become.

And I said, Hey, I bet your wife doesn't like that idea of a man.

He's like, Absolutely.

She can't stand that guy.

A guy that can't be intimate, a guy that can't talk about his feelings, a guy that can't talk about fears and dreams and hopes.

Ah, she doesn't like him.

But this idea of hiding, here's what hiding does: it makes us become experts in isolation.

And so all of a sudden we start hiding and we start convincing ourselves that we're the only ones that understand this problem in this way.

And so no one else understands me.

And so, because no one else understands me, I'm gonna go ahead and put them at arm's length.

And you know what?

Because they're at arm's length, they're never gonna get in.

And so we isolate ourselves, but let me just put a warning out there.

If we are really good at hiding and therefore isolating ourselves, that is exactly where the enemy wants us.

There's power in the presence of community, and outside of community, there is unbelievable temptation.

Let me just illustrate it by looking at Jesus' life.

Look at what he did.

Where was Jesus tempted?

Do you remember?

In the desert.

He was alone.

Isolated.

What about Peter at the end of Jesus' life?

Where was Peter whenever he was tempted to deny his Savior?

He was isolated from his guys, right?

The other eleven people really weren't anywhere around.

Instead, they all were like, hey, you're you're Peter, you got a Scottish accent.

I know you.

You don't watch the same Jesus movies as me?

Peter always has a Scottish accent.

I don't know why.

And he's a strong man, got a big jaw, big old beard.

And they and he he he denies them there.

So the enemy is all for isolating us and telling us the lie that no one understands.

Can I just say and just invite you into the reality?

We may not understand, but we we still want to be the reminders of God's promises and the reminders of God's truth for your journey.

And oh, by the way, for mine.

I can't make it apart from y'all either.

Matter of fact, when Peter, after he went through that, he matured a little bit and he wrote this towards the end of his life in 1 Peter 5.8, he says, Be sober-minded and be watchful.

Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking for someone to devour.

Someone.

Isolated.

How does a lion hunt?

You ever watch these shows?

How does a lion hunt?

He waits for the for the baby gazelle or the gimpy gazelle, the isolated gazelle, and he goes after that one, right?

He doesn't go for the for the herd.

And how does a wolf hunt?

A wolf hunts in packs.

And what do they do?

They chase down whatever they're hunting so much so that they hopefully isolate one animal and then they go after it.

Now, if we're all sheep, and there's maybe a wolf out there or several that are hoping to isolate us, I would think that gathering in community inside the flock is pretty important.

So that we're not isolated out there for easy pickings of whatever it is that the enemy wants us to give up.

Whatever it is that the enemy wants us to give up, not just for our sake, but for Jesus' sake.

Because the kingdom is at stake, not just our own, it's for God.

And so let me just implore you and invite you that by God's design we were created to gather for the purpose of making Jesus' name great.

No matter how you do it, no matter where you do it, that's the point.

And so my final question basically is this is Jesus came to make all this right.

He did.

And he did make it all right, and one day we'll really experience how right he made it.

But he invited 12 guys to come along with him that he didn't need.

He didn't need those 12 guys to do ministry.

He didn't need those 12 guys to change the world.

He could have done it on his own.

Instead, he valued others, invited them in, transformed their lives, and then sent them out on mission to change the life.

We are all here today because of the faithful walk and discipleship of 12 men.

We would have never known Jesus' name.

We would have never had the words of Jesus if not for those men, being faithful to what God called them to do.

And he did not need to do that.

Instead, he chose them, brought them in, and he gave them this command towards the end of his life.

He says, Just as I have loved you, so also you are to love one another.

By this, by this love for one another.

Remember that community, by this love for one another, the world will know that you are my disciples.

And so it's been said that the Christian community is the final apologetic.

In other words, this is the final way that we are going to basically make a statement about how much, how powerful our God is, and how much He really can change lives is when we love one another.

It is the final statement about the character of God, not about us, about God.

And so the question I have as we land this plane is basically this since this is true, since Jesus says that we should love one another and by this the world will know that we are his disciples, what message are you sending to the world by the way you either pursue and thrive inside of his community or avoid and survive outside of his community?

What message are you saying and sending to the world about God's character by how we value community?

So, with that, would you stand up and let me speak a word of blessing over you?

Hold out your hands like this.

Week after week, month after month, and year after year, you have come into this room and we have ended our day with the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

It's a simple reminder that you were created for someone and by a community, a living community.

Go now and do so like you believe it.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.