Community // Family

Introduction to the Series

Pastor Jonathan began a new sermon series by reading Romans 8:14–17, which reminds believers that those led by the Spirit are children of God—adopted into His family and heirs with Christ. He explained that this new series will focus on community and why it is essential for the Christian life.

From Fasting to Feasting

Pastor Jonathan reflected on the church’s recent series on fasting. He explained that fasting is a way of inviting God’s kingdom into our present struggles and needs. However, the Bible begins with a command not to eat (in Genesis) and ends with a great messianic feast (in Revelation). Ultimately, the story of Scripture moves toward a future where brokenness is healed and God’s people celebrate together in His presence. This image of a shared table becomes a picture of the community

God intends for His people.

The Problem of Radical Individualism

Pastor Jonathan described how Western culture, especially in the United States, promotes radical individualism—the idea that people should pursue what is best for themselves, even if it harms others or the larger community. While personal identity is valuable, taken too far it isolates people from one another. As a result, society is experiencing a serious loneliness epidemic. Statistics show that more than half of Americans feel that no one truly knows them, and loneliness is linked to serious physical and mental health problems.

God Designed People for Relationship

Pastor Jonathan explained that loneliness contradicts how God created humanity. Even before creation, God existed in community as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. From the beginning, God declared that it was not good for people to be alone. Because we are made in God’s image, we are designed for relationships. The enemy’s strategy, therefore, is to isolate people, break relationships, and convince them they must face life alone.

Spiritual Growth Happens in Community

Pastor Jonathan emphasized that Christian formation—becoming more like Jesus—primarily happens in relationships with others. Many of Jesus’ commands cannot even be practiced alone. Instructions such as forgiving one another, bearing one another’s burdens, and loving neighbors require real relationships. Although technology and social media make people more connected digitally, they often fail to produce genuine community, which only develops through face-to-face relationships over time.

The Church as a Family

Pastor Jonathan pointed out that the New Testament frequently describes believers as brothers, sisters, children, and heirs, highlighting that the church is meant to function like a family. In Jesus’ day, family was broader than the modern nuclear family and included extended and chosen relationships. This concept is sometimes called “fictive kinship,” where friends become family. The church is meant to embody this kind of relational community.

Different Circles of Relationships

Using the concept of Dunbar’s numbers, Pastor Jonathan explained that people naturally maintain different levels of relationships:

• A few intimate friends who know us deeply
• A group of close friends we regularly share life with
• A larger circle of friends and acquaintances
• A broader community or tribe

Jesus modeled these layers in His own ministry, having a close inner circle, the twelve disciples, and larger groups of followers.

Intentional Relationships Take Time

Pastor Jonathan explained that friendships develop gradually. Research suggests it can take dozens of hours of shared time to move from acquaintance to friend, and even more to build deep trust. Because of this, relationships must be intentional and cultivated over time.

The Power of Community in Everyday Life

Through personal stories—about family, long-time friends, church members, and even neighbors—Pastor Jonathan illustrated how relationships shape lives and create unexpected blessings. He emphasized that community expands outward, connecting people, strengthening families, and helping others grow spiritually.

Why Community Matters for Spiritual Formation

Pastor Jonathan shared that the most meaningful spiritual growth in his life did not come from sermons or podcasts alone, but from conversations, meals, shared struggles, and friendships where people challenged and encouraged him. God often uses relationships to shape believers into people of love.

The Risk and Reward of Friendship

Pastor Jonathan acknowledged that friendships come with risk. Relationships involve disagreements, conflict, forgiveness, and vulnerability. However, unity in Christ allows believers to remain connected even when they are different. When believers live in unity, something powerful happens spiritually—God’s presence works among them to bring healing, transformation, and growth.

Looking Ahead in the Series

Pastor Jonathan concluded by explaining that the coming weeks will explore:

• Why community is necessary for believers
• How people can belong and build spiritual friendships
• How the church can live out its mission together in the wider community

He defined spiritual friendships as relationships marked by depth, vulnerability, and a shared commitment to transformation in Christ.

Closing Encouragement

Pastor Jonathan closed by reminding the church that Jesus is the ultimate friend who remains close no matter how long someone has been away. He encouraged those who feel lonely or hurt by past relationships to trust that healing and new community are possible through Christ and His people. The service ended with an invitation to receive prayer and to explore ways to join groups and serve within the church community.

Good morning, church. Good morning.

Hey, do this for me. Stand to your feet. Let me read today’s key theme verse.

We’re kicking off a new series today.

I want to read this this morning. This is found in Romans chapter eight, verse 14.

And it says this: For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. And if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ—provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

Let’s pray this morning.

Father God, we just thank you so much for today. Lord, we thank you for this opportunity to come into worship. We thank you for this opportunity to come and to be in community with one another, to learn and grow in love with who you are and what you’re doing in our community, to know you better so that we can show you better to this world. We are so thankful for that. It’s in Jesus’ name we pray. Amen. Amen.

All right, you may be seated. You may be seated.

So we are kicking off a new series.

And here’s where we left off. We left off last week. We finished up our practice series on fasting. We finished our practice series on fasting. This past Wednesday, we had our last formation class on fasting. It was a great time. If you missed any of it, you can always go back and catch up online. Those are options that you can do.

But here’s what’s interesting about fasting. And I think that the formation class especially does a really great job of highlighting this: like, we fast today because there’s so many different things that we are standing for and believing and inviting God into this process, whether that’s standing in prayer for something or believing for God to bring healing or hope or provision to us, or to stand for something that’s going on globally in the world.

Like, there’s this amazing opportunity for us to fast. And when we fast, we’re inviting Jesus and his presence to bring that future kingdom of God down to earth and participate in the growth of that kingdom here in our lives.

But here’s what’s amazing: in the end of the story, in the end of this process—and there was this amazing thought—that at the beginning of the story of the Bible, in Genesis, Adam and Eve were commanded not to eat something. They were commanded to fast from something, which was like, “Don’t eat from this tree.”

But in the end, in Revelation, the thing that we see is we see the great Messiah banquet feast. The end times—the thing where we end up—is feasting in heaven, and there’s no longer a need to fast because sin and death and poverty and brokenness have been healed through the power of Jesus. And so we no longer have to fast and ask Jesus to come. He is already here. And so the end result is this messianic feast at this table of community in which we get to enjoy the presence of God.

And so we’re actually picking up that picture—this idea of what it means to be in this feasting mindset, to be surrounded by friends and family, and what that looks like—because we’re going to talk about something that I think is really important in our journey, in our Christian faith, and in our church walk, which is the idea of community.

And we’re going to take some time to break down what that means, answer some questions, expand that thought, because community is a really key and critical thing within our lives.

But here’s what’s important for us to know, kind of in setting these things out: we being in the United States and being part of like western civilization or western culture at large, we deal with an ideal that is pretty tough for us to handle because there’s a lot of people that are going to be in this world that’s going to be hard to handle.

Because there’s this really powerful thought or ideal within western culture—and it really kind of started in America—which is radical individualism. You’ve maybe heard that term radical individualism, right? Which is the idea that the individual is going to do what is best for themselves, right? Consistently and constantly they’re going to choose what’s better for themselves.

And that’s so radical—the part that makes it radical is not only are we going to make a decision to do what’s best for ourselves, but we’re going to make a decision to do what’s best for ourselves even if it hurts the group at large. Like, even if it hurts other people or our community or some other kind of identity, we’re still going to choose this because it’s like, if it’s good for me, then that’s all that I really care about.

There are all sorts of examples where you can see this in history and in life. I’m sure you’ve experienced someone being individualistic and them choosing something for them that outdoes you.

There’s this great show that I’m not like condoning anything about it, but there’s this great show that really displays this in person. I don’t know if any of you ever watched the show Beast Games on Amazon—maybe like three of you—but like it’s a crazy game show, like survival show. It’s like wild. But like all it shows you is that people will literally be willing to do anything for themselves, even if it means just ruining other people’s chances of playing or winning because of radical individualism, right?

This radical individualism—like, so it’s something we experience here and you see it all the time where people are willing to make those decisions.

And the problem with radical individualism, right, compared to maybe a more historical or even a more Eastern idea, which is more of a collectivistic or a community ideal, is the problem is what it does is it pushes us further and further into ourselves.

Having individual identity and thought is actually beautiful. It’s actually a really powerful thing. But the problem is when it continues to press in and you continue to follow that pattern, it begins to isolate individuals from others, and it begins to press them further and further into a place where they are separated from others or into these very, very limited ideas of community.

And as a result, we are experiencing the greatest epidemic of loneliness that our nation has ever experienced, or that the West has ever experienced. The idea of loneliness and number of people who identify as being lonely or not having friends or isolated is at an all-time high.

About 54% of Americans say that no one knows them well. No one—not that they have a friend or some friends—54%, over half of Americans, say that there is not a person on earth who knows me well.

Think about that for a little while. Not their mom, not their dad, not their brother or sister, not their spouse, not a best friend—that when polled, and this was a large poll, 54% said no one knows me.

That’s a little scary.

36% of Americans say that they feel lonely frequently. That raises up to over 51% for young mothers because young motherhood is hard on moms, amen. 61% of young adults say they constantly or regularly feel lonely.

That’s like a wild statistic.

And here’s what the former surgeon general actually said: that the number one health threat in America is the loneliness epidemic.

He said—now I don’t know where you get these statistics, okay? I’m just reading them—he said that loneliness, being lonely for your health, for your physical health—we’re not even talking spiritual health—for your physical health, it is better to smoke 15 cigarettes a day than to be lonely.

Now again, I’m not telling you to go test that out. I don’t know where that’s coming from.

But here are a few things that are directly correlated to loneliness: anxiety, depression, suicidal ideation, heart disease, cancer, and dementia.

Those are things that your physical body will express inside of it as a result of feeling unknown, not in community, and being lonely.

And when we first hear that, we may think, wow, that’s really surprising.

But then at the same time, if we’re really thinking about it, it probably shouldn’t surprise us. Because from the very beginning, the first thing that God said wasn’t good was it wasn’t good for man to be alone.

But even before that, actually, we can go back and realize that before God ever spoke a word that we have recorded in our Bible—before light ever shot forth, before the waters were there, before the Spirit was moving—God was, and God was in community already with himself.

And the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit existed together in relationship, in community, and in love with one another. And it was out of love that they moved forward with creation, to be able to build something together with each other so that love could be poured out.

The very key starting figures, the very start of where we came from, came out of relationship and with the desire for relationship, so much so that when man was alone, he said, it’s not good. Let’s make them a helpmate, an ezer.

And we have this idea of community.

And from the very beginning, the enemy’s plan and goal and desire is to figure out how to break relationships, to create isolation, to make it where people feel like they are alone and in solitude, and not able to live—that they’re the only ones experiencing what they are experiencing. This has been the plight of man from the very beginning.

And what this does for us in our walk as believers is it creates a breakdown in our ability to be formed into people of love.

Because ultimately, when we talk about spiritual formation, when we talk about allowing God to transform who we are, we are talking about allowing the Holy Spirit and the work of the cross and the grace of Jesus Christ to take me from where I am today and to transform me into a person who looks more and more like Jesus every day—a person of love.

And that formation is primarily done in community, in relationships, and there’s a reason for that.

We do these spiritual practices because we want to walk in the obedience of the way in which Jesus invites us to live. And here’s a few things that Jesus has said, or thoughts that were extrapolated from his teachings, things like this: like, don’t worry about tomorrow.

Now you’re like, “Hey, I don’t need to be in a relationship to not worry about tomorrow. In fact, most of the worries I have are from other people, and so I’m better alone.”

Another one: be anxious for nothing. Same thing. My anxiety completely comes from other people.

My family really believe that I’m scared of heights. That’s a known belief here in my family. They will all agree that they say I’m scared of heights. I just want to tell you, I am not afraid of heights one bit.

I’m basically like something that’s really great at heights. That’s me. Picture that, and then there’s me.

But what does make me really anxious around heights is other people around heights. You know what I’m saying? I trust me. I’ve got skills like a ninja. I can do anything around the heights. I can climb up things, but I don’t trust others.

And when they’re all like, “Oh, what’s going on?” like, that’s like, I about died. When we go hiking and we go places, like, I wonder how far I’m like, I almost freeze up.

But I’m fine. If they weren’t there, I’d be like tight roping it. Like, you know, really no issue.

Because I’m not scared of heights. I’m scared of other people around heights, and that includes you.

Like, sometimes I see people doing things like at the mall. Like, you know how there’s the rail and you’re on the second story, and people lean over the rail? Like, my heart. I’m like, “Oh, God, you’re going to die.”

Still, other people.

But here’s the thing. Listen to some of these other ones: bear one another’s burdens. Be patient with others. Be gentle and humble of spirit. Forgive one another. Love your neighbor as yourself. Love your enemy. Love God with all your heart, mind, strength.

Like, you see, the thing is, to be able to live out the gospel and the calling of Jesus, we have to do it in community with others.

And so, the enemy would love for you to be separated, isolated, and alone, because outside of community, you can’t express the love that God has given you, and you can’t be encouraged and rely on and experience the good thing that God has for you.

And so, we live in a society that is like the most connected, yet it’s the most disconnected.

My kids sometimes cannot believe what we had to suffer through in the late 90s, early 2000s. I just had to explain to them the other night: limited cell phone minutes.

I had to explain to them: pay per text.

I got to tell them the innovation of putting someone into their Fab Five, their Fave Five. You remember the Fave Five? You know, it’s like, “Hey, you’re in my Fave Five.”

I got to tell them nights and weekends.

“Call me back in 30 minutes.” I’m like, that’s what we’re about. You guys remember that.

“You’re in my Fave Five. We can talk anytime we want.”

I remember guys who would have five girls in their Fave Five, and they were just trying to rotate that through, see who they could figure it out.

“Girl, you’re in my Fave Five.” I’m like, “I’m asking who the other four is.”

We had to suffer. Like, and now we’re connected. We got Instagram, we got Facebook, we got this, we got that. I can text, I can FaceTime, and call them, and yet, we’re more lonely than ever.

It just shouldn’t shock you, and like at this point, it’s like social media does not create community.

It doesn’t. It doesn’t create relationships.

Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, whatever is new. I don’t know. I’m not cool.

It doesn’t create relationships.

Listen, this is like texting doesn’t create relationships.

Relationships are formed and are grown face to face and in person. That’s how relationships are created.

And for us to be able to understand that we as a community, we as a church, can learn that there is actually a practice in the Bible of biblical community that actually stands against the enemy’s desire to deform you, to isolate you, to break you, to not allow you to grow in Christ and to grow in love and to be formed into his image.

And it’s called being in the family of God and being in community.

It’s this huge thing.

And guys, it all starts. Jesus’ whole ministry started with community. And Mark chapter one, he starts right off the bat by calling disciples and saying, “Hey, I’m going to teach you how to be fishers of men, and we’re going to grow this community,” right?

By Mark chapter three, he now has all 12 of his disciples. He’s got his 12. Same thing as his fave five. He just had 12.

He called them anytime he wanted to. Right?

And listen, by Mark chapter three, verse 32, it’s this crazy story where Jesus is teaching and preaching and all of a sudden his family think he’s gone nuts.

His mom’s there. His brother’s there. No one believes that he’s the Messiah except maybe Mary. She just is like trying to like, you know, keep a… I think she believed, but the brothers didn’t.

And it says, “The crowd was sitting around him and they said, ‘Hey, your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you.’ And he answered them, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And looking at those who sat around him, he said, ‘Here’s my mother and here’s my brother. For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.’”

We read that verse, but we’re adopted.

Here’s what’s wild: the number one term in the New Testament that’s used for followers of Jesus—we’ve talked about it—is like the word that we were translated into like disciples, right? Or followers.

But the number two word that’s used in the entire New Testament to refer to followers of Jesus is brothers/sisters.

Family.

And it’s not just that: there’s brothers and sisters—that’s used like 130 plus times. Fathers used 63 times. Inherits or inheritance or heirs used 19 times. Sons 17 times. Child 39 times.

Like the church of Jesus Christ is based on the idea and the context of being adopted into a new family: a new identity, a new community group.

And by the way, this is something that marketing has figured out. Like, the church—we are here. We are a church family, a local church community, a church family.

But like that word family, they use it all the time. Because people know you have a lot harder job quitting something when you believe that it’s your family.

So that’s why when you go to the gym, they’re like, “Welcome to the gym family.” And you’re like, “I was only planning on being for a couple weeks though.” And like, but now I got to quit on my family. The Bible says not to do that. So I guess I’ll keep paying but not go.

But you hear it all the time. Welcome to the T-Mobile family. Welcome to the Ford family. And we don’t like the Chevy family because they’re the worst family on the block.

I drive a Chevy. Like, fine.

Two Chevys actually. Look at me. I’m a real Chevy guy. I didn’t even know it.

It was not my choice. But here’s the thing.

People exploit that term because we have a deep desire internally created by God to be part of a family.

But our idea of family today is very different than the idea of family when Jesus was around.

So our family, typically we look at just what we would consider our nuclear family, right? Like, it’s like in my case would be me, my wife, my boys, and that would be my nuclear family.

Right? And we even say like extended family, like that would be like your parents and your siblings and cousins. Like that’s like even the extent.

Like, we have individualized and created where nuclear family is just directly the people who live in your house. But in Jesus’ day, that was very different.

And Jesus’ day was very robust. It was not just your actual what we consider nuclear family, but it also went into like parents and grandparents, multi-generational homes, cousins, all those kind of things.

But even beyond that, there were people who they would consider family that were not actually family, but they were so close, they considered them family.

Now, if you want to know what that’s called in like real modern talk and you want to like impress your friends, you can talk about fictive kinship groups.

Doesn’t that sound really cool?

“Oh, you can be part of my fictive kinship groups.”

Let me give you an example of a fictive kinship group. You ever watch the show Friends? That’s a fictive kinship group.

Now, what normal human beings who are not insane call that is we call that framily, right? You know, the friends and family that you choose for yourself.

But if you want to impress someone, be like, “Oh, I was studying fictive kinship groups,” and it sounds more, you know, whatever.

But here’s the idea.

In Jesus’ day, family was this robust idea. And then he extended that to the church. And he said that this is my family.

And that Jesus, it says that he’s our elder brother. And that God is our father. And you belong here.

And even now, here, we’re a church family.

Now, I’ll be 100% honest with you, and I believe this with all my heart. We are here and we are a church family. We’re together.

But like even the number of people who are in this room, it is too large for us to be close friends because I can’t know… I would love, I wish I knew every person’s name here and I had time to hang out with every person here. And like, I really mean that.

But like it’s too much.

But just because I can’t know every person here doesn’t mean that every person here can’t be known by someone.

And that’s how community works. And that’s how it works.

And so there’s this idea—we actually talked about it a few months ago because I think it’s this pretty interesting thought—it was this idea of the Dunbar numbers. Some of you guys remember that about six, seven months ago when we talked about it.

And it talked about how we have these like concentric circles of people. And the tighter the circle, the smaller the number of people we can have.

And so it talked about like intimate friends. You can have between one to five intimate friends, right? That deeply know you, who know your good and your bad, who love us. And that’s like the intimate thing.

That’s the category, that deep intimate friendship group that 53% of Americans say they have zero people in. They have none, right?

Then you have close friends, right? Your community. And they say this is like 15 people where you do life for these people. You eat, maybe you go on vacation, you celebrate with those people. It’s like huge.

Then you go beyond that: like, you can have 50 friends. Despite what Michael Scott teaches us, you can only have 50 friends. Not 100 friends, 50 friends. You can’t keep more than 50 friends. Like you have these regular interactions.

And then there’s this idea of like the village. It’s like 150 people. This number that you can be in relationship with.

It’s like this—you see this throughout history. And there’s a reason why still to this day, the average church size in America is between 100 and 150. Because that’s the size where everybody can know everybody and you can continue to go through that.

And then more than 150, you can still be part of that, but it’s like considered like a tribe, right? Like something that you’re a part of. Like all of Americans can be considered part of the American tribe. But of course, we don’t know all the Americans, right? Like that’s just how it works.

And Jesus had these same things. We can see this in his life. You had the three—Peter, James, and John—and this intimate circle. And then you had the 12 disciples, and then Mary, and Mary, and Mary, and Mary, and Mary, like 12 Marys.

And then he talks about in Jerusalem, there was the 120, right? And then he had all the followers. Like, Jesus had people in all these categories.

And the thing is, we need people in all these categories for us to be able to thrive and for us to be able to grow, because each one of these are important. Each one of these categories are important.

And here’s the thing: it takes time to go from one category to another.

One sociologist did a study, and they put some estimates around some different times. And they said it takes 50 hours of personal contact, of relationship establishment, to move from an acquaintance—or like what we consider the village in this idea—to kin, or to a friend, right?

To a friend.

And it takes 200 hours to move from friend to close friend.

And they didn’t even actually do a study or were able to get a context of how long it takes to go from a close friend to an intimate, because it’s beyond time at that point. It really comes down to even more factors that are beyond just face-to-face interaction, right?

So this isn’t something that’s like done really quickly and fast. It’s something that is purposeful and is intentional, and it’s a process. It’s a journey.

And just sometimes you hear these numbers and it’s like, “Hey, it is what it is.” But I want to give you a little bit of a visual that maybe can help you some, like, and just understand, because we are all people, and we all have some of these, and like you’re trying to figure out.

So I’m here and I’m in this church, right? And we’re part of this church. And I’m really lucky because my family goes here.

So in this room, my wife’s here. She’s one of my intimate people, right? My best friend.

We just celebrated yesterday. We met 25 years ago yesterday. Super exciting.

It was not love at first sight. But it was great.

My boys are here. It’s wonderful. I’m glad they’re here, right?

Now, I’m also fortunate because my parents actually go to church here. So my mom and my dad are in the back there. They’re here. That’s great.

My sister and brother-in-law are here. That’s great. I should make them stand up so you can do that, right? So I have, like, my immediate family. Yeah, my sister has no problem standing up.

It was also her birthday yesterday. So, yeah, it was great.

But so, like, my family’s here. And that’s great, right?

And I have one sister who’s not here today, by the way. I have one other sister and her husband.

But you go beyond that because you have your family. And so many of you know, like, you don’t get to choose who your family is.

And sometimes I’m fortunate that I’m close with my family. I’ve got good relationship with my family. And for some of you, that’s the case for you, but for some of you, that’s not the case, right?

But we also, to our point, you can have the family that you choose for yourself, right? You can make choices, right?

So you have sisters and brothers. And in the Christian world, we’re all brothers and sisters of Christ. But also within that deep relationship, you can choose who your brother is.

So I have a brother who’s here who I consider like a brother, which is over here. So this is my best friend, Josh. He’s here. And he’s like my brother, right? I love him. We met when we were 11 years old, right?

And this is his wife, Angie. And honestly, she’s like a sister. We met a little longer.

Literally anything that Lauren would ask me to do, Angie could ask me to do, and I’d do the same thing, right? Because that’s the type of relationship that we have. And we had a long time.

There’s only one thing I wouldn’t do for her, which is if she asked me to lose her at math, I’d say, “I can’t do that. It’s impossible. I always beat you at math.” It’s just a fact, right?

But we have a relationship that has spanned a really long time. And now our kids have relationships. And they have a text chain, and the name of the text chain is called Basically Cousins, right? But they’re not cousins.

But those are things that are established over a really long time, right? And that you get to create. And that are in deep roots of love and friendship.

And some people don’t have them. Some people have none of that.

But like this is the thing: we get to grow and walk and go through experiences together. And that’s a huge part.

But that’s not all that’s represented in the room. Because in this room, there’s people in every single one of those categories for me.

Like right here, these two are great—Philip and Dakota. If you don’t know, Philip makes a great cookie. Oh, my gosh. If you’re kind to him, he can make a cookie.

Doug’s a great guy. We’ve been praying for relationships and for his son. We’re here.

We have the Tinglers here, who’s a pretty amazing family, including maybe the best dancer I know right here. And if you’ve never seen her perform, it’s just absolutely wild. Wild.

And I could go around and I could talk about people. I could talk about the people under the balcony, but they’re here to be incognito. So I’m not going to call them out.

They pretend like they’re not here. But really, they are here, right?

Actually, I will call one out. One’s here, like Bert’s back here and his family. And I love Bert.

And sometimes you have wild things. So Bert’s been at church like forever. Like I don’t know since like forever, right? I don’t know the whole time.

But so Bert’s great. I love Bert. Bert originally came from Jamaica. Bert’s a track guy. We talk track all the time.

But even deeper, again, how relationships build, I ran track with Bert’s sister, Teresa. And Teresa is someone’s friend. Because something happened with Teresa.

Like, I don’t get to see Teresa very often. But I get to talk to her. She lives in Dallas now. But when she comes in town, we get to connect because we went through something together.

We ran track for four years together, which means we suffered together.

And when you suffered together, you experienced something, you learned, you know what? I don’t care. Like, the Bible is true.

There is neither male nor female. There are blacks nor white nor Americans. Like, when you’re running hard and everyone’s throwing up on the floor, that’s just how it works.

We all sweat. And we all have tears. And we all have good days and bad days. Right? We have things that grow within our relationships. And they expand. And they move. And they change.

We’ve got people like Chris right here. Chris is such a great guitar player. But you know, I didn’t know Chris was a great guitar player from here. I knew Chris was a great guitar player when I was in seventh grade and he was in the youth band at my church.

And I remember thinking, man, I wish I could play some day on the same band as him, but it will probably never happen.

And now, once a month, when Isaiah lets me, we get to play on the same band together. And even cooler, when he has to play bass, he gets to play my bass.

Like that means a lot to me.

Because I’ll be honest with you, pretty much if anyone else said, “Hey, can I borrow your bass” in this room, I’d say no.

But Chris is asking, I’d be like, yeah, 100%. Anytime you want. Because it matters.

And I get to be in this community with other staff. I got Pastor Charlie and Pastor Andrew and Pastor Isaiah. And I got people all over the place.

And I could go on and on. There’s board members around. There’s people who have known me forever. Like there’s stuff that happens here.

And each person represents someone in one of these groups, whether it’s the most intimate friendship, our friends, close friends, friendship. We’re in this tribe.

Like I could go through and name, name after name after name. And then yet even that, even in a room this small, there’s still people here that I don’t know your name. And I’ve never known you. I’ve never had conversation with you.

And yet, we not only have the same identity as believers of God, as Christians, we actually have the same identity as members of Destiny Church, members of this community.

People are here who in this season are planted to be in this house. And we share that together.

And you are a part of that just as much as I am a part of that. And just because I maybe don’t know your name or haven’t had the pleasure to share it doesn’t change the identity that you’re there.

And I need you in my life as part of that relationship, because those are the things that we need to do.

I ran into a gentleman who may even be in this room. I don’t know. I was at a shoe store looking at shoes, trying to buy shoes for my kids. And he walked up and he’s like, “Oh, Pastor Charlie, then how’s it going?” And I’m like, “Oh, hey.” And I didn’t know who he was.

And he’s like, “I go to your church. I’ve been going for about six months.” And I’m like, “Ugh.” And I’m like, “I feel bad,” because I’m like, “I’ve never seen him.”

Now, he was like, “Man, that last weekend’s for me.” He’s telling me details and facts. And I’m like, “Hey, listen.”

It was encouraging. It was encouraging.

And I was excited to meet someone who is in my tribe, but I hadn’t gotten the chance to meet yet.

And in this room, we all have this. And guess what? Outside of this room, I have people who are friends and relatives, people who are all over the world. This is part of it. It’s not just in this room.

But community has a power. And sometimes we can just be like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” But the question is, we get to ask ourselves, is how many people can we walk around and can we name?

And create friendships with? And be in community with?

And listen, you’re not going to be intimate friends with every person, because that’s impossible.

The whole idea of Dunbar’s number is there’s actually a finite number of people that you can be in these limited relationships with.

You really can only have four or five deep intimate relationships because of what it takes.

My wife’s absolute best friend, other than me, of course, is an incredible woman named Alex, who lives in Canada, who they don’t get to talk every day. They don’t get to talk every week. They don’t get to talk every month.

They talk as sporadic. It’s all over the place. But I will tell you, an intimate friend requires exactly 0.1 seconds of proximity, and you are right there. You are connected. And it’s unchanging.

Maybe you have a friend like that, that you can go a long time without seeing because of life and because of distance and because of time. But the second that you’re together, it is not like, “Oh, we…” It’s like there’s no gap at all.

And here’s the thing. Ultimately, those types of friendships not only exist for our soul to grow, but those are the friendships that talk…

When the Bible says that you have an intimate friend in Jesus, you may say, “Oh, man, I haven’t spent time in the Word. It’s been a while since I went to church. I don’t know if I’ve done…”

And you think, “Oh, man, if I go back, is it going to be weird? Is it going to be awkward?”

No, no, no. The second you get back face to face with Jesus is as if you never left off.

That is the power of His grace and His mercy. He is an intimate friend. The friend who says he is closer than a brother.

That is who He is to you. You have that friendship.

But you see, we can’t live the life. Some people have believed, “Oh, well, as long as I have Jesus, this is my friend. He’s the only friend I need.”

Listen, you are called and meant to be in community and to help grow community because the way we interact and the way we’re able to introduce people and move through different circles with people and in life, it changes—how not just for us, but for those around.

Like, I think there’s one great example.

Like, I moved into a house. How long did we move into our house? Eight years ago, nine years ago? I can never remember. Longer than that. Ten years ago? Twenty years? I’m just kidding.

He was two. So ten years ago. Eight, nine years ago. It was great. I love my house.

And I thought, “Man, the best thing about moving to this neighborhood is that I’m going to get this house.” And my house is awesome. I love my house.

But what I didn’t know was I was going to move across the street from literally the best neighbors in the history of neighbors.

And over time—not because of me, because I’m one of those guys—like, honestly, at the neighborhood, like, you know how, like, you park and then you run inside because you just hope to not see your neighbors? Like, that’s me.

Like, however I can avoid the neighbors, that was like my goal.

Like, the whole “love your neighbor” thing, it was like, “But not in my neighborhood,” right? Jesus, thanks.

It’s the safe zone.

But my neighbors across the street just always were kind and talking, and we started talking, and we continued to talk, and then they’re amazing.

And now they actually go to church here, and you actually maybe have seen them because Bill actually plays keys. That’s not Bill. That’s Isaiah.

(Laughter)

Can’t be sneaking up on me like that, man.

And now, like, he’s a friend. Anything I need, literally anything I need, I can go to Bill.

Like, and he is so smart. He’s like the kind of friend that’s like, “My car is broken. Go to Bill. My computer is broken. Go to Bill. My air conditioner won’t work. Go to Bill.” Like, anything, he’s got it. He’s the kind of neighbor you want.

But then it goes even further.

So for me, it’s like, “Man, I picked up this great friend who also ends up coming to my church, who also happens to be an incredibly talented musician.”

But here’s what’s wild: in the process of talking, I end up being able to introduce him to my dad. And now he and my dad are friends.

And wouldn’t you know it, Bill happens to be in a band. And now my dad is in the band. And now they play music in the band. And it’s one of the best bands that you ever, ever get to see.

And guess what? Now that band is playing at the anniversary of a business called Course in Commons, what happened to be opened up by my best friend, Brother Josh.

Look how relationships happen.

Now if I had just been like—and listen, this is Jesus, the Spirit of God, and this is not me—if I had just been like, “Oh, there’s that neighbor again. He’s always out there mowing, making me feel guilty about how bad my lawn looks compared to his,” then I wouldn’t have had that.

I wouldn’t have had that. My dad wouldn’t have had that. All these things.

You see, community matters.

And you know what? That relationship’s good for my dad. And that relationship’s good for Bill. And that relationship’s good for me. And it’s been good for our church. And it’s been good for others because some of you have got to meet some of them.

And Beth is even better than Bill. And you just haven’t got to see her on stage.

These are the things that friendships and relationships and community work.

And the enemy will make you believe the lie that our society is, which is like, “Ah, that’s okay. You’re married. You don’t need anybody else.”

That’s not true.

That’s not true. Your spouse should be an intimate close friend, but it shouldn’t be the only intimate close friend.

Because that relationship will at times go through stress and struggle and hardship, and you need others who are there to help support you, to encourage you, to challenge you, to tell you the things that other people won’t do.

You need friendships to be able just to go and have a good time with. There are so many things that we need to be able to experience.

And the body of Christ was built to be able to do these so that not only can we live, but even more importantly, so that we can grow in our maturity and our formation to become people like God.

And that can be done in the context of relationships.

The greatest spiritual growth that I have experienced as a man did not happen sitting in a seat listening to a sermon.

It did not happen listening to a podcast. It did not happen watching a great preacher on TV.

It happened in one-on-one conversations. It happened over dinner. It happened over coffee. It happened over time. It happened with tears. And it happened with laughter. It happened with challenges. It happened with confrontations.

It happened in the ways that God loves me so much that He puts people in my life to do those things for me.

And it’s not good to be alone. It’s not good.

And so here’s the thing, church: we as a church over the next however many weeks are going to be able to take the time to ask you a few questions, to continue to ask the question, “Why do we need community?” I think we answered that pretty good.

To answer some questions: “How do we belong in a community?” What does it mean to have, you know, God-centered friends or spiritual friendships?

And I’ll give you a little teaser. Spiritual friendships have three things: depth, vulnerability, and commitment to transformation. Those three things.

And you can ask yourself, “Do I have any spiritual friendships?” And that’s the three things.

Does the relationship have depth? Transparency, vulnerability, and a commitment to transformation.

And maybe you’re like, “Oh, I actually have a lot of those.” Or maybe you’re like, “I don’t know if I have any of those.” That’s okay. We’re going to talk about it.

So we’re going to say, “How do we belong in a community?” We’re going to learn how do we invite others to be part of the community.

And then lastly, we’re going to learn how do we live and work in the community around us as a community.

How do we, who are believing and trusting and living in the power of Christ—who are being formed in Him—how do we go and be light into our community and the very mission of God to help partner with bringing heaven down to earth?

And we’re going to look at all of that. We’re going to spend a lot of time in the book of Ephesians because something amazing happens, because this is not just a physical process.

And if you want extra credit, you should read the book of Ephesians over the next couple of weeks.

But it’s not just a physical process. Something in the spiritual realm happens when brothers and sisters in Christ dwell together and work together in unity, despite the fact that in our relationships there will be disagreements and trials and troubles and frustrations.

Because here’s the thing, church: I’m not up here going to be telling you like, “Friendships are the best.” And if you have friendships, you’ll be happy the rest of your life.

Because here’s the thing I promise you: friendships always come with risk. There will be disagreements. There will be hardship. There will be trouble. There will be wounds.

There will be opportunities to forgive and to ask for forgiveness. There will be opportunities to grow. There will be opportunities to try to have discourse over disagreements in different ideologies, whether it’s biblical or political or parenting or whatever.

Like, there will be opportunities to grow. Like, it is the very process of being able to live next to someone that allows us to realize that we don’t have to be totally, completely the same to exist together.

And in fact, there’s something powerful when two people are not united under the fact that they are totally the same, but they’re united under the fact that they have Christ as their commonality.

And it’s a powerful transformation.

There’s a spiritual thing that happens when brothers and sisters come and dwell in unity together, beyond just the fact that there’s no strife.

The very power of God is present for transformation, for healing, for chains to be broken.

And church, that is what we’re going to be experiencing and processing and walking through together over the next several weeks leading up to Easter and even coming out of Easter.

The idea of how do we become not just a church that people come and they go and they leave, but one that presses into relationships and community and family in a way that we can answer the question of, “Do I have spiritual friends?” The answer is yes.

And we are growing together and we are on a journey together and we want to be able to invite more people to this journey and to see that expand in our lives.

And that’s going to be awesome. It’s going to be awesome.

Next week, man, we’re going to be covering some things next week. I hope you can make it because we’re going to be talking about how our church and the vision and the thing that God has for us and the way in which He’s inviting for us to execute that in the community and move forward.

It’s going to be powerful. It’s going to be profound.

Because as a church, we’re no longer called just to come, sit, sing, and leave. We’re called to be a type of people who are forming deep bonds of relationship and walk through that whole process together.

Let’s pray this morning.

Father, we just thank you so much for today. We thank you for the relationship, the community we have in you, the friendship we have in Jesus, that you’ve invited us into your family, into the most close and intimate circle that we can be.

That we have a friend, Jesus, who sticks closer than any brother, and that He’s here with us forever.

Lord, for the people who are in this room who have good relationships and they’re established well, and their wheels are spinning—your Spirit is speaking to them about how to continue to grow and move different relationships—I just pray you give them wisdom and guidance, Lord.

Lord, but for those who are here today and they feel like either they don’t have any close relationships, or maybe even worse, they were hurt and they feel vulnerable because of some close relationships, Lord, I thank you that there’s healing underneath your wings, and that there’s faith and trust and hope to be able to continue, and to trust, and to walk out the call that we have to live in community together.

Lord, we just thank you for that. Jesus, you are so good. It’s in Jesus’ name we pray. Amen and amen.

Hey, listen, church—two things, two things.

One, if you need prayer for anything, our prayer team is going to be down here. They would love to pray with you, get you some resources, anything you need for you, for someone else. They’d love to stand with you.

But then secondly, some of you guys already saw it in the beginning: we have a rush going on outside, and we have different groups, community groups, small groups that are represented outside that are just, man, absolutely incredible things for you to be able to serve and to be part of.

So there’s things like daughters and hands and feet and the different kids groups that are all out there. It’s just such a brilliant fun time. So go out there, learn a way to be able to get connected and serve.

It’s just another way to be able to take that next step in community.

So we love you so much. You guys are officially dismissed. Have a great rest of your Sunday.