CORE VALUE 5 | RELATIONSHIPS 

INTRODUCTION

This verse is a promise from Jesus. 

• When Jesus makes a promise, how does he want you to feel about it?

 This verse is often misunderstood. People read it, from the Bible, in connection with a church, and they naturally think it is about one specific kind of activity that churches do.

• What is that specific activity to which this verse is often applied?

This particular activity is certainly important, but it is not the activity that Jesus was talking about the church doing in this section. Not even close. Take a look:

Matthew 18:15-20 | 15 “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over. 16 But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ d 17 If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector.

18 “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.

19 “Again, truly I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. 20 For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.”

• There are two places in this text where the idea of “two of three” gathering occurs. What is being described in those two places?

• Verse 19 can give the impression that anything is in-bounds for this gathering group’s work. What practical evidence from everyday life can we point to proving that verse 19 has to be understood in connection with the verses around it – and that it can’t just be a universally applicable truth?

Therefore, the comfort from this promise is not about worship together, shoulder to shoulder to experience God. It’s about our relationships – face to face – and about the fact that in these, we truly experience God.

THESIS & SUPPORT

Real, heart-level connections are part of the purpose of the church - and they aren't able to be manipulated or forced. Fellowship is lay-led (not staff-led) and organic.

• Interpersonal relationships cannot be programmatically developed, but instead occur in the midst of interaction.

• True love comes only from understanding the true love of God to us in Christ.

• While fellowship is lay-led, the church staff will work to support and promote healthy fellowship within the congregation.
  How should this be managed, in your opinion?

• In planning ministry and events, space for the development of interpersonal relationships will be considered for the sake of this principle.
  How will this affect the way we do refreshments?

• Since the organic nature of heart-level connections cannot be controlled or programmed, Illumine allows for and idealizes segmented community, intentionally easing the pressure of full-body, know-everyone-by-name interaction and connection.
  Where/How do you hear anti-segmented language in churches sometimes?
  

BIBLICAL CONNECTIONS

THE SAGA OF DAVID & JONATHAN

1 Samuel 18:1-4 | After David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathan became one in spirit with David, and he loved him as himself. 2 From that day Saul kept David with him and did not let him return home to his family. 3 And Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself. 4 Jonathan took off the robe he was wearing and gave it to David, along with his tunic, and even his sword, his bow and his belt.

1 Samuel 19:1-6 | Saul told his son Jonathan and all the attendants to kill David. But Jonathan had taken a great liking to David 2 and warned him, “My father Saul is looking for a chance to kill you. Be on your guard tomorrow morning; go into hiding and stay there. 3 I will go out and stand with my father in the field where you are. I’ll speak to him about you and will tell you what I find out.” 4 Jonathan spoke well of David to Saul his father and said to him, “Let not the king do wrong to his servant David; he has not wronged you, and what he has done has benefited you greatly. 5 He took his life in his hands when he killed the Philistine. The Lord won a great victory for all Israel, and you saw it and were glad. Why then would you do wrong to an innocent man like David by killing him for no reason?” 6 Saul listened to Jonathan and took this oath: “As surely as the Lord lives, David will not be put to death.”

1 Samuel 20 | (That whole business with the arrows.)

2 Samuel 9:1-8 | David asked, “Is there anyone still left of the house of Saul to whom I can show kindness for Jonathan’s sake?” 2 Now there was a servant of Saul’s household named Ziba. They summoned him to appear before David, and the king said to him, “Are you Ziba?” “At your service,” he replied. 3 The king asked, “Is there no one still alive from the house of Saul to whom I can show God’s kindness?” Ziba answered the king, “There is still a son of Jonathan; he is lame in both feet.” 4 “Where is he?” the king asked. Ziba answered, “He is at the house of Makir son of Ammiel in Lo Debar.” 5 So King David had him brought from Lo Debar, from the house of Makir son of Ammiel. 6 When Mephibosheth son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, came to David, he bowed down to pay him honor. David said, “Mephibosheth!” “At your service,” he replied. 7 “Don’t be afraid,” David said to him, “for I will surely show you kindness for the sake of your father Jonathan. I will restore to you all the land that belonged to your grandfather Saul, and you will always eat at my table.” 8 Mephibosheth bowed down and said, “What is your servant, that you should notice a dead dog like me?”

1 John 4:7-21 | 7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. 13 This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15 If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. 16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. 17 This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. 18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. 19 We love because he first loved us. 20 Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. 21 And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.

EXPLANATION

Let’s think a little about the idea of a “friend from church.” It is certainly a reality – you see someone at the store, you greet them, you can’t remember their name, your spouse asks you who it was, you say, “She’s a friend from church.” More than being a reality, it is a natural thing; there will be people you wouldn’t have met unless you were both in the same church-related place at the same time.

But what is Jesus hoping for when he pictures the relationships between people in a congregation? What are his dreams for them – and just as importantly, what aren’t his dreams for them? To what extent does he want them to become similar, liking and valuing the same things – and to what extent does he want them to remain diverse and distinct from one another?

In some ways, we’re thinking about the difference between “unity” and “homogeneity.” These two concepts can seem like they have the same end result, but they do not. Aiming at unity is good, Biblical, and godly (think especially of Jesus’ prayer on the night he was betrayed as it is recorded in John 17.) Aiming at homogeneity is a lot more like the work the Judaizers were doing to the very early Christian church…work the Apostle Paul worked tirelessly to defeat. 

Beyond the unity issue, though, there’s an idea about the source or start of the relationships you have with the people in your congregation. If you’re a person who is fully committed to being part of a Christian congregation, it is particularly easy to have friends from church, and it is likely that those people are going to be committed to Christ and to being part of his public, active church already. You’re going to be there no matter what. So are they. “Friends from church.”

Historically, the church has made it very easy to develop these unique, under-the-steeple relationships. On the other hand, the church has made it kind of hard to bring your non-church-friends (or, as they are sometimes called, “real” friends) into the congregational context.

Room must be made for both, certainly. But the focus and effort of Illumine, when it comes to relationships, needs to be on finding ways for you and your friends (not your church friends – you’re actual close friends) to benefit from this church. There’s a difference between “the people I do this with” and “the people that are there when I do this” – and the difference means something.

Illumine, as an organization that plans events, prioritizes making it easy for people to “do faith” with those God has uniquely positioned them to do faith with. This is not a matter of becoming friends with the people from church as much as it is finding the products, events, and content that this church provides useful to you and your friends.  

Are we against church friends? Nope.

But we aren’t going to make them obligatory. We’re going to let them be organic, because that’s how relationships work. Heart-to-heart connections are God’s territory, and when non-deities try to encroach they only make it worse.

All of this leads to a few conclusions:

• All spaces are for connecting! Whether lobby or assembly or outdoor or anything else, making it a great space for relationship development matters.

• You don’t have to know everybody. (Sigh of relief. You’re welcome.)

• You won’t be “like” everybody. In fact, you’ll be very different from some of them.

• And, finally, 25/50/25.