community

We learn about God through community. It's true.

Many times we go through our lives frustrated that we can't have a conversation with God about what is going on in our lives. We just want to sit down with him and talk about what is going on and ask him to give us guidance...but that never happens.

Instead, God has put people in our lives to speak truth to us. I know there are times in my life where I just need a little extra dose of direction or discipline in my life and usually it comes from my parents or close friends. When you are in true community and you know people you will get a better picture of who God is and what he expects from you.

How are you doing on community? Are you involved with a group of people who can point you to Christ? This is the most important part of community.

If you or your son/daughter isn't involved in small group ministry please give me a call at 330.365.2062 or email me at mberes@newpointe.org and we will get them connected ASAP!

Beautiful Mess

Community - what a beautiful mess.

Have you experienced true community? I'll admit - it's rare. There are few times in life that we really have friends and other people in our lives who really care about our hearts and futures.

You see, it's easy for us to make friends and say we have true community when we look at our myspace and facebook pages, text message inbox, or our group of friends. But, true community is so different than a number of friends. (Believe me, I found this out the hard way...)

True community is what the Bible talks about in Acts chapter 2. This group of people called "the church" genuinely cared about each other's physical needs and spiritual condition.

When you are trying to build community you quickly find out that there are parts that are messy. When you're building friendships that last you start seeing things in other people that might not be the best parts. You start to see their habits. You see their sinfulness. You see all sides.

We have to fight the temptation to keep people far away from us. When people see our sinfulness we want to cower away from them and not let them in anymore, but this is dead wrong. We need to fight through the awkwardness and pain - in the end we won't have regrets.

Think about this...

Who in your life is showing true community? Who is a deep friend who cares more about your heart and future than if you're cool or popular?

How can you mend a friendship that got messy - then you just gave up?

What are ways we can really develop true community?

WE

Yesterday was the first Sunday in the series "WE." We will be talking all about community - what it is, what it isn't, how to get it, etc.

We started off yesterday with the idea that humans were never meant to be alone. Have you ever read Genesis? If you take a look at the book of Genesis you can see that God created a ton of stuff - and he says it is good. Heavens and Earth - good. Day and Night - good. Animals on land and sea - good. Man - good.

Adam had a great relationship with God in the Garden of Eden, but God decided that it was not good that Adam was alone. So, God created Eve.

Funny, we think that God is all we need and we'll survive without other people in our lives. Here's the thing - you're wrong. God created humans for interaction with each other.

You feel this when you walk into the cafeteria and look for your friends.

You look for human connection when you don't have plans on a friday night.

You're waiting for some connection when you compulsively check your cell for texts.

All of us - whether we want to admit it or not - are craving some level of human interaction. We are looking for that connection with another person. We are waiting to share our happiness and sadness with someone who can relate. We all want that. So, what do we do?

Well, this next month we'll be talking about dealing with people in community when it gets messy, serving each other in community, and how we actually get to know God better when we have human relationships.

So, come to the Warehouse on Sunday mornings at 10 am for more.