Created For Community New Life Version Bible â Welcome to VenuLife Church! God bless you and thank you for coming to our page, if your ever in our area we invite you to come join us here for our online messages or events that we hold every Saturday evening. I assure you that we will make you feel right at home. This evenings message is a about, Created For Community. But, before we dive into the word of God please, join me by holding up your Bible and repeating after me. â This is your word. We are what it says we are. We have what It says we have. We can do what it says we can do. Today we will learn the word of God. We boldly confess that our minds are alert, our hearts are receptive and, we will never be the same, in Jesus name. Amen. â Community is something we all want. No matter how youâre wired - introvert, extrovert, socially adept or socially awkward - something in your soul longs for meaningful relationships with other humans. We long to know others and be known by them. We treasure friendships that allow us to truly âbe ourselves.â Though some of us have never found this sort of community and though others have been deeply wounded by relationships, all of us still long for deep, authentic, real community. How did we get this way? How did this craving, this longing, get hard-wired into us? The Bible answers that question by explaining that we are created in the image of God. God created us for community. Created for Community One of the oldest and most cherished doctrines of historic Christian theology is the doctrine of the Trinity. The Nicene Creed (c. AD 325) summarizes the Trinity this way: I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father.... And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life; who proceeds from the Father and the Son; who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified. The Trinity means that God himself is in community. More accurately, God is community: one God, three persons. âBefore all worldsââbefore any sort of human community existedâthere was God, dwelling in perfect, loving harmony in his threefold being. In the biblical account of creation, this Triune God says: Genesis 1:26 Then God said, âLet Us make man like Us and let him be head over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every thing that moves on the ground.â Human beings are made to image God, to reflect his likeness. Thatâs why our longing for community seems so deep and primal. Itâs how weâre made as Godâs image bearers. So if deep community is something we all want, if itâs part of being made in Godâs image, then what makes it so hard to attain? What keeps us from achieving the type of meaningful human relationships that God wired us for? The Fall: Broken Community If you think for a moment about the nature of your relationships, youâll quickly identify another tendency thatâs present-something darker and more sinister than your God-given desire for community. Itâs the tendency to use people to meet your own needs first. Itâs not hard to see how often we are self-focused, pursuing our own interests and protecting ourselves from people and relationships that will demand too much of us. For example, think of the times youâve intentionally avoided someone who bothers you. Or the times youâve said what people wanted to hear in order to avoid offending them. Or the times youâve stopped pursuing certain friends because they were no longer useful to you. Or the times youâve clung to bad or unhealthy relationships just to escape the feeling of being alone. Our inherent selfishness is evidence of what the Bible calls âsin.â When we hear the word sin, we tend to think of bad behavior. But sin is deeper than external actions. The Bible often talks about sin in terms of unbelief. In other words, rather than believing what is true, we believe lies, which obviously leads to bad behavior and negative emotions. Unbelief was at the root of the first sin. Eve believed the Serpentâs lie about God and his intentions toward them: Genesis 3:4-5 Verse 4 The snake said to the woman, âNo, you for sure will not die! Verse 5 For God knows that when you eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and bad.â Unbelief is a failure to see and believe whatâs true about God, the world, and ourselves. Itâs not taking God at his word, not believing his promises, not trusting in his goodness. And sinâs impact is not just that we donât believe, itâs that apart from Christ weâre unable to believe. Sin has turned us in on ourselves and warped our relationships with others. We need Someone who can deliver us from our unbelief and selfishness and restore our capacity for true, deep, lasting community. Redeemed for Community This is where the good news of the gospel meets us. The word gospel literally means âgood newsââa message, a proclamation, an announcement. One of the paradoxes of this message is that before it can be good news, it must start with bad news: we are sinful, broken people. We are rebels against God. We are mired in lies and self-worship, and we look to things other than God to give us identity and significance. We canât free ourselves, make God happy with us, or do enough good works to make up for our sins. But God, rich in mercy, sent Jesus to earth as our substitute. Jesus took our place in his life as he obeyed God fully and worshiped him totally, things we failed to do. He substituted himself for us in his death, as he paid the penalty we owed to God for our sin and unbelief. If we humble ourselves, acknowledge our need, and turn to him, God the Holy Spirit will apply Jesusâ substitutionary work to us by faith. The Bible calls this redemption, a word that means âto be delivered, ransomed, or set free.â What does Jesus redeem us from? Sin and all its effects. What does Jesus redeem us for? A life that images God and reflects his goodness to the world. In other words, one of the chief things that Jesus accomplishes when he redeems us is to restore our capacity for community. Not for a community of people who look and act just like us, but a community made up of people from every tribe and tongue and nation on earth. Revelation 7:9 After this I saw many people. No one could tell how many there were. They were from every nation and from every family and from every kind of people and from every language. They were standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white clothes and they held branches in their hands. God has created us for community, and Jesus has redeemed us for community. In doing so, he has made us into his very own body that is able to live, love, and make known his âgood newsâ to our friends and neighbors. 1 Corinthians 12:27 You are all a part of the body of Christ. But wait: If Jesus redeems us for community, then why is community still such hard work? Why are relationships still fraught with brokenness, even among Christians? This is the tension we live in. Even though Jesus has delivered us from the penalty and rule of sin, he has not yet eradicated sin from the world. Because of sinâs ongoing presence, we are prone to unbelief. We easily forget the good news of the gospel and fall back into lies and self-worship. Thatâs why the Bible encourages us not just to receive the gospel, but to âstandâ in it. 1 Corinthians 15:1 Christian brothers, I want to tell the Good News to you again. It is the same as I preached to you before. You received it and your faith has been made strong by it. and to âcontinueâ in it Colossians 1:23 This is for you if you keep the faith. You must not change from what you believe now. You must not leave the hope of the Good News you received. The Good News was preached to you and to all the world. And I, Paul, am one of Christâs missionaries. In other words, building and enjoying healthy community is going to require us to believe the gospel, to believe that what Jesus did for us has power and relevance for the way we relate to God and others. This requires an intentional focus on our part. It means identifying the unbelief in our hearts that hinders our ability to love and serve others and to receive love from them in turn. It means receiving the healing, liberating truths of the gospel in ways that allow them to soak deep into the core of our being. And guess where this work of ongoing transformation takes place? In community. Transformed in Community Did you ever notice how patient you areâas long as no one is getting on your nerves? Or how loving you areâas long as youâre surrounded by people who are easy to love? Or how humble you areâas long as youâre respected and admired by others? Every one of us is a saint in isolation! Itâs in community that our real weaknesses, flaws, and sins are exposed. Thatâs why community is essentialânot optionalâfor transformation. We canât become the people God wants us to become outside of community. You see, redemption is not the end of the story. God is preparing us for 2 Peter 3:13 We are looking for what God has promised, which are new heavens and a new earth. Only what is right and good will be there. His goal is a renewed creation, where redeemed humans dwell in perfect harmony with each other and with their Creator. God is out to prepare his people for this glorious future by transforming them now, a process the Bible calls sanctification. The agent of sanctification is the Holy Spirit. The tool of sanctification is the truth of the gospel. And the context of sanctification is community. Consider some of the âone anotherâ statements in the Bible: âLove one another with brotherly affection; outdo one another in showing honor.â Romans 12:10 âLove each other as Christian brothers. Show respect for each other. â 2 Corinthians 13:11 Last of all, Christian brothers, good-bye. Do that which makes you complete. Be comforted. Work to get along with others. Live in peace. The God of love and peace will be with you. â Galatians 5:13 Christian brother, you were chosen to be free. Be careful that you do not please your old selves by sinning because you are free. Live this free life by loving and helping others. Ephesians 4:32 You must be kind to each other. Think of the other person. Forgive other people just as God forgave you because of Christâs death on the cross. Isnât it obvious that none of us can do these things perfectly? These commands arenât given just so that weâll know what we should do; theyâre also given so that we can try, and fail, and grow in our experience of Godâs grace. Trying to fulfill these âone anotherâ commands helps to reveal our sin, drives us to Jesus in repentance and faith, and causes us to depend on the Holy Spirit for transformation. Community is the laboratory in which we learn to rely on Godâs grace and experience the gospelâs transforming power. Community is also the primary context for mission, our outward focus as believers. God wants to use our communities, messy and broken as they are, to draw others into his story and introduce them to Jesus, the Redeemer! Itâs not just about us becoming more like Jesus; itâs about people who donât know Jesus coming to know him as Savior and Lord. We sometimes treat community like the safety net under a tightrope walker: itâs a good thing to have in case something bad happens. But the Bible talks about community as if itâs the tightrope itself: you canât move forward without it. We are created for community. We are redeemed for community. And we are transformed in community. â Closing prayer: Dear Heavily Father we want to thank you for this time to reflect on your perfect love for us. We are imperfect people living in a chaotic world and we know it. We ask that you protect us, our family, our friends and everyone we come in contact with. We live to fulfill your will for our lives and we give you all our praise and worship. Thank you for giving Jesus your Son as your ultimate sacrifice so we could be a free people. And everyone said, Amen. Thank you for visiting VenuLife Church! We invite you to come visit us. Wherever you are you can join us on Saturday evenings at 7P for Online Messages and church events. God bless you! Senior Lead of VenuLife Church, Leonard Beene "Leo" VenuLifeChurch.org
