Hunter,
The messages you and Ben have been preaching lately from Proverbs have been truly beneficial and I believe of course, God’s message for us.
The one thing that really grabbed us when we first came to Redeemer over a year ago was the emphasis on community. I also had great need for healthy relationships and God has brought us to a wonderful place.
Yet in ‘community’ we always don’t agree, especially regarding politics. I grew up conservative Southern Baptist, have had a good dose of Wesleyan , Lutheran, Charismatic, Moravian and Presbyterian influence in my beliefs. I also know that I can be extremely opinionated, critical, and judgmental. These are things/sins the Lord is showing me I need to repent of and as I ask for His grace to do so, the testing comes when I encounter people at this wonderful place who don’t agree with me. Sometimes it is a strong temptation to withdraw and disassociate with others, yet God calls us to and blesses us in community. So when I see a bumper sticker on someone’s car promoting their politics, that ire wants to rise up in me, but because ‘greater is He that is in me’ truly is in me, I ask God for the grace to love that brother or sister regardless. And this is not easy, especially with a strong track record of isolation. Sometimes it seems easier to withdraw, sulk and be critical than to engage, love and respect and perhaps (I shudder) to be willing to change my mind.
Anyway, this is my thought for the day. Thank you for listening Hunter.
Signed,
The Isolator
I don’t know where to begin. It seems very providential that the only e-mail that I had today was from you saying that you would be preaching on friendships/relationships the next three Sundays, after a morning of feeling very hurt by a good friend. The incident this morning seems like one of many among several relationships in my life.
I guess being a quieter person, I often feel left out of conversation when I am with groups of people (sometimes I am very OK with that). But I often feel left out of “groups” or maybe “clicks” of friends. I can be deeply jealous of the people who seem to be “best” friends with each other when I am not a part of it. I continue to tell myself that maybe I am so different from these people that a deep relationship wouldn’t work anyway so I just shouldn’t worry about it. After all, shouldn’t people be allowed to be better friends with others and it be OK? But it is hard for me to let it go. I feel so sinful with my jealousy.
I do have a few good friends in my life who I love dearly, but as a stay-at-home, homeschool mom with a baby who still naps twice a day, I often feel like I don’t have the time to pursue relationships the way I did in the past. It feels like if I’m not calling and pursuing other people then I am somehow off their radar.
I’m not sure if this helps at all for your purposes, but I felt compelled to share. Please pray that I would have wisdom and clarity in these relationships and that I would know what it looks like to be repentant concerning my jealousy.
Signed,
Home Alone
I’m glad to hear sermons on friendship and community, and I appreciate you opening it up for comments. As I was reading the email, I knew I had to comment, since this has been one of the big struggles of my life. I spoke about it some during Sonship last year, and that class actually was very helpful in learning to trust the Spirit more with pursuing friends.
One of the questions I often ponder is what does it look like for an introvert to live in community. I enjoy being around people, and I know that I need community, but it wears me out sometimes! Time to myself is hard to come by these days (with 3 kids), and after being around people I need the down time. In the past, I have gone to extremes in pursuing friends. One week, I’ll make lots of plans with people. Then I get overwhelmed and spend the next week resting and “getting things done”. I have gotten better about spreading out my social time and with inviting people to do things together. Sometimes I really want to spend time with people, and sometimes I do it out of guilt or loneliness. The Sonship class helped me see those sinful patterns and that the focus is on me. Now I am trying to ask the Spirit to help me love my friends and focus on them instead of myself, and to give me direction in knowing when to call people up. Also, if they can’t get together, I used to feel that I had few friends, but now I am trying to trust that this is the way the Spirit is answering my request for direction. Then there’s the whole jealousy thing — of seeing my friends hanging out without me. (Facebook is the worst for that, by the way!) But, here is an opportunity for repentance and leaning on the Spirit to help me overcome the temptation to be jealous. God has put me here with these people as my friends on purpose, and I have to remember that and love them.
Another struggle I have is having deep friendships and the consistency it takes to maintain them. To look at me from the outside, you’d think I was deep in community, being involved in a lot at church. But I have the tendency to want to know everybody a little bit, which means I don’t know many people very well. I’m not saying I don’t have good friends — God has blessed me with many. But I have a hard time keeping in touch regularly. Sometimes I feel like I’m missing out on some friends if I spend all my time with others. There’s so much to do and so little time, and I have a hard time focusing on a few. It encourages me that Jesus had Peter, James, and John so close to him and was still able to love many. I want to grow in this area. I imagine this is a gap for a lot of people — knowing people in their church community but still not having a deep relationship.
I see these struggles in friendships as part of a bigger struggle in friendship with Jesus. Growing up, I had the blessing of having a family and church that taught me a great deal about the Bible and theology. Much of my spiritual growth has been turning that head knowledge into heart knowledge about relationship with God and with others. Even the day I mark as the day I became a Christian was realizing that Jesus was standing at the door and knocking, wanting to come in and be in a relationship with me. One of the things I love about Redeemer is it moves me to be in authentic relationship with God and with people because of the atmosphere of repentance and grace.
Thanks for listening, and for your faithfulness in preaching the Word. And for teaching the Sonship class last year!
Signed,
Recovering Introvert
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