Message: You're Invited to Community
Speaker: Tim Bounds
Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. Ecclesiastes 4:9-10
DISCUSSION:
-Looking back at least week's message from Matthew 7:7: When it comes to community, what does it mean to ask, to seek and to knock?
Read Acts 2:42-47
This is a picture of the kind of community we are invite to do together.
DISCUSSION:
-What things did this community do to care for and to be in relationship with one another?
-What would it look like today in our context to be community as this passage describes?
There is an epidemic of loneliness in our society. Half of all Americans say that they feel lonely and isolated. Two out of five say they have no meaningful relationships.
DISCUSSION:
-Can you describe a time in your life where you experienced real loneliness or isolation?
-What can we do to identify those who are lonely and invite them into community?
Read Colossians 3:12-16: This is a beautiful picture of community.
DISCUSSION:
-List the very specific ways this passage encourages us to love and care for one another.
When we love each other like this we begin to experience genuine love in community.
We also begin to reflect God's love to those around us.
And we begin to experience communion with God Himself. God exists in community. We see this in the mystery of the Trinity.
"The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit were in an endless dance of endless love and surging joy and delightful play as they enjoyed the depth of their love for on another." Scot McKnight
The is the love and community that we are invited into.
As we discover this community, we are called to invite others into it as well.
"Welcome is one of the signs that a community is alive. To invite others to live with us is a sign that we aren't afraid, that we have a treasure of truth and of peace to share." Jean Vanier
DISCUSSION:
-What are we afraid of when it comes to being in community or inviting others into community?
-Has there been a time that you were invited into community that made a difference in your life?
-How can we better live out what we saw in Colossians 3 and share this treasure of truth and of peace?
It becomes community only when people start truly caring for each other and for each other's growth.
Jean Vanier