A Caring Community

Core Value #1-A Caring Community

SMALL GROUP TESTIMONY:
I want to begin by telling you how “A Caring Community” my dad was part of literally saved my life…. My dad was part of a small group, “A Caring Community,” when I was 19 years old and out of control…The reader’s digest version of my story goes like this…In my senior year of High School, I traded my dreams of becoming a professional BMX Bike Rider for a life of drug addiction…I did not just graduate High School with a Diploma, but also a heroin addiction…I did a lot of bad things to a lot of people….At the same time, my dad was part of a small group that met weekly a couple miles from my house… I finally got into trouble I could not get out of…It was pretty serious…the state of NJ offered me three years…so I agreed, but at the same time I got into trouble, my dad learned about Teen Challenge which is a Christian Drug and Alcohol rehab at his small group meeting from one of the group members….I had no clue of this, so the person who told him about TC also helped him get an application for me…The day I went to court to sign the papers that secured me a spot in a NJ state prison for 3 years…My dad came to court on my behalf…approached the judge and lawyer with a plan for an alterative sentence…He brought the application he got from his SMALL GROUP member with him, which is what I think sealed the deal and they accepted this alterative sentence before I even got into the court room that day…it just so happened that the Teen Challenge this application was for was the only TC this judge would accept that was out of state….remember this was that application my dad got because of someone in his SMALL GROUP cared enough about me, someone they did not even know…When I went to TC, I got saved, God called me into the ministry…Immediately following TC, I attended VFCC, and just gradated last May, and now I am here at GCTS with my wife…

(TRANSITION)—A SMALL GROUP, “A Caring Community,” was instrumental in my salvation…and because of this I take SMALL GROUP ministry extremely serious and personal….but before we jump into the nuts and bolts of “Holistic Small Groups”… I want to share with you two ways to keep CORE values CORE!!!

HOW TO KEEP CORE VALUE’S CORE:

(1). Our Core Value’s Are Non-Negotiable: Our core values are not just something we will post on our website or on the weekly bulletin…They are CENTRAL to who we are as people and as a Church.

This is how I look at core values…if I were to die today, like right now, do the people closest to me know my core values?...Do they know how important a caring community, strong marriages and healthy families are to me?...Do they know how important education is to me?... Do they know how important Biblical Studies are to me?...Do they know how important community is to me?

People tend to talk about those things that matter most to them…The question I ask myself and want to encourage you to ask yourself is: What do people learn from you when they are in your presence?... Do they know what you stand for?...What you would die for?...Do you have core values of your own, both personally and as a family?

As a family, one of my wife and I’s core values are “Strong Marriage.” “WE believe that if you want our marriage to work, we have to work on your marriage.” So we are intentional about working on our marriage, we have a plan of attack, we attend a marriage conference every year together, read a book together on marriage and do devotions together at the minimum….What are your core values and how are they evidence in your life?
(2). Our Core Value’s Apply To Everyone: They are not just for the pastoral and leadership staff, but every follower of Christ who is part of our church…They are to be embodied by each person in our church as if they were there own core values…When people see you, they should see these core values in action…You are a living, walking, talking billboard of Garden City Church…What you do and say is going to impact the spiritual and moral climate of the church…We as a group are going to be responsible for the shaping of Garden City Church…we are the leaders, we are going to set the tone, we are going to set the bar in a lot of different ways, probably a lot more than Rich and I have thought about… that is why these core values are so important….We must together, embody these core values in such a way that people’s lives are impacted by your presence in their life whether its at work, church, small group or at the grocery store….wherever you and I go, these values must shine through…We are all Core Value Evangelists…Hurting families need to see strong families…dysfunctional communities need to see caring communities…and on…!!!
GARDEN CITY CHURCH IS A CHURCH OF SMALL GROUPS: Garden City Church is a church of small groups… That is a loaded statement…We do not take small groups lightly around here…We are not a church that has some small groups over here and some over there…We are a church of small groups…. Small groups are not simply a program for the church. They are a way of being the church.

Small groups are not an add-on program…they are not one ministry among many…They are part of the fabric of our overall church life….Small Group Ministry is part of the DNA of Garden City Church.

Most of what we do will be in the context of small groups…Especially since we are portable we have to be extra intentional about the application of this core value….we will be renting a space every Sunday for a good while…which means we do not have any church building during the week to gather, (JOKE) unless you want to call Rich and my office at Starbucks part of Garden City Church!!! We will do almost all of our ministry in the context of small groups settings.

For instance, our small group leaders training will be at somebody’s home, our membership classes ( or as we are going to call them, our partnership classes, will most likely be in a home…I say all that to say, if you are not part of a small group at Garden City, you are not going to feel connected to the church…I am going to be totally honest with you, if you are not part of a small group in some way, your spiritual growth most likely will go down before it goes up….Small groups are a great way to grow spiritually…when you have people rubbing up against other people sparks create sharp edges, and as the BIBLE says loud and clear, “Just as Iron sharpens Iron, one man/woman sharpens another”…And Small Groups will be one of those environments where a lot of sparks fly, and sharpening takes place….

THE BENEFITS OF A CARING COMMUNITY:
(1) Research has proved that it is healthier to have a couple genuine relationships and eat junk food regularly then to eat healthy food and have no friends. So it is better to eat Twinkies with Good friends then to eat broccoli alone.
(2) Harvard did a study, where 276 volunteers were infected with the virus that causes the common cold. Those who had Meaningful Relationships were 4 times less susceptible to colds, they had less of the virus and they produced less mucus! Did you catch that, they produced less mucus! It’s literally true then that Unfriendly people are snootier then Friendly people.
(3) And last, I don’t know if you are aware of this, but research also tells us that being active in a small group is like receiving regular pastoral counseling (JOKE) Now we are not saying you all need counseling!!!

But we do think you need people in your life at all times…not just when you suffer a loss…because loses happen all the time…most of life can be lost in a moments notice…to lose a job is a loss, when somebody dies…that is a loss…if your son or daughter become addicted to drugs that is a loss…Loses are part of life…There is something about having somebody to share your low points as well as to celebrate your high points that makes all the difference in the world…

Larry Crabb says in his book Connecting: “People experience the life changing force of healing relationships when something powerful comes out of one and touches something good in another” (p. 56).

(STORY) About a month ago…one of my friends from VA, who also graduated TC a few years before me and who also graduated from VFCC, got a hold of me…He had recently gotten married in the beginning of January and within three weeks…his new bride left and wants a divorce…There is a whole bunch of back story…but he suffered a huge loss…he was hurt…confused…frustrated…and just in a lot of pain…so we started to talk…I tried my best to be emphatic…and prayed that God would show me what to say…we talked everyday for a week, shared some scripture, prayed together…and each day as we met together to talk on the phone…

(TRANSITION)—he was a little more encouraged…his spirit was lifted up a little more…his was more hopeful (JOKE) now I am sure it was not my eloquent speech or my brilliant exposition of scripture, off the cuff I might add…but what I am sure of is that “the life changing force of healing relationships, Larry Crabb says, people experience, when something powerful comes out of one and touches something good in another,” could be the reason…This life changing healing force is innate…because we were created from a community for community…

WE WERE CREATED FOR COMMUNITY:
I believe that community is God’s Best Idea…Let me ask you, what was the first Christian community in history? Trinity…And out of the overflow of love the Trinitarian Community had brought forth all of Creation

Before the creation of the universe and humanity, the Bible does not say this, but I bet the Godhead met for their weekly SMALL GROUP, collaborated, took a look at the Divine Blue prints one more time before they went to work for those 6 days… There is, some truth to what I just said…they were in complete unity…they were the first cohesive team in history…

The LOVE of GOD that spilled out of this community, created the universe….and since we were created in “the image and likeness” of God….community is part of our DNA…We were created to be in community… we are intrinsically social beings, we are made for community.

John Ortberg says, “The need for community is woven into the very fabric of our being. Nothing else can substitute for the life-giving benefits of connecting with others—not even God.”

(TRANSITION)—There are needs that are met through community interaction with human beings that God designed for us to meet in community…These needs can not even be met by God…But there is one problem with having these needs met in community…Are you ready for this?...The biggest problem with community is spelled, P-E-O-P-L-E…People are potentially the biggest problem with community.

THE PROBLEM WITH COMMUNITY:

The reason for this is because people are so very DIFFERENT…Just the fact that we are MALE and FEMALE is enough to show the vast differences but it is a lot more complicated than that…we are introverted and extroverted…thinkers and feelers…perceivers and judgers…intuitive’s and senser’s…we are Sanguine’s and choleric’s…melancholy’s and Phlegmatic’s...we are doers and be-er’s…we vote democrat or republican and even some independent…we are conservative and liberal…and on I can go…

But the reality is that potentially, the greatest obstacle from having meaningful community is the people in the community…If we dwell on the differences…than we will not celebrate the common bond we all share, Jesus Christ… He is the glue that holds the community together despite our great differences…He is the reason why we celebrate life together…He is the reason why we serve one another….He is the reason for community….


“PERSONAL CONFESSION”: I have to make a confession…”Hi..My name is Jess, (Your suppose to say, Hi Jess—What, you’ve never been to an AA Meeting”…I was a community junkie…I cared more about my dreams of community than God’s…When I first led a small group I thought it was more important to run a good meeting than caring for people…I thought that I had to get every detail off the list for us to have a good meeting…so if somebody took the whole group time talking about a problem and we didn’t get through the 4 W’s and some of the other details…It was a horrible group for me and I was upset…I was a community junkie… I discovered that I cared more about the agenda then people…

I repented of my sin, after I heard this quote from a man who was arrested in March of 1943. He was imprisoned by the Germans, and eventually hung, just before the end of World War II in Europe, which was just three weeks before the liberation of Berlin and one month before the capitulation of Nazi Germany.

Deitrich Bonhoffer said in his book, “Life Together:” “He who loves his dream of a community more than the Christian Community itself becomes a destroyer of the latter, even though his personal intentions may be ever so honest and earnest and sacrificial.”……What he was saying was, if you love the idea of community more than the people in your community, you will destroy the community.

(TRANSISTION)—The turning point for me was when I submitted to God’s plan for community, his model, not my egotistical hopes and dreams…In God’s vision for community…people are most important despite their differences and flaws.

“AS-IS-PEOPLE:” At the grocery store, there is an aisle where they have items that have been marked down from their original prices…I love this aisle, it is my favorite aisle in any grocery store…I love buying dented cans…I don’t think we own a can in our house that is not dented…We have like 20 cans of corn and they are all dented and I am proud of that!!!!

The items in this aisle are dented, broken and maybe a little stale, but still in a condition that they can be sold to the public. These items are marked “AS IS.” They are just like people. The reality is because of sin we are all damaged goods. We all have flaws, and we all fail at times. Even though, we are flawed God can still use us, just as a grocery store can still sell those items marked “AS IS.” At best we are “AS IS” people and guess what these are the people in your community.

John Ortberg in his book, “Everybody's Normal Till You Get to Know Them,” says,”We’re all weird. Folks around us may seem normal enough, but just wait till we get to know them—and they get to know us.”

(TRANS)—One of my favorite small group stories in the Bible is the story of the 4 friends, the Paralytic and the fellowship of the mat…

FELLOWSHIP OF THE MAT:

Imagine what life was like for the paralytic…He spent his whole life on a mat that was three feet wide and 6 feet long…Someone had to feed him, carry him, clothe him and move him to keep him from being covered with bedsores…He was dependent on people…Now one day, Jesus comes to their town…These four men find out that a famous Rabbi is in town so as it was custom you would go hear him speak…

(JOKE) One of them probably said, “We should bring “Mat” with us?” Get it, “Mat”…the paralytic lived on a mat!!!... They probably even heard about Jesus’ miracles and said…maybe that Jesus is for real.. …So Jesus did what he normally did and packed the house out...I bet there was probably standing room only…The BIBLE actually says, “There was no room left not even outside the door.”…These four guys saw a great opportunity for the paralytic, but they faced a great challenge…that challenge was those who were closest to Jesus, the religious people were in the way….(Sometimes people closest to Jesus are the biggest obstacle for others to get to Jesus)…So they improvised on the spot…and came up with Plan B…they must have had some carpenters in that small group because who in their right mind would come up with making a sky light as a plan B, unless you were a carpenter or at least a roofer… So they climbed on top of the house…lifted their friend up…and went to work…that sounds like a lot of work…

I thought to myself when was the last time I went to that extent to make sure someone got to experience Jesus like the paralytic…This guy was a nobody…and these friends knew that Jesus can make him into a somebody, but they also knew there friend was not able to do this in his own strength…from the looks of it, he might not even had the strength to have faith in Jesus because the Bible says it was “THEIR” faith that healed the man…these 4 friends were not just concerned with Mat’s physical needs, but also his spiritual needs…this little plural personal pronoun, “THEIR,” most people miss it…is the Greek word “αυτων” from αυτος, which means “HE”…

These 4 men were desperate to get their friend to Jesus…I want you to ask yourself…When was the last time you dug through a roof for a friend? Are you desperate to get people to Jesus or are you so close to Jesus that you are blocking others from him?

(TRANS)—John Ortberg says, ”Friends are people who have made a major roof crashing commitment to other human beings….When ever human beings love and accept and serve each other in the face of weakness and need, there is the fellowship of the Mat.”

DEFINITION OF COMMUNTY:

The Greek word for community is Koinonia…. Koinonia is an old, old word…the FIRST time it shows up is in the 4th century BC by Socrates who used Koinonia to describe the intimate connection the bond of marriage forms between two people who share one life.

Some 400 hundred years later…the word Koinonia was used to describe the relationship followers of Christ shared with each other…it was used a total of 17 times in the NT, what I discovered is that it was never used in the Gospels…It was used primarily by Paul…The gospel writer, Luke used it one time in Acts 2:42…this means the word is a post-Pentecost word…the word was applied to the Christian community following the spirit falling upon believers on the day of Pentecost…

Koinonia described the bond Christ followers have with each other…the foundation of that bond is spiritual…there is a (1) spiritual connectedness that binds Christ followers together…Paul says in 1 Cor. 12:13, “We were all given the one Spirit to drink.”…Since we all drink from the same spirit we are able to be unified despite are differences…

I want to show you something that blew me away about the power of koinonia…and its spiritual dynamic…that intimately connected believers in the early church…Acts 2: 42 reads, “They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship (KOINONIA), to the breaking of bread and to prayer.”

NOW CHECK THIS OUT—43 “Everyone was filled with AWE, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles.” 44 “All the believers were together and had everything in common (KOINOS).”

Notice they did not have extravagant church buildings, comfortable pews, power point programs, electric instruments, or even video screens…Could you believe it?...They had church without all that…But what does the text say?.. “Everyone was filled with AWE…”

One of the selling points for the early church was KOINONIA…there is a little word that is extremely important in front of koinonia…it is a definite article…”the”…Luke made it clear that is was not just any old group of people…this group was distinct…there was something different about these early Christians when they gathered together in the name of Jesus…

This fellowship...this koinonia involved close association…they shared life with each other…not just on a shallow level…like how’s the weather…but because of their (2) Relational Connectedness, the community shared a spiritual synergy….they shared common ground, and what and how they shared, was attractive to those both inside and outside the community….

Real Christian KOINONIA has nothing to do with technology, but everything to do with relational connectedness and spiritual connectedness to other Christ followers…Christians rubbing shoulders with Christians…there is no substitute for KOINONIA…

(TRANSITION) I can sit here all day long and expound so elegantly on koinonia…but if it does not become part of your thoughts and convictions then it will not work…because for the most part you will forget my word study and examples…but if it is part of who you are, your convictions as a follower of Christ, than it does not matter because it will be an automatic response in whatever group you are a part of and relationship you find yourself in….KOINONIA is not a thing to do, but a thing to be…I want to share with you two convictions that are non-negotiable for building community…

THE CONVICTION OF COMMUNITY:

(1) AUTHENTICITY:

Do people know who you really are? Do people know what you are struggling with? Do people know your secrets?....The reality is we become what we hide…we become our secrets…what we tend to do is hide our bad things…and announce our good things…but if we reverse that, we will become better people…we will become authentic.

Authenticity is a journey not a destination…You will always be more authentic tomorrow than you are today because it takes time to be authentic…and it also takes trust to be authentic…so in time as you trust, you will grow in authenticity…

Authenticity means to reveal the real you…to balance out your perfections with your imperfections…to disclose information about yourself that gives people the big picture of who you really are not just who you want people to know…

The heart cry of our culture today is authenticity…We live in a day where SHE can be a HE, and HE can be a SHE…a man can have a baby…but be a woman at the same time…black people can be white…plastic surgery can do just about anything…divorce is acceptable…family is not as important as success in the business place…and I can go on…We are living in a time where Americans prefer “A good fake to a bad real. But also, A bad fake could not be as good as the good fake.” …

Did you ever hear of the Alamo?…It is a historical monument in Texas…When Hollywood went to make a movie about its history…they found out it was too small so they bought some land in the Texas desert and built a replica Alamo…Do you know that just as many people visit the fake Alamo each year than the real Alamo?…

Americas prefer a good fake to a bad real…But on the other side of the coin, Americans will not tolerate a bad fake that is not as good as a good fake…

True story…A girl wanted to be a playboy model, so she went out and got all the plastic surgery that was necessary for her to look just like Pamela Anderson…and when she got to the picture shoot with the Playboy photographers…they said she looked too fake and fired her on the spot…

Americans will not tolerate a bad fake…Do you see the problem? Where are the real people in our culture…Where are the authentic people who are really real…Who embrace who they are and not try to be who they are not? ….I don’t think there is a better evangelistic tool than authenticity in today’s culture that is so confused and in the dark…

When God says, “He is light”...what HE means is that HE has made a full disclosure of who HE is…He has shed light on all areas necessary for us to know him on an intimate level…

The Bible says, in Colossians 1: 26 “The mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations, but is now disclosed to the saints. 27 To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”

(TRANSITION)—God has made himself fully known to us in Jesus Christ…so that we can fully know him…Have you opened up your life for others to see who you really are so that they can fully know you…Are you an open book like God?… OR...Do you only allow people to see a couple chapters of your life?

(2) MUTAULAITY (SECOND CONVICTION):

A small group is a place where everybody present is a potential participant…This is the thing…if Jesus is in you…then you have something to bring to the table…there is something in your that I need to be me and there is something in me that you need to be you….we need each other to be who God created us to be…

God didn’t create any “Lone Ranger Christians”…He created us to be in community which means to share our giftings, talents and abilities with those who are in our community with us…

This is Biblical...Paul says to the Corinthians who struggled with mutuality, “What then shall we say, brothers? When you come together, everyone has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. All of these must be done for the strengthening of the church” (1 Cor. 14:26).

Do you know what the Greek for “each person” mean? “Each Person.” Every person has something to bring to the table…not just the select few on Sunday mornings who are being used in their gifts, talents, and abilities… In order for the whole body of Christ to be fully functional…you and I must exercise our gifts, talents, and abilities…in some capacity..

(ILLUSTRATION)--I have led small group Bible discussions where I studied hours for a lesson…parsed all the Greek words, read all the commentaries and someone in group who does not even go to Bible school will say something that made all my studies useless and my response to that is…I love it…

Each person has something to bring to the table so that we can strengthen each other…What we do bring to the table has the power to build somebody up or on the other hand…tear somebody down…The law of love always drives mutuality because without love we are “only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal” (1 Cor. 13:1)

(TRANSIITION)—Remember, No one dominates, but each person mutually gives to others and mutually receives from others so that you and your group will be built up.


HOW TO BUILD COMMUNITY (KOINONIA)!

Larry Crabb also says, “Something powerful has been placed within us that we are to release toward others in a way that promotes godly community” (pg.57—Connecting).

People experience the power of Christian community when we “Practice the ONE ANOTHERS.”

A powerful example of what koinonia should look like can be found in a study of the phrase “one another” in the Bible. There are 53 “One Another’s” in the Bible: SCRIPTURE COMMANDS us to be (1) Devoted to one another (Romans 12:10), (2) Honor one another (Romans 12:10), (3) Live in harmony with one another (Romans 12:16; 1 Peter 3:8), (4) Accept one another (Romans 15:7), (5) Serve one another in love (Galatians 5:13), (6) Be kind and compassionate to one another (Ephesians 4:32), (7) Admonish one another (Colossians 3:16), (8) Encourage one another (1 Thessalonians 5:11; Hebrews 3:13), (9) Spur one another on toward love and good deeds (Hebrews 10:24), (10) Offer hospitality to one another (1 Peter 4:9), and (11) Love one another (1 Peter 1:22; 1 John 3:11; 3:23; 4:7; 4:11-12).

That is what true biblical koinonia looks like. In those very moments, when you are practicing the one-another’s, you are restoring to that person what was lost in the fall and what has taken place in their life because of sin…

(TRANSITION) In closing, I want to share with you a true story...that took place in a small group I was part of…when we got serious about koinonia…and stopped serving ourselves…

OPERATION JASON
I want to share a story I call “Operation Jason.” Last year, in the men’s small group I was facilitating, our group’s target audience was for both men on campus and men in Phoenixville. Jason was from off campus. He was in his late twenties and was married to a woman who had mental issues. When Jason joined our group his wife was actually in the hospital. Upon her release, they moved into a new apartment. He had very little money when moving into this apartment. After personally going to visit this apartment I learned that they did not have any furniture whatsoever. Plus the place they were moving into was disgusting. It was filthy. It probably was not pained in years and was not cleaned in longer…..One night after visiting Jason with another guy from the group, he dropped me off around 1:30 AM. No sooner did I jump in the shower. Isn’t funny how some of our best ideas come in the bathroom? For some reason, I remembered that earlier in the day I helped someone throw a bed into an empty dumpster. All of a sudden it dawned on me that they did not have a bed. So I got out of the shower and called my friend. Mind you it was about 2:00AM at this point. I told him about my idea and asked him what he thought? So we decided to go get the mattress and surprise them. He comes to pick me up with his little Saturn. So we tie the bed to the roof of his car with a telephone wire and drive through Phoenixville to his apartment and wake him up. He was so happy. On our way home that night (actually early morning) I thought about that show extreme makeover. We began to talk about it and thought it would be a great outreach to do with the group. The next small group meeting, without Jason there, we discussed it and decided to surprise him with an extreme makeover. We got some money together and God blessed us with a long couch, two chairs, and a kitchen table with chairs, a ton of cleaning supplies and 4 gallons of paint (The Miracle Paint). With the whole group present, plus a few extra people we met up and went to his apartment instead of having our normal group time and completely remodeled the apartment in two hours. They were blown away. We completely painted both rooms and cleaned every inch of that apartment plus refurnished it in less than two hours. (The Miracle Carpet)!!!

Small Groups are to be Colonies of Heaven…if people want to know what Heaven is going to be like, they should see it in your small group…in the way you care for the communities that matter most…