Tag Archives: community

Putting the “Christian” in Christian Friendship

Posted on

Is there anything distinctive about Christian friendship? What’s different about how two fellow followers of Jesus relate to each other, compared with two friends who don’t identify with Christ? Romans 15:2 helps us consider one essential component of what puts the Christian into Christian relationships.

“Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, to build him up.”

Who Is Our “Neighbor”?

“Neighbor” can be used very broadly (as Jesus does in Luke 10:29), but in this case, Paul is plainly talking about fellow believers (as he does in Ephesians 4:25). This is confirmed in the verb “to build up” — a word which Paul reserves exclusively for the church. We’re talking about Christians here in Romans 15:2 — Christian neighbors, fellow followers of Jesus with whom we share some proximity. So we could say this text carries significance for Christian friendship.

And the imperative is to “please” them, to accommodate them, to make their welfare of higher interest than our own. To please our Christian neighbor is to serve them. Undoubtedly, this will be for our own joy — no one is really served when it’s done in stiff reluctance. But it being for our joy doesn’t mean it’s always (or often!) comfortable. Pleasing our neighbor will take sacrifice. It’s not typically easy — it’s “not to please ourselves.” We’re giving something up for something better and that better is the building up of our brother or sister.

Sacrificially Build Up One Another

The sacrificial building up of one another — this is what makes Christian friendship, well, Christian. It’s Christian both in the adjective (sacrificial) and in the verb (building up).

Sacrificial building up (“not to please ourselves”) means it’s Christian in its manner. The foundation to our serving, our sacrificial edifying of others, is rooted in the example of Jesus. We’re to have the Philippians 6:6–8 mind among ourselves. He didn’t give prominence to his own comfort when he “left glory.” Nor when he prayed in the Garden. It wasn’t easy when he bore our sins and suffered the wrath we deserved. Yet even in the midst of the pain, there was a joy set before him. It wasn’t easy, but it was glorious. And when we walk in that example, it works the same way (1 Peter 2:21). It shocks the world — for the glory of God.

But this sacrificial building up is not only Christian in its manner. It’s also Christian in its goal. The friendship goes beyond discussing the latest scores (though it may involve that), or the newest app (though that may be a part, too), or the best book we’ve read (another good one). The purpose is to build them up. This is what the pleasing is about, for their good. It’s about their conformity to Jesus. Our little place in their life is to serve the goal to which God has elected them, Jesus has died, and the Spirit is working. We want to build them up.

For Your Friends

Now then, let each of us, by grace, please our neighbor for their good — count them more significant than ourselves, and their needs more pertinent than our own; to build them up — play the God-ordained role of a means of grace in their lives, investing in their transformation into the likeness of Jesus. Let’s stir this Christian intentionality in our relationships — that we not seek to please ourselves, but that we pursue the pleasing of our neighbor for their good in Jesus.

Read the original post at DG.

It’s Good to Sing Together

Posted on

I think the weekly corporate gathering of the church, i.e., the church service, has been overemphasized. For many, at least in the American South [my majority experience], the Sunday gathering is the totality of the Christian life. Sunday and Wednesday nights are bonus points. And even for those who would check the right answer when asked, the church service can still be an event that drains energy, subtly eases the conscience about Christian activity, and inadvertently distracts from mission to our neighbors.

The simple adjustment (at least in words) is to make the corporate gathering a sabbath. Make it the weekly culmination and commissioning of the church’s calling to the world. It’s very important, just not the be-all, end-all of Christian existence.

With this qualifier in place, I love what Bifrost Arts are saying and doing. . .

(HT: JT on the video)

Beware of Over-accessorizing Community

Posted on

A few Derek Webb songs convinced me that I was a little too easy on myself in the previous post. I do have Americanism issues. I do like stuff. I like stuff even when it’s not mine, as long as it’s around here somewhere.

Now, the question is “Do I like stuff more than people?” Of course not. Nobody does. Give a man all the stuff there is and make him a loner— he’ll never make it. Everyone needs others. We are communal creatures. But beware of over-accessorizing community.

There is something to appreciate about a community’s rawness. One thing that we should help one another with is getting bare. No hype. No stuff. Just us. Us, together. Creatures of God put in relation to one another in Jesus Christ. I think this is what makes me love Bonhoeffer’s Life Together so much. It is real to the core.

May the Father grant us such community.

“You Are the God Who Works Wonders”

Posted on

“I will remember the deeds of the LORD; yes, I will remember your wonders of old. I will ponder all your work, and meditate on your mighty deeds. Your way, O God, is holy. What god is great like our God? You are the God who works wonders; you have made known your might among the peoples.”(Psalms 77:11-14)

Over the past few days my family and I had the joy of a good friend’s company. Joel Lind is back in the states after two years of gospel labor in Asia. Over the course of that time my family has anticipated the reunion we all just experienced. Elizabeth has drawn pictures of Joel and has heard us pray for him regularly when we tuck her into bed. She was seven months old the last time we were all together. She is getting closer to three years old now and over the past week she treated him like a hero–just like I hoped she would do. I could go on about that and about how Hannah greeted Joel with a lovely smile the first time they met… but I want to highlight something from Psalm 77:14, “You are the God who works wonders.”

The psalmist is battling doubt here. He questions the faithfulness of God. He is surrounded by uncertainty in regards to his present and his future. But then he “remembers the deeds of the LORD” (v. 11). He recounts God’s salvation of Israel. God has worked. He has expressed his power. He is the God who works wonders.

So at the brink of a new semester, a mile-marker in my graduate studies—nonetheless where my family is in seeking clarity for where to be in future ministry—grace is poured out on me to remember the wonders that he has worked. The wonder is the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And flowing from that are the numerous shimmers of wonder that have been lavished upon me in Christ.

The connection to Joel’s visit: he is a monument to me of God’s wondrous grace worked in my life. What began as a group of guys who lived together and decided to do a Bible study is today what I look back on as one of the single most important things that has ever happened to me. I cannot quantify the grace that was poured out upon me during that season of my life, along with the other brothers.  Joel’s visit is a means of grace to me in that I am reminded of that wonder in the past and given hope for wonder now and tomorrow.

In Jesus Christ alone, amen.

Brothers, Read Reviews

Posted on

In light of Jim Hamilton’s recent review of John Sailhamer’s The Meaning of the Pentateuch and a review by D.A. Carson of John Webster’s Holy Scripture: A Dogmatic Sketch , the value of reading reviews really reasserted itself.

Brothers, read reviews. And write them, too. Reviews accomplish a special thing in the life of the Church. It is the next best thing to sitting around a table with brothers or sisters over a cup of coffee in some book-club-type discussion.

Reading review are especially helpful for to two reasons:

1. Reviews leverage our independent thinking.

Reviews should not form our opinion of other writings, but they should supplement our independent thinking. I can’t let Don Carson tell me what I should think about John Webster’s writing. But I can (and I will) let Don Carson supplement (or even correct) what I have already come to think about John Webster’s writing.

I was recently reminded by a colleague, in conversation about Carl Trueman and Kierkegaard, that we must think independently and not simply have what “everyone else is saying” imported as our own conviction. This is so important. If we don’t learn to think independently then we will never be helped by theologians that the conservative evangelical consensus considers askew.  Bauckham would be dismissed because of what he thinks about 2 Peter. Moltmann would be ignored because his influences. Barth, well, we may catch something if we get too close to his works. To be sure, we should hear the concerns of others. But we need to also go to these works and learn to think for ourselves. Learn to disagree. Learn to learn from someone we disagree with on some points.

And then, after we have done this, go read a review and let it scrutinize your independent thinking.

2. Reviews help us get the gist of the books that we don’t have time to read

This is not a contradiction of point #1. There are a lot of books out there. We just cannot read them all. There are some books that we should read and others that we should at least know about. For those books that don’t, for whatever reason, make our lists of books to read, then read their reviews. A personal example would be David Peterson’s Engaging with God. I have heard amazing things about this book. It is a book that needs to be read. However, because this book is not pertinent to a biblical theology of union with Christ, I will not read it for the next two years. But I will read a review and hear Michael L. Johnson’s incessant ravings.

Brothers, read reviews.

What Do You Have? – Part One

Posted on

Apparently the gifted Corinthians had issues with judging one another’s spiritual giftedness (1:7). They were puffed up in favor of one against another. Paul goes straight to the heart of the problem. A misunderstanding of God’s gift to his Church is a misunderstanding of the gospel. Paul gives a series of three rhetorical questions that drive home his point in 1 Corinthians 4:7.


First, who sees anything different in you? That is, how do you distinguish these gifts in one another. Maybe there was some kind of ranking system they had put together. However they were doing, they were calling one guy better than another because he could do ______.


Paul follows, “What do you have that you did not receive?” There it is. Stop and think.  He is saying something like, “Okay, so you think this fellow is more gifted than this other fellow, where you think he got the gift from?” He surely did not create the gift himself. What? Do you think he just decided one day that he would start doing ____ in the power of the Spirit? Have we ever “just decided” as if anything decent has its origin in our own efforts? Paul’s point is that there is absolutely nothing that you have that was not given. That is, everything, everything, everything that you have has been given to you by God out of grace.


Paul concludes, “If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?” If God has given it to you out of his grace, then why do you act as if you acquired it by your personal will? What kid opens a present at his birthday party and instantly tries to pass it off like he made the present pop out of thin air? Or worse, would the kid act like he worked hard for years to make the birthday present happen? Or maybe he wants a pat on the back for making himself be born!

Learning to Pray Together: Protect Us From…

Posted on

“But let all who take refuge in you rejoice; let them ever sing for joy, and spread your protection over them, that those who love your name may exult in you.”

(Psalms 5:11 ESV)

From the post a couple of days ago… “The protection has a purpose, namely that those who love the LORD’s name may exult in Him. Protection is a means here to enjoying God–to being satisfied in Him. What protection means then must be expanded to refer to all those things that are an obstacle to enjoying God.“

So we should be vigilant to ask God to protect us from those things that would be an obstacle to exulting in Him.

Father, in Christ, by the Spirit… please protect us from:

  • the love of our own name in the place of Yours
  • a superficial joy that gives too much weight to the Central Division-leading Cardinals
  • aborting the grace of knowledge before it becomes the grace of transforming knowledge
  • thinking that anything in the universe is more important than Jesus Christ

What would you add to this list in order to help us pray for this kind of protection?

Let’s help one another here.

Holy Week Worship: Look to Him!

Posted on

Mike and Catherine Tong are hosting a time of meditation, singing, and prayer at their house from 9:30PM to 10:30PM every night this week. This time of worship is in fulfillment to Pastor John’s encouragement to set apart Holy Week. 

We are reading through chapters 26-28 of Matthew’s narrative and we are meditating on Psalm 22. The Scripture reading and meditation is followed by singing and a sweet season of prayer. 

The explanation for why we are meditating on Psalm 22 is found here.

This is an open invitation by the Tong’s– “Oh, magnify the LORD with us, and let us exalt his name together!”