Covenant Relationships: A Curriculum for Life with God & Each Other

Pastor’s Corner December 2019

On average North Americans check there phones every 6 1/2 minutes. Perhaps those older than 65 among us doso less, but those just starting out will do so even more. There are now baby bouncers and potty seats specifically designed with a slot to hold a phone or ipad. One quarter of teens are on their phones within five minutes of waking. On average teens send 100 texts per day. 80% of teens sleep with their phones. Now there is no question that digital devices are used in so many good ways, but they are changing the way and the quality with which we relate. But this is not the only way our relationship are changing.

Increasingly, our homes have shifted from being centres of service, work, and caring to retreats for comfort, recreation, and entertainment. The state has taken over much of society’s day-care and child earing, education, health provision, care of neighbours and family members in need. Almost half of our homes just have one person living in them, rather than a household however defined. On average people will have eleven different homes and neighborhoods through out their lives and they will know their neighbours much less. While short term commitment to marriage is on the rise with early divorces, surprisingly the number of couples divorcing after the \kids have been raised is on the rise too. As investments into our relationships is challenged with all the busyness of work and our recreations.

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Relationships in the church family change too. Some have tracked a trend to service becoming more entertainment events, where we become like religious consumers rather than engaged members of Christ’s earthly body and the family of God.

And finally relationship with God also changes when we lose the ability to be alone and quiet. Our growth in knowing the Lord is indeed stalled when we Him less and worship Him less. On the whole I think it is safe to say that relationships and community are thinning!

The good news is the Living God and His gospel have what we desperately need and this world is aching for! True friendship. This Advent season we focus on why the Son of God came and is coming again incarnate in our human nature, sharing our life so we can share His. And the reason is Friendship. Jesus says:

John 15:15 ESV

No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.

Jesus can bring us into true friendship with God, and experiencing that friendship is supposed to transform how we do family relationships and friendships. Over the last 7 years I’ve been taking one or two courses a year, through Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary to stay fresh and to equip me to pastor better. As a last project in this program, I am beginning to write a curriculum guide that should be helpful for our church and even others. I look forward to sharing this with our catechism program Grade 7-12, but perhaps also next fall with some sessions with the whole church on relationship. The goal is to set a foundation with our covenant relationship with the Lord as the model for what covenant relationships look like: i. in the home between parents and child, ii. in the church with intentional Christian friendship, and in iii. Dating Marriage and Singleness.

It is my firm conviction that our Christian community and outreach can be strong now and for the next generation if we take hold of the concept of friendship with God through covenant, and then let that model of spiritual friendship change all our relationships.

1 John 4:11 ESV

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

Put another way when we develop friendship with Jesus this should not disconnect us from the world; it means developing friendships with his friends. Nothing could be sadder than for us to claim to be friends of God, but not live in grace-filled loving relationships with those around us. As one medieval monk, Aelred of Rievaulx, describes it like this: Through friendship one learns of the love of Christ, and then through Christ one’s love of others is perfected! Can you imagine your love growing to be like Christ in your home, in a friendship with a fellow pilgrim here, with a spouse, or life-long friend. At the end of the day, and at the end of our lives - relationships are what really matters and where God’s grace is received and magnified. Please pray for me for blessing on this work