CREATED FOR CONNECTION

INTRODUCTION

Science tells us that we are hard-wired for relationships – God created us that way. Life change/transformation happens in the context of relationships. NOTE: accountability does not CHANGE people - life-giving relationships do! The definition of doing life together is; strangers become friends, friends become family! Christianity is imparted in relationships, not taught.

God hides the kingdom in Community:

​Matthew 16:19 NLT19 And I will give you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. Whatever you forbid on earth will be forbidden in heaven, and whatever you permit on earth will be permitted in heaven.”

From this statement we can draw two immediate conclusions:1. The Kingdom of God is hidden behind multiple locked doors.2. It is necessary to operate in the “Kingdom keys” given us by Jesus to enter into, and walk consistently in His kingdom.The first of these keys /principles is relationship; Jesus said He wasn’t showing up for the Lone Ranger;

GOD’S PLAN FOR SPIRITUAL MATURITY AND FRUITFULNESS

Ephesians 2:10 NLT

10 For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.

John 15 TPT

1 “I am a true sprouting vine, and the farmer who tends the vine is my Father. 2 He cares for the branches connected to me by lifting and propping up the fruitless branches and pruning every fruitful branch to yield a greater harvest. 3 The words I have spoken over you have already cleansed you. 4 So you must remain in life-union with me, for I remain in life-union with you. For as a branch severed from the vine will not bear fruit, so your life will be fruitless unless you live your life intimately joined to mine. 5 “I am the sprouting vine and you’re my branches. As you live in union with me as your source, fruitfulness will stream from within you—but when you live separated from me you are powerless. 6 If a person is separated from me, he is discarded; such branches are gathered up and thrown into the fire to be burned. 7 But if you live in life-union with me and if my words live powerfully within you—then you can ask whatever you desire and it will be done. 8 When your lives bear abundant fruit, you demonstrate that you are my mature disciples who glorify my Father! 9 “I love each of you with the same love that the Father loves me. You must continually let my love nourish your hearts. 10 If you keep my commands, you will live in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands, for I continually live nourished and empowered by his love. 11 My purpose for telling you these things is so that the joy that I experience will fill your hearts with overflowing gladness! 12 “So this is my command: Love each other deeply, as much as I have loved you. 13 For the greatest love of all is a love that sacrifices all. And this great love is demonstrated when a person sacrifices his life for his friends. 14 “You show that you are my intimate friends when you obey all that I command you. 15 I have never called you ‘servants,’ because a master doesn’t confide in his servants, and servants don’t always understand what the master is doing. But I call you my most intimate friends, for I reveal to you everything that I’ve heard from my Father. 16 You didn’t choose me, but I’ve chosen and commissioned you to go into the world to bear fruit. And your fruit will last, because whatever you ask of my Father, for my sake, he will give it to you! 17 So this is my parting command: Love one another deeply!” 18 “Just remember, when the unbelieving world hates you, they first hated me. 19 If you were to give your allegiance to the world, they would love and welcome you as one of their own. But because you won’t align yourself with the values of this world, they will hate you. I have chosen you and taken you out of the world to be mine. 20 So remember what I taught you, that a servant isn’t superior to his master. And since they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. And if they obey my teachings, they will also obey yours. 21 They will treat you this way because you are mine, and they don’t know the One who sent me. 22 “If I had not come and revealed myself to the unbelieving world, they would not feel the guilt of their sin, but now their sin is left uncovered. 23 If anyone hates me, they hate my Father also. 24 If I had not performed miracles in their presence like no one else has done, they would not feel the guilt of their sins. But now, they have seen and hated both me and my Father. 25 And all of this has happened to fulfill what is written in their Scriptures: They hated me for no reason. 26 “And I will send you the Divine Encourager from the very presence of my Father. He will come to you, the Spirit of Truth, emanating from the Father, and he will speak to you about me. 27 And you will tell everyone the truth about me, for you have walked with me from the start.”

Father God is above all things, relational.

God did not come to a fallen creation because heaven was lacking order or holiness. He considered all of heaven and its perfection along with his own holiness secondary to restoring relationship with a messy and broken creation.

CONSIDER THE FOLLOWING:

We are beings created in relationship - we were created in the image of a triune God in relationship. [1]“Let us make man in our image” – we are created in the image of a relationship.

We were created for relationship - God created us in His image to be in relationship with Himself. We are called “the bride”, “children”, “sons and daughters”, “brothers and sisters”; everywhere is the paradigm of intimate relationship.

We continue to exist by relationship - We continue to exist as a creation only as long as we are willing to pursue and cooperate in relationship.

Matthew 18:20 NLT

20 For where two or three gather together as my followers, I am there among them.”

By requiring relationship, he requires us to operate in that nature to walk in His By requiring relationship, he requires us to operate in His nature to operate in His Kingdom.

Galatians 5:22–23 NLT

22 But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!

Kingdom Relationships achieve exponential results:

When 2 or more Christians cooperate in something, it is a non-linear equation; to quote Aristotle put it this way: “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

Our ability to affect change in the earth increases exponentially when we are in community.

Knowing that we can greatly increase our impact in the earth through community, how then can we justify working alone?

Our individual witness is important, but it pales in comparison to our corporate witness in community.

Jesus said this:

John 13:35 TPT

35 For when you demonstrate the same love I have for you by loving one another, everyone will know that you’re my true followers.”

In Revelations is says this:

Revelation 12:11 AMP

11 And they have overcome (conquered) him by means of the blood of the Lamb and by the utterance of their testimony, for they did not love and cling to life even when faced with death [holding their lives cheap till they had to die for their witnessing].