How to Make Friends & Love Other People
How to Make Friends - E4 - Mission
January 28, 2024 • Caleb Martinez • Jeremiah 29:4–7, Matthew 28:19–20
Throughout the Biblical story, the people of God usually find themselves in the minority. From slavery in Egypt to oppression and persecution by Rome, God’s people have always had to learn how to live in a culture that isn’t their own. In the prophet Jeremiah’s day, the Israelites found themselves exiled in Babylon surrounded by enemies and paganism. But rather than assimilate into the culture or separate themselves from it, God instructs his people to pursue the well-being of their city. We find ourselves in a similar situation today. As we form tight-knit communities of proximity, vulnerability, and practice, we will become increasingly at odds with the world around us. And yet, it’s through these very communities and friendships that God intends to renew the world. By committing to accomplishing the mission of God, our friendships can do what God instructed the exiled Israelites to do: renew our city.
How to Make Friends E3 - Practice
January 21, 2024 • Trey Van Camp • Deuteronomy 5, 2 Kings 21, 2 Kings 22, Matthew 11:28–30
When it comes to developing deep friendships that form and shape us into the image of Jesus, one barrier often stops us: preferences. Rather than commit to a community of people who hold us accountable and build us up, we find it easier to surround ourselves with others who think like, act like, and approve of us. But the people of God have never flourished this way. In https://biblia.com/bible/csb/exod%2020 and https://biblia.com/bible/csb/deut%205, God institutes a set of practices and behaviors (the 10 Commandments) meant to shape and form his people into his image. And when Jesus starts his earthly ministry, he chooses 12 unlikely men who wouldn’t normally get along to reorient their lives on him. For us today, becoming a community of practice means putting aside our preferences, committing to each other no matter how different we are, and reorienting our lives on Jesus.
How to Make Friends - E2 - Vulnerability
January 14, 2024 • Trey Van Camp • 2 Timothy 1:6–18, Proverbs 26:24–26, 2 Timothy 2:8–13, 2 Timothy 4:17–18
One of the hardest but most rewarding features of any healthy friendship is vulnerability. We get the most out of our relationships when we allow ourselves to be fully known and truly loved. And yet, few of us actually experience this type of freeing love. Instead, we live in private shame over our weaknesses, wickedness, and woundedness. But the gospel frees us from fear and shame. By learning to practice vulnerability with those around us, we become capable of deep and valuable relationships. To get the most out of our friendships, we move from proximity to vulnerability.
How to Make Friends E1 - Proximity
January 7, 2024 • Trey Van Camp • Genesis 2:18–22, Proverbs 27:5–17
As connected, informed, and globalized as we are through social media and the internet, we’re also becoming more and more lonely. Fewer and fewer people admit to having close friends, and as life becomes more automated and individualized, it’s easier to go through our days without any meaningful interactions with other people. But this is far from the life that God designed for us. From the opening pages of Genesis to the end of the human story in Revelation, we see that God has always intended us to live in close proximity to one another — Adam walked with God and was still lonely before Eve; Abraham is called out to create a new close knit family; Jesus does ministry while in deep relationship with his disciples; Paul takes close friends like Barnabas and Timothy with him on his ministry journeys; and the early church grows because of their radical inclusion of their neighbors. To recapture these lost relationships and live the way God intended, we start with a simple step: moving towards people in proximity the way God moves towards us.