Some Thoughts on Relationships

Relationships: Messy, challenging, hard work, needed, outdated, helpful, hurtful, costly, and sacrificial. These are just a few of the adjectives I have heard over the years when it comes down to the relationships people have.

At First Free, we call our small groups Life Groups. This is purposeful. Implied in the title are the questions, ‘With whom are you doing life? With whom do you spend time hanging out and talking about the deepest things of life? Whom do you sharpen, and who sharpens you?’ Proverbs 27:17 “As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend.”

When you look at the life of Jesus you discover he lived it with great intentionality. He lived toward the cross and the resurrection. He depended on God for constant guidance. He made choices strategically. For example, look at these verses from Luke 6:12-13: One day soon afterward Jesus went up on a mountain to pray, and he prayed to God all night. At daybreak he called together all of his disciples and chose twelve of them to be apostles.

I see in these two verses an intentionality of relationships.

We need to gather with our ‘thousands.’ I’m not talking about the number but the environment. We need to be a part of a weekly gathering with other followers of Jesus, some whom we might know personally, but many of whom simply share our common bond of being part of God’s forever family. A family where we can sing together, be taught together, serve together but we can’t go deep together.

We need to pour ourselves into others, and we need to be poured into ourselves by others. We need to have a network of dozens. This is when we get to know each other by name. You can go a little deeper with a network of people with whom you intentionally stay in touch. You may have a thousand friends via social media networks, but we probably only maintain actual friendships with a small percentage of those.

We need a Life Group. Jesus had thousands of followers. He had dozens of disciples. He picked twelve to train more deeply and send out. A small number helps us with prayer, caring, accountability, studying the Bible together and mutual encouragement.

And last of all we need a handful of close friends. Jesus had Peter, James, and John that were with him even more often than the other 9. He wasn’t showing favoritism. He just knew He needed to have a tightly knit core of friends in His life. To pour wisdom into them. For us we need them to pour it right back into us.

So let me ask you- who are your 3? Who are your 12? Who are your 70? Who are your thousands? If you can’t spit the names of your few or your dozen out pretty quickly, start working today on developing relationships. How? Well, not by passively waiting for friendship to happen. Reach out. Encourage. Invest. Give. Be a friend, mentor, and leader.

Blessings,
Mark "The Bru" Brunott