0:05

Hello and welcome to the John Mark

0:07

Comer Teachings Podcast. I'm Strawn

0:09

Coleman, your host and part of the teaching

0:11

team here at Practicing The Way. Each

0:14

week on the podcast we share a teaching

0:17

from John Mark or other trusted voices in

0:19

the formation space. Today

0:22

we continue our series in partnership with

0:24

Bridgestown Church called 9 Practices for

0:26

a Rule of Life, with

0:28

the return of John Mark to explore the

0:30

practice of community. In

0:32

this teaching John Mark addresses the cultural

0:34

loneliness so prevalent in our time, exploring

0:37

three circles of relationship every apprentice

0:40

of Jesus is invited to live

0:42

in to. As

0:45

you listen you may like to ask yourself the question, how

0:48

am I going with not journeying

0:50

alone? Here's John

0:52

Mark. I'm

0:56

going to read to you from Mark

0:58

chapter 1, and that

1:01

will serve as our jumping off point

1:03

for our teaching today. Mark chapter 1

1:06

beginning in verse 16. As

1:13

Jesus walked beside the sea of Galilee,

1:15

he saw Simon and his brother Andrew

1:17

casting a net into the lake, for

1:19

they were fishermen. Come,

1:21

follow me, Jesus said, and I will

1:23

send you out to fish for people.

1:26

At once they left their nets and followed him. When

1:29

he had gone a little further, he saw James,

1:31

son of Zebedee, and his brother John in a

1:34

boat preparing their nets. Without

1:36

delay he called them, and they left their

1:38

father Zebedee in the boat with the hired

1:40

men and followed him. This is the

1:43

word of the Lord. Good

1:52

morning everyone. Peace

1:55

to all of you. Ah

1:57

gosh, it does my heart such.

2:00

Good. I will discipline myself to not

2:02

talk about two things this morning. One, the

2:05

weather in Southern California. And

2:08

two, just how sappy

2:10

I am and just so much love

2:12

for all of you. T and the kids all send their

2:14

love. Mo is down here in the front row. But

2:17

we miss you terribly this morning. It's not

2:19

about that. It's not about me. But we

2:21

miss you terribly. And it is my honor

2:24

to come back. I hear so

2:26

many good things about you from your leaders. And

2:29

so many good things about your leaders from you. And

2:31

that's the winning combination that is very rare, it

2:34

turns out, in church life. And

2:36

I just love

2:38

what God is working in the soil

2:40

of this community. And

2:43

it was my dream to pass

2:45

the baton when my time was done to

2:48

a leader who would take you into a whole

2:50

new territory that I could never take you. And

2:53

we all live with unfulfilled dreams. And I think

2:55

we'll go to our grave with some. But

2:57

then there are those that come true. And that

3:00

is the great joy of life. So thank

3:02

you so much. That

3:04

guy is just still really good looking. That's

3:06

not intimidating at

3:08

all. Okay. Mark

3:11

Chapter 1. Go ahead and do me

3:13

a favor. Just take a deep, slow,

3:17

belly breath to just center

3:19

your soul before God. I

3:36

find this photograph to be haunting. This

3:41

is the oil tycoon John Paul Getty

3:43

at Sutton Palace,

3:45

his home in the English countryside in

3:47

the early 60s right before his death.

3:49

At the time, the richest man in

3:52

the world. Short version on

3:54

his biography is, he was the quintessential,

3:56

you know, self-made man. But

3:59

the more wealthy man he was, The more wealthy

4:01

and famous and successful he became, the more

4:03

miserly he became. Multiple

4:05

movies have been made about the famous

4:07

story where his grandson was kidnapped and

4:09

he refused to pay the ransom. Apparently,

4:11

with his dying breath, he was complaining

4:13

about medical bills. And

4:15

he just grew more and more isolated.

4:17

His wife wrote... Not making this up.

4:20

His wife wrote a memoir about their

4:22

marriage and titled it Alone Together. Not

4:26

great, you know? Just not a

4:28

great sign. And here

4:30

he is at the climax of his

4:32

life. All

4:34

the money in the world. Sitting

4:37

at the head of a table

4:39

made for fifty. Or innate tapas.

4:41

I mean, literally golden goblets on

4:43

the table. But he is

4:47

all alone. This

4:49

image is like the anti-messianic feast.

4:53

If you're familiar... Yeah. I

4:59

feel the same about my preaching all of the time.

5:02

At least you have a

5:04

way out of it. This

5:09

image is like the anti-messianic feast. If you're

5:12

familiar with that literary motif, running all the

5:14

way through the library of scripture, where

5:17

the kingdom of God is likened to a feast. And this

5:19

is the kingdom like in the fullness of it, down

5:22

the road in the future. And

5:24

at this kind of banquet table, as I

5:26

imagine Abraham at one hand and Jesus at

5:28

the other, and the family

5:30

of God from every tribe and tongue

5:32

and nation at a table set rich

5:35

with food and wine, this

5:38

man would be miserable at the

5:40

messianic feast. Sometimes

5:44

it's helpful to see the concentrated

5:46

form of something in

5:49

order to better understand the diluted

5:51

form. And I

5:53

can't think of a better image to

5:56

capture the concentrated form of one of

5:58

the hallmarks of late capitalist society. what

6:01

the sociologist Robert Bella famously

6:03

called radical individualism. The

6:06

self-made man, and it is normally a man, out

6:08

to conquer the world, and nowadays the world's not

6:10

enough. Where do all the billionaires go next? Space.

6:16

The final frontier for male ego, right

6:18

there. What's

6:20

Elon Musk's life mission? Quote,

6:22

to make human beings an interplanetary

6:25

species. What's your life

6:27

mission? Bella

6:30

called individualism the defining

6:33

trait of America. And

6:36

the dark underbelly of radical individualism is

6:39

loneliness. Now

6:42

you are likely not an oil tycoon, and

6:44

I doubt you eat dinner alone in your

6:46

palace on a golden plate. But

6:49

do you feel lonely?

6:55

Do you ever ache for

6:57

more in relationship? More

7:01

than just colleagues and co-workers

7:03

and friends and running partners,

7:05

but something more. To

7:08

know and be known to have at

7:12

least somebody love and accept you as

7:14

you are and yet call you to

7:16

grow, and

7:18

to give and receive love. And

7:22

yet at the same time, is there some parts

7:24

of you, as there is in most of us,

7:27

that is absolutely terrified of such an

7:29

idea? Do you feel

7:31

that push-pull dynamic inside your own body

7:34

where part of you is drawn toward

7:36

more relationship and the other part of

7:38

you is simultaneously, I

7:40

don't know. If so, you are not alone.

7:45

Part of the pain of the human condition

7:47

is this. It doesn't matter what day and

7:49

age you were born into, whether you have

7:51

a family or you are single, or you

7:53

are an oil tycoon or a barista, all

7:57

of us feel the pain

7:59

of loneliness. In

8:01

the fourth century, St. Augustine, who was the bishop

8:03

of the city of Hippo in North

8:05

Africa, wrote his book Confessions, which

8:07

is arguably the first memoir in history,

8:10

but it's a theological memoir. It's kind

8:12

of reflections on his life through the

8:14

lens of Christian theology. And

8:16

one of Augustine's most insightful contributions

8:18

is his work on loneliness. For

8:21

Augustine, loneliness is the best

8:24

word we have to

8:27

name the felt experience of being

8:29

human this side of the

8:31

garden, being created in the

8:33

image of God and yet cast out

8:36

of Eden. We come

8:38

out of the womb searching

8:40

for love and connection. Experts

8:44

who study attachment tell us that

8:46

our attachment system comes online either

8:49

when we're still in the womb or

8:51

at least the moment we take our

8:53

first breath of oxygen. Look

8:55

at newborn babies. I just... See? Another one

8:57

goes. There it is. I

9:00

just became an uncle. See? That is my nephew walking

9:02

in the foyer right there with the guy that looks

9:04

a lot like me, just a little bit handsomer. That's

9:07

my little brother. I just became

9:09

an uncle again, twice over. And if

9:11

you ever have the gift to be

9:13

in a delivery room, the miracle

9:15

of childbirth, what do infants do?

9:18

Often they come out and as they

9:20

begin to open their raised-in eye, they

9:23

immediately begin looking around

9:25

to make a connection. Dr.

9:28

Kurt Thompson has that lovely

9:30

line, we all are born

9:32

into the world looking for

9:34

someone looking for us. And

9:37

we remain in this mode of searching for

9:40

the rest of our lives. So

9:43

in a way, loneliness

9:45

is the seedbed of all

9:47

spirituality. It's the ache that

9:49

drives you and I out of the prison

9:51

of the self to search for God, ultimately

9:54

the one who is looking for us. Because

9:58

in the core of our being, it turns out, that

10:00

what we all crave is not just friends

10:02

to hang out with and watch

10:04

a new show, not even a

10:06

lover to know and be known by,

10:08

or even a family. We desire more

10:10

than any other human or family, no

10:12

matter how intimate and healthy could ever

10:15

give what ancient Christians call union

10:17

with God. So

10:20

loneliness is just part of what it means to

10:22

be human. Welcome to the

10:24

condition. And we can

10:27

open it up and let it become our

10:29

pathway to God. As

10:31

the Persian poet Hafiz said,

10:33

don't surrender your loneliness so

10:35

quickly. Let it cut

10:37

you more deep. Let

10:40

it ferment. Something missing

10:42

in my heart tonight has

10:44

made my eyes so soft,

10:48

my voice so tender, my need

10:50

for God absolutely clear.

10:55

But that said, the cultural milieu

10:57

we live in, in particular in

10:59

this city, has turned loneliness up

11:01

to a fever pitch. You

11:03

all know the stats, the percentage of Americans who say

11:05

they have no close friends, quadrupled

11:08

between 1990 and 2020. 54%

11:12

of Americans, more than half, say, quote,

11:15

no one knows them well. 36%

11:18

of Americans report they feel lonely frequently

11:20

or almost all of the time. That

11:23

number goes up to 51% for young mothers and 61% for

11:25

young adults. Vivek

11:30

Murphey, the former Surgeon General of the U.S., made

11:32

waves recently when he called

11:34

loneliness a social epidemic, and his claim

11:37

was it's the number one health threat

11:39

in America. The claim is it's

11:41

worse for your health than smoking 15 cigarettes

11:44

a day. And

11:46

it's not just in the U.S. The United

11:48

Kingdom famously appointed a loneliness minister a few

11:50

years ago. Other nations

11:52

have followed suit to attempt to

11:54

heal this wound in the soul

11:56

of our society. Turns

11:59

out, you are a man of the same. You cannot be

12:02

a true original. March to

12:04

the own beat of your own drum. You

12:07

do you. Don't let anybody tell you

12:09

what to do. Speak your truth.

12:11

There's nobody in the world just like you.

12:13

Swipe right. And

12:15

taste the goodness of a quiet

12:18

relational life marked

12:24

by giving and receiving love.

12:28

Is there a practice from

12:31

the way of Jesus to

12:33

live in a thick web of

12:36

loving relationships right in

12:38

the midst of a global epidemic of

12:40

loneliness? Yes, it

12:43

is the practice of community. We

12:45

are working through a rule of life that has

12:47

been seven plus years in the making at Bridgetown

12:49

Church. My heart is full of joy to see

12:52

it unfold in your life. And

12:54

the fourth part of our rule that even though

12:56

I don't live here anymore, I am living by

12:58

and gathering a community in LA around, is this,

13:01

a community of love and depth

13:04

and a culture of individualism

13:06

and superficiality through the practice

13:09

of community. Each

13:11

practice in our rule is intentionally designed

13:13

for what you could call counter formation.

13:16

It's designed to stand against the

13:18

powerful forces inside our own body

13:20

and certainly outside our own body

13:22

and culture all around that

13:25

deform our soul and our

13:27

society over time. We

13:29

named two for this practice, individualism, which

13:31

I just said a few words about,

13:34

and superficiality, which is like a new

13:36

sibling in the anti-family. As

13:39

individualism has been transposed to

13:41

the digital age, we have a new challenge

13:44

where we know more people than ever before.

13:46

Can you imagine most people for all of

13:48

human history were farmers living in villages of

13:50

about 150 people. You did

13:52

not get out much, or if you did, it

13:55

was the same people. Not

13:57

our problem. We know more people than

13:59

ever before. yet our relationships

14:01

are remarkably shallow. Dunbar,

14:04

an evolutionary psychologist out of Oxford, we'll

14:06

talk about him in a minute, basically

14:09

made this famous claim, it's now called the

14:11

law of 150, a lot of sociologists all

14:13

agree with it, that basically the maximum number

14:15

of people that the human person can know

14:18

is around 150. There's a range of about

14:22

120 to 180. Most of you have

14:24

more numbers than that in your phone, in

14:26

your front right pocket right now, set

14:29

aside social media and all of that stuff. And

14:32

so the digital age has traded

14:34

the illusion of connectivity for the

14:36

reality of community. And

14:39

in particular living cities where we're

14:41

surrounded by noise and stimulation and

14:43

people and crowds and transients, none

14:46

of that does anything to touch the ache in

14:48

our heart. It will often make the pain of

14:51

loneliness worse, not better, to be

14:53

alone in a sea of faces. And

14:56

let's be honest, church

14:59

is not often not all that

15:01

different. And

15:03

that's not a slam on church, it's just we

15:05

come here as Americans or whatever you are.

15:08

We don't come here as a blank slate.

15:11

We've been formed since the moment we came

15:13

out of our mother's womb by this cultural

15:15

atmosphere. So we come

15:17

most of us into this room as

15:19

an individual in a crowd, less

15:23

a member in a family and

15:25

more alone together. And

15:28

yet there are a few things, more

15:31

radical, more strenuous

15:33

and more beautiful than

15:36

Jesus vision of and call to

15:38

community. Let's just work through a

15:40

few key passages together from Jesus

15:43

on the call to community. We read one, let's

15:45

just kind of reread it, Mark chapter one, verse

15:48

16 again. And Jesus

15:50

walked beside the sea of Galilee. He

15:52

saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a

15:54

net into the lake for they were fishermen.

15:57

Interesting that the first story about apprentices

16:00

about two brothers, about family. Come,

16:03

follow me, or that can be translated, come,

16:05

apprentice, under me, and I will send you

16:07

out to fish for people. At

16:09

once they, notice the pronoun there is plural,

16:11

they left their nets and followed him. And

16:14

when he had gone a little further, he saw

16:16

James, son of Zebedee, and his brother, another two

16:18

set, John, in a boat, preparing

16:20

their nets. Without delay, he called them. And

16:23

they left their father Zebedee in the

16:25

boat with the hired men, and followed

16:27

him, almost like he is forming a

16:29

new family from

16:31

other families. Notice,

16:33

just very simple, Jesus did

16:35

not have an apprentice singular.

16:38

He had apprentices, plural. He

16:41

called Simon and Andrew and James and

16:43

John, and he called them to join

16:45

his new community and to quote, fish

16:47

for people, meaning to invite others to

16:49

join his new community. Turn

16:52

the page to chapter three, look down at

16:54

verse 13. Jesus

16:57

went up on a mountainside and called to

16:59

him those he wanted, and

17:01

they came to him. Again, all the pronouns

17:04

here are plural. He appointed

17:06

twelve, so this is like a subset

17:08

of the community of apprentices that later

17:10

are named as the apostles. That

17:13

they might be with him and that he might

17:15

send them out to preach and have authority to drive

17:17

out demons. These are the twelve

17:19

he appointed. Simon, to whom he gave the name

17:21

Peter, James, son of

17:23

Zebedee and his brother John, to whom he gave

17:26

the name something, which means sons of thunder, Andrew,

17:29

Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James,

17:31

son of Alphaeus, Thaddeus, Simon

17:33

the Zealot, and Judas Iscariot,

17:35

who betrayed him. Why

17:38

twelve? Have you ever thought about that? Why

17:42

not twenty-one, or seventy is a

17:44

nice number, or a thousand? Because

17:47

this is a highly symbolic

17:49

act. Jesus is

17:51

intentionally naming twelve apostles to

17:53

evoke the twelve tribes of

17:55

Israel. It's Jesus'

17:57

way of saying he is foreign.

18:00

a new family. What

18:02

we call the church is not a building, it's

18:05

not an event on a Sunday morning, or

18:07

a non-profit, it is

18:09

a family. Not based

18:11

on blood, but on

18:14

apprenticeship to Jesus. Look down at verse

18:16

32, just a paragraph down. A

18:18

crowd was sitting around him, and they

18:20

told him, Your mother and brothers are outside

18:22

looking for you. Who are my

18:24

mother and my brothers, he asked? You would think

18:27

that's a rhetorical question, but no. Then

18:29

he looked at those seated in a circle around

18:31

him, he's in the middle of teaching his apprentices,

18:34

and said, Here are my mother

18:36

and my brothers. Whoever does God's

18:38

will is my brother and sister

18:41

and mother. The word

18:43

used by Jesus here is a delphoi

18:45

in Greek, and it literally means sibling.

18:48

Old school translations have brethren. It's kind

18:50

of getting at the right idea, brothers

18:53

and sisters. It comes

18:55

as no surprise that on the writings of the

18:57

New Testament, the word delphoi is the only other

18:59

moniker used just as often as Maphiteis,

19:02

which is the Greek word for disciple

19:04

or apprentice or follower. The

19:06

Apostle Paul, for example, uses it over 130

19:11

times in his letters. Family

19:13

is a dominant theme in the New

19:15

Testament theology. Listen

19:17

to Paul's words in Romans, Chapter five.

19:19

The spirit you receive does not make

19:22

you slaves. That's not the

19:24

right metaphor. Yes, we serve Jesus, but that's

19:26

not the right word picture so that you

19:28

live in fear again. Rather,

19:30

the spirit you received brought

19:33

about your adoption to sonship.

19:37

And the read this in the word

19:39

sonship there is used because you could

19:41

only adopt a male in Greco-Roman society

19:43

adoption to sonship for all. And

19:46

by him we cry Abba,

19:48

Father. One of

19:50

the main ways that Paul and the New

19:53

Testament writers explain Jesus work is through the

19:55

metaphor of adoption. Through Jesus,

19:57

we have been adopted into the family

19:59

of God. God has become our father

20:01

Jesus our older brother and the people

20:03

all around you have become your siblings

20:06

I have the privilege of being an adoptive father

20:09

and when we adopted Sunday

20:11

into our family She

20:13

simultaneously became my daughter and Judomosis's

20:17

sister for better or

20:19

for worse right, she

20:21

did not have a choice in the matter that it

20:23

was just all of a part

20:25

in the same way when we Quote

20:28

say yes to Jesus when

20:30

we begin to follow Jesus

20:32

we simultaneously join a new

20:35

family Listen to Ephesians

20:37

this family is made up of all

20:39

sorts of people This is chapter 2

20:41

speaking of the racial hostility between Jews

20:44

and Gentiles Which is a dominant theme in the

20:46

New Testament which we often don't realize because it

20:48

doesn't map onto the racial history of our nation

20:51

But we're still reading about this tension every

20:53

single day right now in the news For

20:56

he himself is our peace

20:58

who has made the two

21:00

groups one and has

21:02

destroyed the barrier the dividing wall

21:04

of hostility His

21:07

purpose literally a wall of hostility right

21:09

now His purpose was

21:11

to create in himself one new

21:13

humanity out of the two Thus

21:16

making peace and in one body to

21:18

reconcile both of them to God through

21:21

the cross By which he

21:23

put to death their hostility for through him.

21:25

We both have access to the father by

21:27

one Spirit consequently you

21:29

are no longer foreigners and

21:31

strangers but fellow citizens Not

21:34

of America or Israel or whatever but

21:37

of the kingdom of God with God's

21:39

people and also members of his Householder

21:42

his family built on

21:44

the foundation of the Apostles and

21:46

prophets with Christ Jesus himself as

21:48

the chief cornerstone This

21:51

quote new humanity and what

21:53

audacious language? Transcends

21:55

all the lines that divide us race

21:59

class gender, politics,

22:02

you name it. In

22:04

fact, these twelve apprentices were from all

22:06

over the map. Matthew

22:09

was a tax farmer. So he

22:12

was fully on the side of the Roman

22:14

Empire, the oppressor of all oppressors. Simon,

22:17

we read, was a zealot. Zealots

22:20

were a first century insurgency group marked

22:22

by basically guerrilla warfare against the Roman

22:24

Empire. They were called

22:27

Sicaria, or dagger men, because they

22:29

would hide daggers under their tunic.

22:31

They would go to public places.

22:33

They would sneak up behind Roman

22:35

military officers or Roman officials, or

22:37

sometimes just Roman citizens, and they

22:39

would take the dagger out, slit their throat,

22:41

and then disappear back into the crowd. Hey,

22:45

Matthew, meet Simon. We'd love

22:47

for you guys to, like, do some group spiritual

22:49

direction together, help each other listen to God. I

22:51

just want you to tell each other your stories,

22:54

like how you end up where you are, and

22:56

can you imagine? And

22:59

we don't, we don't, we in America, we really don't

23:01

have an example of this. I mean,

23:03

you could take your brightest red hat all

23:06

the way down to the AOC, and you would

23:08

not even come close. The

23:11

level of tension, animosity,

23:14

history, full-on

23:16

hate. He has

23:18

broken down the wall of hostility, made

23:20

the two groups, won this, whatever

23:22

this family is, it is not

23:24

like attracts like. This

23:27

is mapping onto something else. Meaning,

23:29

and please listen, this is all I'm trying to say,

23:33

Jesus desires not just to form

23:35

you into a person of

23:37

love, but

23:40

to form us into a

23:42

community of love. We

23:46

say a lot about what Jesus

23:48

has done in his death, burial,

23:50

and resurrection, and that is right in sitting.

23:53

But we don't say enough about what

23:55

Jesus is doing. You ever thought about

23:57

that? What is Jesus doing right now?

24:00

between His resurrection and His

24:02

return. What's He doing? I'm

24:07

not exactly sure for the record. I

24:10

know from Hebrews that He's praying for you and I. That's

24:13

fascinating. But

24:15

best as I can tell, this is my

24:17

kind of read of the New Testament. I

24:19

think that it seems that

24:21

what Jesus is doing right now as we

24:23

speak is He

24:26

is forming a new humanity

24:30

from every tribe and tongue and

24:32

nation, every

24:34

band of the socioeconomic spectrum, every

24:38

color of skin, every affiliation,

24:40

every background, every

24:43

personality type, every Enneagram number. He

24:46

is forming a new humanity

24:49

into people of

24:51

love and joy

24:53

and peace

24:57

and wisdom, courage,

25:00

power, strength

25:03

and weakness and humility and

25:05

gentleness and more in

25:08

order to one day

25:11

together co-rule with Him

25:13

over the cosmos. Turns

25:16

out that job is going to

25:18

take a bit of training, right?

25:21

You know, if you have to train for like

25:23

at least four years to become an accountant or

25:25

whatever, how long do you think you have

25:27

to train to like co-rule the universe? Likely

25:30

a bit longer. One

25:33

word for that process of training is

25:35

apprenticeship to Jesus. This

25:37

is what Jesus is doing right now. And

25:40

this has all sorts of implications

25:42

for our apprenticeship to Jesus. Let's start

25:44

with the most obvious. You can't

25:46

follow Jesus alone. Not

25:49

you shouldn't. Not, hey, I would

25:51

advise against it. Or, hey, you know, you

25:53

should think about doing it more. You

25:56

can't. The whole point of

25:58

the spiritual journey is to become a believer. person

26:00

of love. Jesus called love

26:02

the greatest commandment. Like

26:04

the New Testament summary of all of

26:06

Christian spirituality down into one word is

26:09

the word agape, or love.

26:12

Dr. Todd Hall of Rosemead School

26:14

of Psychology calls the Christian faith

26:16

a relational spirituality. I love that.

26:19

By which we are loved into

26:21

people of love. This

26:23

means that what we call spiritual formation

26:26

is not just a set of practices

26:28

of disciplines and exercises and a rule

26:30

of life. It is at the core

26:32

a relational process. Dr. Joseph

26:35

Hellerman in my all time favorite book

26:37

on community says this, spiritual

26:39

formation occurs primarily in the

26:41

context of community. Persons

26:44

who remain contented with their brothers

26:46

and sisters in the local church

26:49

almost invariably grow in

26:51

self-understanding. This

26:53

is especially the case for those

26:56

courageous Christians who stick it out

26:58

through the often messy, always messy

27:00

process of interpersonal discord and conflict

27:02

resolution. Long

27:04

term interpersonal relationships are

27:07

the crucible of genuine

27:09

progress in the Christian

27:11

life. People who

27:13

stay, grow. People

27:16

who leave, do not grow. This

27:20

is why church is so essential,

27:23

but, and I need to tread carefully here. By

27:26

church I do not mean or

27:28

like just on the, I do not mean

27:30

church attendance. Yes this is

27:32

a part of what I mean and a

27:34

part of the practice of community but it's

27:36

certainly not the center point. Sabbath

27:39

worship is an essential part of our

27:41

formation, but while God works

27:43

through all shapes and styles and

27:45

sizes of churches, as

27:47

a general rule it's in the smaller,

27:49

more relational spaces where we experience

27:51

the most profound

27:54

stage, change. There

27:56

is a growing body of research from the

27:59

social sciences groups relationships into different

28:01

categories based on group size and

28:04

levels of vulnerability. And

28:06

it maps perfectly onto the Jesus story.

28:09

One of the most widely accepted paradigms

28:11

is a number but one of the

28:13

best known ones is from the evolutionary

28:15

psychologist Dr. Robert Dunbar of Oxford. It's

28:17

loosely referred to as Dunbar's number. I would just

28:20

call it the four circles of community. He

28:22

calls our inner circle our intimates. This

28:25

is one to five people max

28:28

who know us as we actually are our

28:31

light and our shadow and

28:33

hopefully love us as we are.

28:37

Of course the pain is that

28:39

over half of Americans have

28:42

no intimates. I'm

28:44

sure some of you in the room have no intimates.

28:48

Back to the fallout of radical

28:51

individualism with divorce breakdown

28:53

of the family all sorts of

28:55

factors. But hopefully you

28:57

have a few people that you can

28:59

bear your soul to a best

29:02

friend or a spouse or roommate

29:04

or old friends from high

29:06

school or college who know you and love you

29:08

as you are. The next

29:10

circle is our friends which there's kind of

29:12

different theories here but is right around 15

29:15

people. This is

29:17

the number of people that we do life

29:19

with. We practice the one or another of

29:21

the New Testament with. We help each other

29:23

move. That one's not in the New Testament

29:25

just for the record because it's miserable. But

29:27

we help each other move. We go on

29:29

vacation. We share meals when somebody gets home

29:31

from the hospital. We drop off groceries.

29:34

We help each other make decisions. We

29:36

help each other parent. This is our

29:38

community. The next threshold is right around

29:40

the 150 person mark. Again sociologists

29:42

call this the law of 150 as it's about

29:46

the maximum number of people that you

29:48

can actually know and be in relationship

29:50

with. And it turns out there's all

29:52

sorts of data to suggest it's the

29:54

optimal group size for most human behavior.

29:56

So they Dunbar and others looked at

29:58

for example the median size of

30:01

villages and indigenous culture and medieval Europe. They looked

30:03

at military units and this number 150 just was

30:05

over and over and over

30:08

again. This is our village per

30:10

se. And we draw on this wider

30:13

social network for all sorts of things. If you read that

30:15

book, The Strength of Weak Ties. We

30:17

need weak ties. Like right now, I have a 18 year

30:20

old son who's in high school and he

30:22

needs a job. And so

30:24

I'm texting all these random people I barely know

30:26

like, hey, do you know of any like, and

30:29

I want him to have a bad job. No offense

30:31

to some high schoolers down here. If you don't have

30:33

a couple of really bad jobs, you are gonna be

30:36

a horrible human being in the dulcet. I

30:38

learned that the hard way as an employer

30:40

never ever hires somebody out of college who

30:42

hasn't had some horrible jobs. It's just

30:44

like you're just both gonna be miserable,

30:46

right? So if you happen to know

30:48

of anybody in LA that has a good bad

30:50

job for a high schooler that will

30:53

let them still keep Sabbath on Friday night, that would be

30:55

wonderful. Thank you so much. But

30:57

we draw on this wider community for

30:59

all sorts of things. And then the

31:01

final circle is our tribe. This is

31:03

the larger group that we identify with

31:05

and belong to. And

31:07

this is crucial. We don't know, we don't even

31:09

know most of these people personally. Most of you

31:11

don't know this room personally. But

31:14

yet from this wider group, we get a

31:16

sense of meaning, purpose, belonging, identity, a sense

31:18

of self, a sense of call and vision

31:20

of what it means. For

31:23

many in the secular world, this could be a

31:25

company like Nike or some like hardcore startup. It

31:27

could be a political party. If you're from the

31:29

UK, for many people it's their football team. For

31:32

us as followers of Jesus, this

31:34

is the Church of Jesus. And

31:37

when it comes to our spiritual formation, one,

31:40

we need relationships across all

31:42

four circles. Jesus had

31:44

relationships every layer. He had three

31:46

intimates, Peter, James and John. And

31:49

then he had the 12 plus a few

31:51

close friends. And that word is used of

31:54

Jesus. Mary, Martha, Lazarus, at least right around

31:56

15. And then he had a group

31:58

of 120. Jerusalem

32:00

that were his closest core

32:02

community and then thousands after

32:04

that in Jerusalem and around

32:06

Israel who were his followers.

32:09

Healthy people have relationships

32:11

across all four circles

32:13

but secondly our

32:16

deepest formation, this is my

32:18

conviction, our

32:21

deepest formation growth, healing

32:25

and change all

32:27

happen in the smaller two circles. We

32:31

need what Celtic Christians called

32:34

an Anamkara or

32:37

a soul friend. Just

32:39

bear the weight of life together

32:43

and we need a community to do

32:46

life with a kind of

32:48

family. We were

32:50

created to live deeply relational lives

32:52

and it's in the first two

32:54

circles that we experience deep

32:57

and lasting transformation and

33:00

yet we all have mixed

33:02

feelings about these kinds of relationships

33:04

right. Again part of

33:07

you and I we ache for it we want

33:09

to know and be known part

33:11

of us is scared to death of it especially

33:14

if in your childhood you did

33:17

not receive safe steady love from

33:19

your parents or caregivers or

33:22

if like so many of us you have

33:24

been deeply wounded along the way. The

33:27

Portland therapist Susie Hausch likes to

33:29

say our deepest wounds come from

33:31

relationships but so does

33:33

our deepest healing. Whatever

33:36

your it's the only way we heal by the way.

33:39

I love to write books read books think

33:42

about books guess what

33:44

you don't heal from reading books

33:47

or listening to podcasts or

33:50

even coming to church. You

33:52

heal in deep

33:54

relationships whatever

33:56

your emotional appetite is these

33:59

deeper relationships. Relationships are essential

34:02

if you want to heal and grow So

34:05

let me just take a moment before we're done and

34:07

name what these relationships look like Anamkara

34:09

kind of soul or spiritual friendships

34:11

are marked by at least three

34:14

core characteristics First

34:16

is depth. These are not

34:18

superficial relationships where we chat about

34:20

the weather or work projects or

34:22

Oscar nominations We talk about

34:24

what's below the surface about our life

34:27

with God About our

34:29

past our family about our pain and our

34:31

suffering often and we talk about our sin

34:34

Where the growth edge is in our

34:36

formation, but it's not just depth It's

34:38

also vulnerability because it's kind of a depth that's

34:40

just like kind of really like, you know, interesting

34:42

and profound It's vulnerability

34:45

we come together around weakness

34:48

not around strength Around

34:50

failure as a rally point more than

34:52

success and

34:54

to do that you have to open

34:56

up and be raw and honest and

34:59

Transparent and you have to let

35:01

people in to see what Jesus

35:03

called your spiritual poverty your

35:05

spiritual bankruptcy There

35:08

are two parts to this one is just telling the

35:10

truth or the kind of official word for that in

35:12

the New Testament Is the practice

35:15

of confession, which is a

35:17

sub discipline to community? And

35:19

it is just naming our sin and our

35:21

shame to another as Tyler is so beautifully

35:24

said we can't live without sin But

35:26

we can live without secrets Can

35:29

you imagine? living

35:32

with no secrets I Would

35:36

imagine many of you don't even think that's possible

35:40

It is trust me it is I

35:45

Think it's God's intention For

35:48

all of us naked and unashamed if you

35:50

know that story Telling

35:53

the truth the other is listening Listening

35:56

deeply to each other's stories

35:59

and struggles Neurobiologists tell

36:01

us that when people feel felt, when

36:04

they, in the language of psychology, when they

36:06

feel listened to in a compassionate way, it's

36:09

indistinguishable from feeling loved.

36:12

David Brooks in his recent book, How to Know a

36:14

Person, which I highly recommend, writes about

36:16

how, you know, there's this new data to say that

36:19

if you listen carefully enough to a person, you're burning

36:21

calories, like you're working up a little sweat. Some

36:24

people are exhausting to listen to. Let's

36:26

just be honest, all right? Well, I

36:29

mean, not you, none of you, but, uh, there, he

36:31

writes this, there

36:34

is one skill that lies

36:36

at the heart of any

36:38

healthy person, family, school, community,

36:40

organization, or society. The ability

36:42

to see someone else deeply

36:44

and make them feel seen.

36:47

To accurately know another person, to

36:49

let them feel valued, heard, and

36:52

understood. That is at the heart

36:54

of being a good person, the

36:56

ultimate gift you can give to

36:58

others and yourself. Trying

37:00

to teach my kids the slant method, are you

37:02

familiar with that? It's an acronym, slant. Sit

37:06

up, lean in, ask

37:09

questions, nod your head, track the

37:11

speaker. Guess how well

37:13

it's working? Not

37:15

at all. But it's

37:17

a great acronym. Moses, grill

37:20

you on it later this afternoon, okay? As

37:23

we listen deeply to

37:26

each other, tell our stories, and help

37:28

each other make sense of our stories

37:30

in God, we

37:32

experience real healing from both

37:34

sin and shame. And

37:37

finally, it's a commitment to transformation.

37:41

You know, when monks join a monastery, they take

37:43

vows. And one of the

37:45

most common vows is conversatio morum in

37:47

Latin, or conversion of life. That sounds

37:49

really weird. Catholics use the word conversion

37:51

differently than Protestants. So we use it

37:53

as a one-time event in our past,

37:55

when where you quote, convert it. That's

37:58

not how most Christians use the word. use

38:00

it as an ongoing word, a new conversion.

38:02

It's almost like the millennial

38:04

version, like where you level up in

38:07

your spiritual formation. And

38:09

so conversatio morum, or conversion of life,

38:11

is essentially a vow. It

38:14

is basically a vow to never

38:16

stop growing. It

38:21

is a lifelong commitment to

38:24

formation. Many people, psychologists,

38:26

I'm sure you're familiar with the

38:28

language, distinguish between a fixed mindset

38:30

and a growth mindset. Many

38:33

people reach a certain level of psychospirational

38:35

maturity, and then they plateau into kind

38:37

of a fixed mindset. I'm

38:39

good, cool, just maintain goodness.

38:42

Church then becomes a place to come and feel

38:44

good, a kind of

38:46

emotional coping mechanism. No more,

38:48

you just wanna kinda hear what you already

38:51

believe and kinda good reminder, and yeah, okay,

38:53

I feel better now. But

38:55

as apprentices of Jesus, we come together

38:58

not just to be a safe place

39:00

to process emotional pain, but ultimately to

39:02

give ourselves more deeply to

39:05

Jesus. This

39:07

means that part of our relational dynamic is

39:09

telling the truth to each other in

39:12

love and gentleness, but in

39:14

honesty. I

39:16

need people to

39:18

both comfort me and confront me at

39:20

times, to

39:23

point out my potential and any pitfalls.

39:26

And while I like to think that I

39:28

rarely need a full-on rebuke because I'm a

39:30

godly man, I regularly

39:33

need people to tell me things I don't

39:36

wanna hear and

39:38

speak into my life the honesty

39:40

of reality before God. All

39:43

that to say, and this is, I don't

39:45

know, a blunt way to say this, spiritual

39:49

friendships do not work unless

39:52

both members are fully

39:55

committed to the transformational journey. Bridge

39:59

down communities. not really work very

40:01

well unless if

40:03

people as a community

40:05

are deeply committed to the transformational

40:08

journey. So

40:11

depth, vulnerability, and

40:13

a commitment to transformation.

40:16

Here's the thing, it is possible

40:18

to go to church every single Sunday,

40:20

have a lot of friends, and even

40:22

be in a Bridgertown community and never

40:24

have these types

40:27

of relationships. How

40:29

do I know that? Because I did

40:32

it for a long time. Where? Here.

40:36

I know how to do it. When

40:39

I most I won't rehash that story of those of you

40:41

that have been around, I'm sure I've told it too many

40:44

times, but I did not grow

40:46

up in a stream

40:48

of, this is not an angry statement, I'm really grateful for the

40:50

stream of the church I grew up in, but in it, like

40:53

this concept of, you know, what my

40:56

mentor calls dining room table Christianity, of

40:58

life around a table in community, about

41:00

soul friend, of confession, of sin, shame,

41:02

just open, like your life is an

41:05

open book. That was not in

41:07

the paradigm. It's like come to church and hear the

41:09

Bible and then just be a

41:11

good person. And that

41:14

was not in the paradigm. And so when

41:16

I first woke up to Jesus called the

41:18

community, I started really, really

41:20

smalls before Bridgertown communities were saying, Matt and

41:22

Anna that aren't here this morning.

41:24

I don't know if that's passive aggressive against me

41:26

or what that means, but they moved in, you

41:28

know, across the street from us and with some

41:30

other people, we just started having a meal together.

41:33

We were like so clumsy. We had no idea.

41:35

And we just began to do life together.

41:38

And of course, you know, over time you

41:40

pass through this kind of series of

41:42

intimacy gradients and you go from

41:44

just kind of, hopefully from just like dinner with

41:46

friends and, and you begin to tell

41:49

your stories and you begin to help each other make

41:51

sense of your stories, right? All the

41:54

Portland West Coast, like just, you know,

41:56

define yourself and choose your identity

41:59

and connect. It is

42:01

so unscientific, set aside religion, it's so

42:03

unscientific it's not even funny. Any

42:06

neurobiologist would tell you, your brain

42:08

cannot form an identity or

42:11

make a coherent emotional processing of

42:13

your story without another brain. Your

42:15

brain needs another person's brain to

42:17

tell you who you are. Fact.

42:21

Doesn't matter, however you come at

42:23

it. So we began to just

42:25

make sense of our stories together, and of

42:27

course you just keep going, you begin to

42:29

do life together, you begin to confess your

42:32

sins to each other, you begin to make

42:34

decisions together. We kept coming here on Sundays

42:36

and it was lovely, but most of our

42:38

life was not around a stage, it was

42:40

around a table. And

42:42

as romantic as that may sound, all of you who

42:44

have been in this journey, which is hundreds of you

42:46

in the room, you know it's not romantic at all,

42:49

it's an absolute pain in the butt. The honeymoon's wonderful.

42:51

It's like, oh, we're doing life around a table. And

42:53

it's like, yeah, but with you. It's

42:56

like, you know, we had to learn

42:58

the hard way about what Dietrich Bonhoeffer,

43:00

after his experience of living in an

43:02

intentional community called Sinkenwald, he

43:04

called the wish stream of community, and if you

43:06

haven't learned this yet, oh, I'm so sorry to

43:08

break it to you. But in his book,

43:11

Life Together, he writes this. This is

43:13

the paragraph, that's one of the most famous books

43:15

on community in the last hundred years. If you

43:17

read it, this is the standout paragraph. Those

43:20

who love their dream of a Christian

43:22

community, more than they

43:24

love the Christian community itself, become

43:26

the destroyers of that Christian community,

43:29

even though their personal intentions

43:32

may be ever so honest,

43:34

earnest, and sacrificial. No

43:37

actual church or community

43:39

or friendship or

43:42

family or marriage can

43:44

ever possibly live up to

43:46

the wish stream of

43:48

the ideal church or community or marriage

43:50

or family or friendship. I

43:53

can tell you, as so many of you could

43:55

tell each other, that this way of living, this

43:57

practice of, it's not even a practice, it's a

43:59

war. of being, doing

44:02

life together with other people, it

44:04

is not easy. And

44:07

when it goes wrong, when you

44:10

let down all of the

44:13

shields that from our earliest days many

44:15

of us begin to put up to

44:18

protect our fragile hearts, and

44:21

when you let people in, and when,

44:25

not if, when they wound

44:27

you, or

44:29

when you wound them,

44:32

I mean there's a pain

44:34

that, I mean

44:37

it's just really bad, it's really hard. When

44:40

it goes wrong, it is so

44:42

painful. But

44:44

when it goes right, it

44:48

is a glimpse of eternity and

44:51

time. And

44:53

like so many of you in the

44:56

room who have braved the dangerous waters

44:58

of just being

45:00

who you actually are with a small group of

45:02

people over a long period of time. It's

45:06

changed my life. We

45:08

moved to L.A. seven months ago and

45:10

we love it again, the weather, it's

45:12

just okay. But

45:15

it has been to start over in

45:17

the middle of life of three teenagers

45:19

after almost 20 years with you, I mean

45:23

it has been, I'm just going to

45:25

be honest, it's been painfully lonely. I'm

45:28

so introverted. I'm like, my

45:30

definition of introversion is like I've never met

45:32

anybody whose company I enjoy more than my

45:35

own. Like as

45:37

nobody I would rather be. I love Gerald,

45:39

love Tyler, Chris is great, but like they're

45:41

not as great as me in a poetry

45:43

book. It's not like an egotistical statement, it's

45:45

just a pleasure statement, you know? And

45:51

you know all the things about people that are less

45:53

extroverted and how they're neurotic and messed up, yeah, that's

45:55

all true. But

45:58

man, living

46:00

in one place for so long, I've just felt relationally

46:03

rich, but kind of exhausted a lot

46:05

of the time. So this

46:07

is my first time, really,

46:10

as an adult, feeling what I

46:12

would imagine many of you feel every single day.

46:16

Just that sharp pain.

46:18

It's almost like a pain like, other

46:21

than rejection, it's like hard to

46:23

even imagine what it feels like. And

46:27

I went

46:29

through a really hard relational breach recently,

46:32

about a year or two ago, with,

46:35

not with Tyler, don't worry, it

46:37

was with Gerald, but we're praying for him. And

46:42

I have never felt in any season

46:44

of my whole life, both

46:47

such an egg-four community and such

46:49

a fear, I've

46:52

felt that temptation to like, hey, new city, new place, new

46:54

season of life, we could just do

46:56

life differently. But

46:58

no way. I will

47:00

never, and we have found, we're beginning to

47:03

form communities small, my sister's there, I have

47:05

one friend who is a treasure to my

47:07

soul, we're together every week doing

47:09

confession and such. I

47:12

will never go back to

47:15

church attendance on Sunday and living like an American

47:17

the other six days of the week. That

47:19

is a bankrupt way of life. And

47:23

the end of it is that old man at the end of

47:25

the table. It's

47:27

the problem, I can say this fast

47:29

because I'm not here anymore, the problem

47:31

in particular with the progressive narrative that

47:33

this city is indoctrinated in, ever you

47:36

cannot walk a block, this

47:38

is one of the most indoctrination cities in

47:40

the world. This city makes LA feel like

47:42

Dallas, Texas, as far as like the

47:45

level of liberalism. And that's

47:47

not a slam on you, it's just like, let's be honest, LA,

47:51

who doesn't call itself Stumptown or Bridge City,

47:53

it calls itself Babylon,

47:57

and it feels chill. You're

48:00

like, wow, but wow. But

48:04

one of the dangers to the progressive

48:06

narrative, it is entirely dominated by people

48:08

under the age of 40, most

48:10

of whom are single. The

48:13

people you wanna look at and base your life

48:15

on are the people that are 80 and

48:17

don't sit at the end of the table all

48:19

alone. Those are

48:21

the people, so often nobody's

48:24

doing the math. Where does this go

48:26

70 years from now? Does

48:29

it go to what

48:32

we most deeply desire to live

48:34

in deep, loving

48:37

relationships? And

48:40

yet, this is hard. I will be the first person

48:42

to tell them how to oversell it, it's hard. And

48:45

in the day and age of radical

48:47

individualism and busyness and hurry and all

48:49

of this stuff, these types of relationships

48:51

will not just fall on your head.

48:54

They will require you and I to

48:56

make an intentional effort to

48:58

resist busyness and individualism and superficiality,

49:01

to live deeply with a few,

49:03

to go deep with a few,

49:05

to sink your roots, it will

49:07

require a rule of life. Because

49:10

a rule of life is not just a

49:13

set of spiritual disciplines for devotional life. In

49:16

fact, this tiny micro resurgence of rule of life

49:18

that Bridgetown's a part of, the work I do is

49:20

very much a part of, is

49:22

beautiful, I'm all for it. But it

49:24

is all tragically being run through the

49:26

grid of radical individualism. In

49:29

the West, with individuals writing their rule of

49:31

life, not a bad thing, I

49:33

am all for it. But historically,

49:36

that is an aberration, it doesn't

49:38

even exist, there's no parallel in 2,000 years. A

49:42

rule of life was for a

49:44

community. It was designed

49:46

to hold a community together

49:49

around shared rhythms of formation,

49:51

to anchor a community, a

49:53

web of relationships in Jesus

49:56

himself. And foster

49:58

in relationships of depth and. in our

50:00

age will require a level

50:03

of discipline and intentionality

50:05

and self-sacrificial love. It

50:08

will require a rule of life.

50:11

So to end, I would just invite you, if you

50:13

wanna just clear off your lap, I'm done. I

50:16

would take a moment. You wanna clear

50:18

your lap off, sit up straight, take

50:20

a few deep breaths. If you wanna close

50:22

your eyes, please do. And

50:25

I just have a few questions for reflection because

50:27

all of us are at a different spot. So

50:30

the growth edge for you is different than the growth

50:32

edge to me, yours, these, and mine, all of us

50:34

are at a different spot. So take

50:36

this idea and let the Holy Spirit direct

50:39

your heart. Let's take a

50:41

few deep breaths. Let

50:46

me offer you three questions to reflect on

50:50

now and in the week to come. One,

50:54

do you have your Peter, James,

50:56

and John? Your

51:01

three or four, your intimates? And

51:07

if so, who are they? Two,

51:22

do you have your 12, your community, your

51:25

God, your

51:28

dining room table? And

51:42

three, whatever your answer, there's

51:45

no right answer here, this is just for

51:47

you. What's

51:49

the next step for you to

51:53

move deeper into a relational

51:55

spirituality? Deeper

51:58

into the practice of community. the

52:03

way of being in family that is at the heart

52:08

of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit themselves.

52:36

This podcast is from Practicing the Way. We

52:39

develop resources to help churches and small

52:41

groups apprentice in the way of Jesus.

52:44

And all we make is completely free because

52:46

it's already been paid for by The Circle,

52:49

a community of monthly givers who partner

52:51

with us to see spiritual formation integrated

52:53

into the church at large. Special

52:56

thanks for today's episode goes to

52:58

Daniel from Hillsborough, Oregon, David

53:00

from Yorba Linda, California, Artie

53:03

from Beaconsville, Australia, Melanie

53:06

from Flower Mound, Texas and Kim

53:08

from Keller, Texas. Thank

53:10

you all very much. To

53:13

join The Circle yourself or to learn

53:15

more about running a practice in your

53:17

church or community, visit practicingtheway.org. Until

53:20

next time, may the grace of the Lord

53:23

Jesus Christ and the love of

53:25

God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit

53:28

be with you all.