Beloved Community
The Post Game Interview
Trevor Lawrence is the quarterback for the Clemson Tigers. 2 years ago, he comes on campus at Clemson as a highly touted true freshman.
Within just a few weeks he does the seemingly impossible. He beats out Kelly Bryant, the quarterback of the team who had led them the previous season to the College Football Playoffs, to win the job as the new starter! And remember, he’s a true freshman. A few months before he was playing high school football. Now, he’s the starter for a team that’s expected to make the playoffs again and compete for the National Championship.
As it turned out, he was able to lead his team back to the College Football Playoffs. And not only that, his team defeated Alabama to win the National Championship!
What you may not know about Trevor Lawrence is that he’s also a person of faith. He belongs to a church about 30 minutes away from the Clemson campus in South Carolina. And after winning the National Championship Game, with confetti and fireworks flying through the air, there’s a reporter by the name of Maria Taylor on the field interviewing Trevor Lawrence.
She asked him this question: “There was a lot put on your shoulders. How have you managed the pressure and led your team to this championship stage?”
His response?
“It goes back to having good teammates and coaches and surrounding yourself with the right kind of people that’ll lift you up and help you and definitely my small group, people to help me out and lift me up and keep me level headed, too.”
Here’s Trevor Lawrence, college freshman, college football champion MVP quarterback, calling out his small group from church, a group of spiritual friends, in his post game interview! Wow!!
What we need…
The truth is, we need each other.
We can pretend like we don’t. As if we’re fine on our own. But the truth is, we need each other.
We need to belong to a smaller community of believers. We need friends who are followers of Jesus to surround us. And this isn’t just important when crisis hits our lives or our family, this is important in our own spiritual growth and discipleship.
The good news is that we were never intended to do this life alone. We were never intended to live the Christian life alone. In fact, this is so important that Jesus commanded that we love each other and experience this kind of fellowship with each other within the church.
Here’s what the Apostel John, one of Jesus’ closest friends and followers once said:
“And this is his commandment: We must believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as he commanded us. Those who obey God’s commandments remain in fellowship with him, and he with them. And we know he lives in us because the Spirit he gave us lives in us.” – 1 John 3.23-24
The Command
What I find fascinating about this is that three times here, the word “command” is used in relation to loving each other. And again, John is talking to people in the church telling them to love the people in the church.
Commands are commands because they tell us we have to do what we would not do if we didn’t have to!
You don’t need a command from your doctor to stop eating so many M&Ms! That comes easy! But when your doctor tells you to eat more vegetables!!!! That’s something different altogether.
The truth is. we’re just not that great at receiving commands. At being told what to do. We like giving commands, yes! But receiving them? Not so much.
Obeying this command… following this command to love our brothers and sisters in Christ… this leads to fellowship with God and with each other.
And this is a different kind of fellowship. It is life lived in community born out of the Holy Spirit living in us.
MLK, Jr. and Beloved Community
February is Black History Month. And every year about this time I find myself listening to and reading the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had a name for this. And I love the way he talked about it. He called this the beloved community.
Here’s what Martin Luther King, Jr. once said…
“But the end is reconciliation; the end is redemption; the end is the creation of beloved community. It is this type of spirit and this type of love that can transform opposers into friends. It is this type of understanding goodwill that will transform the deep gloom of the old age into the exuberant gladness of the new age. It is this love which will bring about miracles in the hearts of men.”
MLK, Jr.
Here’s what I think has happened in a lot of churches… We’ve agreed to be a part of a larger faith community. Maybe we even signed up to be a part of a class, or a home group, or something like that, but we’ve stopped short of “beloved community.”
And here’s what I mean by that. We want to be a part of a community for whom it is easy to love and for whom it is easy for them to love us. But whenever there is conflict, tension, pressure, or disagreement, we tend to run the other way.
Martin Luther King, Jr. had a grand dream of God making all things right in the world and people who at one time hated each other now becoming friends. He was preaching and teaching all those who would listen about a radical kind of love, the kind of love that makes life long enemies friends.
John was speaking to the church and reminded them of the command of Jesus… that we HAVE to love each other. And the reason it’s a command is because we don’t always want to love each other. We don’t always feel loved by each other.
The Church or the Club?
Scott Sauls once said, “Sometimes it takes having differences, not understanding one another, and even being a little bit irritated by and bored with one another, to remind us that the church is a family and not a club.”
And this is why the church becoming this beloved community is so powerful. Because when we love each other in spite of our differences, when we love each other even when we don’t agree with each other, we show the world what Jesus died for. He didn’t die for a country club. He died for the church.
And when we love each other well it points the world to Jesus. Because this is different. This is uncommon.
It’s not normal to love people you don’t agree with and stay in community with them. It’s not normal to care deeply and take tangible action to demonstrate love for those that, if it weren’t for the bond of love you share in Christ, you probably wouldn’t do this. And when we love each other with this kind of love, it is an undeniable witness to the love of God.
But it’s more than that… Jesus commanded it not just because it’s an undeniable witness to His love. Jesus commanded it because YOU NEED IT!
Because…
You were created for spiritual friendship.
This is how you grow.
And the spiritual practice of living in community with believers in Jesus, in having spiritual friends in your life who will love you, challenge you, encourage you, correct you, pray for you, tell you when you’re in the wrong and support you when you’re not at your best… this is vital NOT just because it points the world around you to the love of God (AND IT DOES), this is so important because it’s how you GROW as a DISCIPLE of Jesus.
So, if this is really that important, if belonging to a spiritual community is so important, then I think you have to ask yourself this question: Are you a part of a small group of believers committed to loving each other with this kind of love?
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