We were created by God to know and to be known, -by Him and each other.

Matthew 22:34-40 But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?” Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

Our Relationship with God:

“Legalism is not your answer, correct doctrine or politics is not your answer, a euphoric feeling is not your answer, a man on a stage -or a TV screen is not your answer, the answer you are looking for will only be found in having a relationship with God through His Son Jesus.”

Why did God create us anyway? If you haven’t, please stop and think about that. -Go ahead, I’ll wait………

Did God create us just to be His servants? or robots? or His pets??? I believe the whole of scripture tells us the love story of a God who “created us in His image” so that He could “know us.” -So that we could we could know Him. After all, Jesus once defined eternal life as “knowing God.” Yes! The God of the universe wants us to know Him. God created us. God loves us. Despite our sin, God has been very patience with us. God humbled Himself and became a man for us. Jesus died for us -to redeem us. The Holy Spirit pursues us. The Holy Spirit indwells and empowers us. And Jesus is coming back for us.

I think just about any Christian with good spiritual common sense and an elementary understanding of the Bible would agree with those Truths. All of these Truths point to a very simple theological fact: God wants an intimate relationship with us. And as Keith Green would say, “He wants more than Sundays and Wednesday nights.” God wants to be a vital part of our everyday lives. He wants His presence to be “real” in our lives, just as real as the presence of our spouses, children, parents and close friends. The foundational element of the Church should be our relationship with Him; this is exactly why Jesus calls the Church His “Bride.” Our Groom is passionate about His relationship with us. -And He wants us to be passionate about our relationship with Him.

Furthermore in regards to worship, authentic worship is born out of authentic relationship. How could we ever worship a God that we simply did not know? How could we ever fully give ourselves in authentic worship to a God who we refused to trust as our Anchor, -for everything in our lives? Music -and talented worship leaders can certainly facilitate a worship experience, but authentic worship demands the depth of a relationship. Therefore, as our relationship with God matures, how could we ever “not” worship Him? As a believer matures, worship should be an almost automatic response to God working in their lives. Authentic worship is a natural fruit of an authentic relationship with God. I fear we are, at times, attempting to “induce” worship in our church services -rather than facilitating it. My concern is that there is often a stronger connection to the music and those leading it, than there is to God.

In the end, the above Truth must escape our doctrinal statements, church website verbiage & blogs and be driven as an anchor to tether our church culture. Our churches should not be anchored with talented ministers, beautiful buildings, emotional worship experiences, the traditions of man, financial wealth, innovative programs or even well established “correct doctrine.” While all these things are “good,” we begin to worship them (rather than God) when they are used to anchor the Church. When our relationships with God are not anchoring the foundations of our churches, all types of perversions are possible -from extreme legalism, to ultra liberalism and almost any perversion in between; “balance” is lost. Unfortunately, this point can be easily proven by running a Google search on “church scandals.” Please note that these scandals are not limited to any particular denomination or doctrinal group; they are equal opportunity byproducts that appear across all veins of Christianity. Our churches must be anchored by living, breathing, authentic relationships with God through His Son Jesus. –Absolutely nothing else can replace this.

Our Relationships with One Another:

“How much visiting do you have to do?” and “I just want to preach.” -These are two phrases that I have often heard from other pastors over the years. I restate these quotes here because I think they illustrate our problem with relationships between each other in the Church. The Church in our culture has been reduced to sitting in large rooms and auditoriums, participating in corporate worship and listening to teaching/preaching for a few hours per week. I love to preach and I love hearing good preaching and teaching. I love to worship God corporately and I don’t mind listening to talented worshipers, worship God. I am even OK with there being somewhat of an “entertainment value” in a worship service; I do not think God wants church services to be boring. BUT, if we call a group of people seated in a building with worship music and preaching: “having church,” we have got major problems. Please pardon my bluntness, but calling that the Church is like calling a man and a women lying in bed together “a marriage.” While we should like and enjoy what happens in the bedroom, it does not make a healthy marriage by itself; -divorce statistics clearly demonstrate that sex is not enough to make a healthy marriage. I would never settle for a wife that just showed up at my house a few hours per week. Frankly, I am looking for something deeper; I want to share my life with someone. Jesus expects nothing less from His Bride. The Church is the people; the Church is people loving each other and participating in relationship. I am sorry friends, but that does not happen during a Sunday morning worship service in a large room or auditorium in the midst of a crowd.

Christian relationship happens when love, time, grace, truth, sacrifice and people intersect. When “life” rubs up against “life;” in other words, when we get to know each other. -And we make a decision to put up with each other, -even though we “know” each other! Another word could almost be used here, “family.” Seems like we may have heard that word used in the Bible a few times when God’s people are described. No matter how elaborate the building, how good the music or how entertaining the teaching and preaching is, it simply cannot serve as an adequate substitute for relationship. As messy as the process might be, there is no substitute for “life rubbing up against life.” Jesus modeled this principle HImself by sharing His earthly life with His disciples and spending much less time with the crowds. He could have catered to the crowds, but He knew better. Who are we to think that our strategy is better than His? Jesus focused on authentic relationships that had true depth. Therein lays the beauty of the Church; and therein lays Her power –when we learn to love each other as God’s love is revealed to us.

In addition, our pursuits for numerical growth and “success” in our churches often overshadow our pursuit of “relationship” with God and each other. Then when we become successful, we no longer “need” God or each other. Often times, we sacrifice these relationships in the process of becoming “successful.” As a result, at a certain point we belittle God to His place in our doctrinal statement, written core values and Sunday rhetoric and we throw each other away. (Please note my use of the word “we.” I include myself in these allegations.) I have been in the ministry for 17 years and I have personally watched this scenario play out multiple times, in multiple groups and in multiple denominations; it is simply the nature of “the system.” *This would not happen if “relationships” were the core element and deeply driven anchor of the local church. We do not “belittle” or “throw away” those who we dearly love and authentically care about. Do Jesus’ Words in Matthew 22 make better sense now?

–And He said, “On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” Relationship is not everything; but everything hangs on relationship. Without proper relationships, the Church predestines itself to be much, much less than what God designed Her to be.

We were created by God to know and to be known, -by Him and each other…