A Community with Easy Entry

We want our congregation to be a tight-knit community. We want our members to spend time together, to actually hangout on a regular basis, to do life together, to do ministry together. To come up with all sorts of creative initiatives together, for the good of the Twin Cities.

We want our congregants to really get to know each other, and to constantly be encouraging and challenging one another, and praying for one another. We want the friendships that exist within our church to be an instrument for sanctification in each other’s lives! That’s good. And there are many people looking for that. People are looking to be a part of that type of tight-knit community.

Over the course of my life, I've read several studies and articles about how people choose a church. One of the top factors is relationships. When people are visiting a church for the first time, they are often asking themselves, “How easy will it be for me and my family to build friendships here?”

Human beings want to be in a tight-knit community. People want to be known. People long for that. And they know they need it. The problem is… breaking into pre-existing community is really, really hard. I've been thinking and praying about this a lot over the last few months. The reason this has been on my mind so much is largely because of several conversations that I have had with people here at Cities Church—some of you. I've had several people tell me that it was really hard for them to get connected here. These are people that now feel connected, but that it took a while. For some of you here this morning, that’s your story.

In addition, there's a second group of people that I've talked to a lot over the last few weeks and months, and that’s regular attenders, people who have been coming here for a while, but they don't feel connected—at least not yet.

There are quite a few people here, sitting in this room, right now, that want deep relationship, but they don’t know how to break into the friendship circles that already exists here at Cities Church.

There is a group of people sitting here, in this room, right now, that see some great gospel-centered friendship circles all around them, which is awesome, but those same people just don’t know how to get into those circles.

To solve this problem, our friendship circles need to have easy entry points. We want a tight knit community, yes, but we want a tight knit community that is easy for new people to plug into.

And honestly… that’s on us. Those of us that already feel connected, we need to make it easy for people to break into our lives and break into our friendship circles. And this is not just on the pastors… no… this is on all of us. We must find ways to make it easier for those who do not feel connected… to get connected. Now, there are certainly people in our congregation that are already doing this very well. Praise the Lord!

But, if we’re honest, I think there are many of us, myself included, that could afford to be better.

Now, our church is not unique in this. Lots and lots of churches across the country struggle with this. However, we can’t allow that to be an excuse. We don’t want this to be our story.

So, how do we solve this? Here’s some ideas.

• Pray for our church.

• When you meet someone here on a Sunday morning, invite them out to lunch, that day… or better yet, invite them over to your home?

• Maybe hang out after service… linger… not just see your friends and people you already know, but to intentionally meet people that you don't already know.

• When service is over today look around the room, find someone you don’t know, walk up to them and introduce yourself. I know it feels awkward, but I’d encourage you, do it anyway. Have a conversation, get to know each other a bit. And maybe invite them into your life somehow. Something like, “Hey, there’s a group of us hanging out Tuesday night, why don’t you join us?” Swap phone numbers or emails, right there, and if possible, make plans on the spot.

My exhortation this morning is for everyone—both those that feel connected and those who don’t.

First, if you’re someone who doesn’t feel connected, you may need to take some steps too. Come up here after the service and talk to one of the leaders upfront, or come find me in the back, almost every week after service I’m back there. Feel free to come up to me and ask how to get connected. I promise, we’ll introduce you to some people. We’ll get you connected.

And to those of you who already feel connected, those of you who call Cities Church home… in particular, to our covenant members… this exhortation is especially for you.

I encourage you… Proactively find people that you don't know, seek out people that might feel disconnected, and invite them into your life… and into friendship circles. No matter how inconvenient or awkward it may be.

Please pray with me please.

Lord, please forgive me for the times where I have been apathetic in this area. And I ask the same for my brothers and sisters in this room, forgive us for the apathy that we often display. Forgive us, Oh God, for the moments where we have been selfish, when we have not considered the relational needs of those around us, and for the times when we’ve lacked compassion and sympathy for others. Forgive us for the moments where we’ve allowed awkwardness or fear or pride or busyness to stop us from being the church community that we ought to be. Forgive us for not being proactive when we should. Help us to build friendships with those we don’t know, and I ask that those friendships would become the catalyst for greater sanctification in our lives. God, please give us the grace to be the church community that you desire us to be. And Lord, we recognize that to be the community you want us to be, we must confront sin, not just our corporate sins, but our individuals sins as well. And so, this morning, with sobriety, we take a moment of silence to confess our individual sins to you now.