2011 Radicalis – Session 4, Rick Warren – Radical Community
John 13:34-35
Romans 12:5
1 Timothy 3:14-15
Ten building blocks
1. Real community requires authenticity
- large group worship/small group fellowship
- Hebrews 10:25
- Acts 2:46
2. Real community takes authenticity
- revealing your feeling is the beginning of healing
- 1 John 1:7-8
- James 5:16
- 2 Corinthians 4:2
- Hebrews 4:12
3. Real community is built on mutuality
- speak only what is helpful in building other up
- mutual encouragement
- mutual honoring
- mutual accountability
4. Real community is cultivated through courtesy
- In every small group there is at least 1 difficult person
- It’s easy love people who are lovable
- For God to teach you real love, He’s going to put you around people who are difficult to lovebr
- Romans 14:1 Welcome with open arms people who don’t see things the same way you do
- We always look at people at how they are without knowing how far they’ve come
- When you know where people have come from, you love them more, not less
- Secret of courtesy: Understand where people have come from
- Rules of Celebrate Recovery – everybody can share, everybody wants to be heard without having people piling on them to try to fix them or appear better than them
- When people come to your group with problems, they a lot of times just want to be heard
5. Real community requires sympathy
- One of your deepest needs in life is to have your feelings understood
- Sympathy says I know what you’re talking about and you’re not weird
- Some of you have a deep fear that you might lose your mind. You’re broken, but you’re not crazy
- If you worry about going crazy, you’re not. Crazy people don’t worry about being crazy. Fearing going crazy is a mark of sanity. You’re broken, but you’re not crazy
- Romans 12:8
- 1 John 3:18
- Romans 15:1
- Jude 1:22
- Job 6:14
- If you have a friend in your church who isn’t sure they believe in God, that’s when they need you most. Sometimes you need to believe in God for other people and hang in there with them
6. Radical community is built on humility
- 1 Peter 5:5
- Romans 12:16
- Humility is not putting yourself down or denying your strengths. That’s often pride asking to be fed
- Humility is being honest about your weaknesses
- You need to learn to do both – recognize your strengths and weaknesses
- Paul could say follow me as I follow Christ and I’m the chief of sinners – he acknowledged both
- It’s okay because people learn from models
- Everything we learn, we learn from the model others set for us
- If you only follow a perfect model, there are no models except for Christ
- Examples of humility
— Accepting the weaknesses of others
— Point the spotlight and credit to others – Humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less often
— The humble person walks into the room and thinks how can I serve these people
7. Real community is based on honesty
- Most people are surrounded by people who don’t love them enough to be honest with them
- What are you pretending is not a problem in your marriage
- The truth sets you free
- On one side of life is pseudo-community (shallow)
- On the other side is genuine community
- You get from one to the other through the tunnel of conflict
- It’s only through conflict that we get real with others and develop intimacy
- You can’t fix the problem as long as you’re fixing the blame
- Most groups don’t have intimacy because their afraid of gut-level honesty
- If you stay in the tunnel and don’t back out, your will be set free to be intimate with your small group
- In the end, people appreciate frankness more than flattery
- When you see somebody sinning in your church and you don’t confront it, show me the scriptural reference for that. There are personal sins, but not private sins. Your sin affects everybody else
8. Real community requires mercy (Out of time so Rick just gave the last 3 points)
- Am I going to use my energy for retaliation or resolution?
9. Real community needs confidentiality
- The quickest way to destroy a small group is gossip
10. Real community produces untity
- Unity is based on our same Savior and same purpose
- If you get your church/people on the same purpose, you will have unity
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Filed under: Radicalis 2011
