No Matter Where, No Matter What

When lust captures us in the dark, we buy into lies that keep us in the dark: “You’ll lose everything if someone finds out.” “What are people going to think if they know?” “No one wants to know those details about your life.” “If you tell someone, it will end. You don’t want it to end.” It feels inescapable, so we do everything we can to cover it up in order to avoid coming clean. There is no freedom in the darkness. When we live in the darkness, sin has the power and control. But God has given us a community of believers to hold us accountable. It can be scary and uncomfortable to ask friends to hold us accountable, but the more we get into the habit of holding one another accountable, the more it becomes normal in our friendships. We tend to believe the lie that we would come off judgmental, annoying, or arrogant, but we have to remind ourselves that to hold a friend accountable is one of the most loving things we can do.  When we hold each other accountable, we aren’t waiting for “gotcha” moments where we can lay on the guilt and shame. Instead, we have a chance to remind one another of the goodness of God and the wealth of his grace. We remind our friends that we have the chance to restore one another and have the kind of deep fellowship we were created for. Reflection/Discussion Question: How can you start implementing accountability into your community?

Sometimes, we can wonder why God feels distant, why we can’t hear his voice, why we can’t feel his love, his comfort, his peace, or his strength. In these times, we must take a close look at our lives and evaluate whether or not we are living in isolation. Sure, we can have a lot of “friends” to hang out with to talk about surface-level topics. We can be surrounded by people at work, and our houses full of hustle and bustle; but we still feel the pangs of isolation. Why is God so distant? Because we aren’t in real community with other believers. We choose isolation when we pretend like we have it all together. When we portray that we are perfect, we communicate that we don’t need people and we don’t need God. But we all struggle with insecurities, inadequacies, weaknesses, and hardships. People won’t be fooled by our facade, God sees right through it, and we sure haven’t fooled ourselves. And yet, we’d rather keep the facade and miss out on God’s love, grace, strength, comfort, and peace than share our weaknesses and embrace the fullness of God expressed through his children. If you want to experience God’s comfort, share your hardships with your community and watch them become the tangible representation of his comfort. If you want to experience God’s strength, share your weaknesses and watch your community hold you up. If you want to experience God’s grace, confess your sin to your community and feel the shackles of guilt and shame fall from your heart. God does his best work in the context of community. Since we are made in the image of God, we get to be the tangible expression of his character to the people around us. We may pray for comfort for a friend, but God is calling us to be that comfort. Prayer is valuable, but we may find that it often calls us to action to be the hands and feet of Jesus, carrying the good news of his grace and love to all believers. Reflection/Discussion Question: What is one step you can take to remove the facade that you have it all together and become more vulnerable with your community?