We’ve encouraged you to learn neighbours’ names, stories, work together, become friends, and now your challenge is to find people of peace in your life. Start sharing Redeem the Commute with them. Perhaps you could do the Marriage course with your spouse and some other couples. Or you could do the parenting courses with other parents. Then take Christianity 101 together, and then the daily challenges. Make a habit of eating together whenever you can, and talking about things that matter.
This is our vision, to be a network of small groups who are being the church. We don’t want to be a church you go to, but a church on the go. We don’t want you to just go to church, but to be the church every day. We’ll be the church when we are scattered around the GTA at work, and scattered around our various neighbourhoods, but also when we gather for community events. We started this with our outdoor movie night, and next we have a trivia night.
After that, we’ll have a Christmas event. We want it to be welcoming for local residents and families, generous for those in need, and introduces the story of the original Christmas party. We’re about to start planning, so let Ryan know if you would like to help!
In the next series, Becoming Like Family, we’ll look at what it means for you, and perhaps your own immediate family to be part of God’s family, called the church. See you there!
Challenge: Ask your person of peace for help with the party you’re planning. Then invite them to follow challenges, or another course, with you.
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Here's one of Jesus' most famous one-liners:
“So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.
Then he went on:
“Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few. (Matthew 7:12-14 ESV)
We'll look first at the first part – what's known as the Golden Rule.
You may think this was nothing new. Haven't other teachers said similar things?
Rabbi Hillel was once approached by a young man who asked him to summarize the whole law while the inquirer stood on one foot. He simply said, "What is hateful to yourself do to no other.”
Socrates told a story of a Greek King: "Do not do to others the thing that makes you angry"
Confucius was once asked, if there is one word to sum up the law of life and he answered, "Reciprocity: What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others."
People will often repeat a similar idea today: you can do whatever you want as long as you aren’t hurting someone else.
If Jesus is just saying what others have always known, it seems strange for him to pair this saying with a story about a narrow gate, and how difficult it is to live this out, and how few people will manage to do it.
But in fact, Jesus isn't saying the same old thing, he says something very new!
When this concept appears in other traditions, it's always in negative – do not do to others what you would not have them do to you.
But Jesus says the positive: Go above and beyond. DO. He wants the motivations to be love, not fear. The object to be the other person, not self. The question to be, not how much I can get away with, but how much can I do for others.
That's what Jesus was all about.
We'll explore this more later this week.
Question: Many have said ‘Don’t do to others what you wouldn’t want done to yourself” – but only Jesus gives the positive – “do to others what you would want done to yourself”. If you were to apply each of these statements to a practical situation you’re facing, would they each lead you to different responses?
