The Opening

Overview

Creedal Statement

We prize the family as a bedrock of faith formation,
we cherish marriage as a most holy and most sacred union,
we value parents as frontline shepherds to disciple their children,
we treasure friends as our own souls,
we engage society as godly citizens with redemptive purpose, and
we embrace our lifework with a God-centered focus.

We confess the church as Christ’s family, a family called to:
treat other members with genuine care,
steward our possessions for the common good,
honor appointed leaders and participate in Christ’s worldwide body,
engage the domains of the world with the truth of the gospel, and
represent Christ to all those who are far and near.

Key Elements

• Key Passage - Preview
• Scripture Memory - “We … are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.” Romans 12:5
• Catechism - Q: How are Christians to relate to one another? A: Community.

Introduction

Although I hope to come to you soon, I am writing you these things in case I am delayed, so that you will know how each one must conduct himself in God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth.

Satan always hates Christian fellowship; it is his policy to keep Christians apart. Anything which can divide saints from one another he delights in. He attaches far more importance to godly intercourse than we do. Since union is strength, he does his best to promote separation.

At its core, Christianity is interpersonal. The Christian life is experienced in community with others. While we enjoy a personal relationship with God, the life of faith is not an individual endeavor. When God calls us to himself, he also invites us to forge deep relationships with other believers. The shared life and common bond of this Christian fellowship is one of the great blessings of the Christian life. In addition to fellowship with other believers, God has placed each of us in various spheres of life in which we have encounters and interactions with other humans. In an effort to mature us in our faith, God wants to shape the way we live out our faith in each of these interpersonal spheres. An introduction to Christian relationships, The Bond Between Us lays out a pathway that helps Christians order their various relationships after God’s design.

Exploring the essentials of a Christian approach to relationships is important for many reasons. For one, new believers often bring the baggage of past relationships into their newly found Christian lives. While we pledge our faith to Christ and seek to reform our conduct, we also must allow our relationships with others to undergo a transformation. God wants to reorder our interactions with others after his design. Additionally, these reordered relationships offer a compelling witness to the surrounding world. It is often through interpersonal relationships that the gospel is shared and people come to faith in Christ. As unbelievers observe the transformation in the life of a disciple—in addition to the transformation that occurs in a community of disciples—this becomes a powerful testimony to the Christian faith.

Christian community is one of God’s great aims in his global mission. To become mature in our faith, we need to establish foundations of correct belief, godly living, and formative habits. No Christian can be mature without deep moorings sunk into these areas of the Christian faith. These pillars of the faith have been explored in previous books of the Narrative Journey series. As these foundations are laid, we must also learn how to interact with others in a godly manner. Mature Christian faith orders, calibrates, and defines its relationships after God’s design. Not only are the essentials of the faith meant to be embraced individually as a disciple, but these essentials are also meant to be embodied as a community. God’s mission is to establish mature communities of faith throughout the world.

Further, foundations of Christian community also provide a context where Christian formation can occur. Cultivating healthy relationships in various spheres of life allows for fertile surroundings in which to grow our faith. Interacting with family members challenges our Christian character. Ordering our parenting and reforming our marriages after God’s design is crucial to embodying the faith as a mature disciple. Participating in a loving Christian community provides support for our faith journey. Meaningfully and redemptively interacting with those outside of the Christian community will galvanize our own faith as Christians. Redefining how we approach work and personal resources puts our faith to the test on a daily basis. Even reconsidering how Christians should interact with government and public life proves to be helpful for our formation as Christians. In short, establishing foundations of Christian relationships equips believers to put their faith into practice in concrete and practical ways.

In this study, we offer twelve biblical narratives that deal with various aspects of Christian relationships. The stories are divided into two main groups. The first set of six stories will address relationships connected with the Christian family and surrounding society. The second set of six stories addresses spheres of relationship involving the church community. Broadly speaking, these two sets of stories relate to each other in dynamic ways. While the family is a basic unit of relationships for individual development and society, the church is God’s redeemed people operating as a family of faith.

Connected together, the biblical passages form a pathway by which we can mature in our approach to Christian relationships. Aiming to establish godly families, we explore six passages that orient believers to foundations of community life in a Christian household. The journey taken through these six stories teaches believers how to live in the context of family (Genesis 15:1–19:38), marriage (Genesis 24:1–67), parenting (1 Samuel 1:1–3:21), friendship (1 Samuel 18:1–20:42), government (Daniel 1:1–2:49; 4:1–6:28), and work (Nehemiah 1:1–7:4). Building off of the foundations of godly family life, we explore six more stories related to Christian community, now considering the context of the church. Through these six stories, Christians learn to relate to Jesus as a family of faith (Mark 3:7–35), care for one another with community virtues (Matthew 17:22–18:35), practice a common life by caring for the needy of the community (Acts 4:32–6:7), understand relationship with leaders and other churches (Acts 14:19–16:5), interact with domains of the surrounding world (Acts 16:6–18:17), and practice hospitality to outsiders (Acts 27:1–28:31).

God has placed each of us in various spheres of influence. These relationships are testing grounds where our faith is put into practice. The bond we enjoy with other humans is one of the great mysteries and joys of God’s created world. In the Fall, these relationships became places of pain, hardship, brokenness, and abuse. In Christ, God powerfully redeems and transforms the way we approach our relationships with one another. In the very call of discipleship, Jesus wants us to consider how we can order each domain and relationship after God’s design. Our maturity of faith is reflected by our willingness to do just this.

Discussing various domains of human relationships is not easy. Humans disappoint one another. People fail to live up to expectations. Loved ones can place inappropriate and unhealthy expectations on others. Even with our best intentions, we can hurt, disappoint, or frustrate. Needless to say, we venture into a conversation about a Christian view of relationships not because it is easy, but because it is close to the heart of the faith. Christianity is an interpersonal faith in which we enjoy our relationship with God in the context of relationship with others. As we consider what it means to live rightly within the spheres of family, society, work, church, and the unbelieving world, we can once again experience God’s powerful and gracious work to redeem what otherwise would be impossible to redeem. In the study that follows, we hope that God’s vision of mature relationships—“the bond between us” in various spheres of life—will come to reality as we journey toward Christian community.

Book Overview: Surveying the Landscape

Discipleship is a process of establishing believers in the essentials of the Christian faith. In this section, explore the core content, consider the key idea, and articulate particular areas of interest in this study.

Core Content

An outline of Christian teaching is like a map for the journey of faith. Survey the twelve scriptural passages and associated themes that will set the itinerary for your upcoming study.

Key Idea

Faithful disciples plant firm roots in the soil of biblical principles. Review the main idea of this study. Discuss how the individual narratives and corresponding themes relate to this overarching theme.

Key Idea: Mature Christians prioritize God’s design to rightly order their interpersonal relationships in all spheres of life.

Personal Interest

The essentials of the Christian faith are extremely relevant to our lives. Pick one or two biblical passages or study themes that capture your attention. Briefly discuss with your community what most interests you about these narratives and topics.

Faith Foundation: Exploring the Terrain

God calls his people to move beyond a superficial understanding of Christian essentials. Use the discussion questions and key quote to ponder with others how the subject area of study is of great importance in the Christian faith.

Discussion Questions

Disciples progress in the faith in the context of committed Christian community. Discuss the following questions with other believers as a means to orient your community to the subject of this study.

Significant Quote

Christians learn from believers who live in different generations and cultures. Read the following quote and discuss with others what it suggests about the importance of Christian witness.

A holy, well-governed family, is the preparative to a holy and wellgoverned church…Well-governed families tend to make a happy state and commonwealth; a good education [upbringing] is the first and greatest work to make good magistrates and good subjects [citizens], because it tends to make good men…Holy, well-governed families are blessed with the special presence and favour of God. They are his churches where he is worshipped; his houses where he dwells: he is engaged both by love and promise to bless, protect, and prosper them. It is safe to sail in that ship which is bound for heaven, and where Christ is the pilot. But when you reject his government, you refuse his company, and contemn [despise] his favour, and forfeit his blessing, by despising his presence, his interest, and his commands. So that it is an evident truth, that most of the mischiefs that now infest or seize upon mankind throughout the earth, consist in, or are caused by the disorders and illgovernedness of families. These are the schools and shops of satan, from whence proceed the beastly ignorance, lust and sensuality, the devilish pride, malignity, and cruelty against the holy ways of God…These are the nests in which the serpent does hatch the eggs of covetousness, envy, strife, revenge, of tyranny, disobedience, wars and bloodshed, and all the leprosy of sin that hath so odiously contaminated human nature, and all the miseries by which they make the world calamitous…Cleanse and cure these vitiated [spoiled] families, and you may cure almost all the calamities of the earth…Family reformation is the easiest and the most likely way to a common reformation: at least to send many souls to heaven, and train up multitudes for God, if it reach not to national reformation.

Record any initial observations or community insights below.

Learning Plan: Charting the Course

Formative biblical interpretation fosters Christian growth as the faith community purposefully engages the scriptural text. Review the session framework and use the planning calendar to coordinate your learning for this upcoming study journey.

Session Framework

The Scriptures bear authority over every area of our lives. To deeply understand any particular passage, disciples must engage the text at various levels. In the Narrative Journey series, a common study framework is applied to each core session. This common framework helps disciples engage each biblical passage in exegetical, theological, personal, ministry, and missional ways. This dynamic hermeneutical approach (a spiraling process through five movements that serves to deepen your understanding as you engage the text multiple times) helps believers and churches faithfully engage the Scriptures for life transformation.

Review the five movements of this interpretive framework and discuss how this hermeneutical approach helps individuals and communities engage the biblical text in a way that reforms our thinking and changes our lives.

Planning Calendar

Wisdom calls believers and the community to approach an ordered process of faith development with diligence and preparation. Use the following calendar to plan out dates and teachers for the various sessions in this study.

Core Project: Synthesizing the Faith

Genuine disciples integrate the truth of God’s word into their personal and community life. In this section, you will preview the capstone project, view an example confessional statement, and imagine how God might want to change your life through this study.

Project Preview

Coming soon.

Example Covenant

As we journey toward Christian maturity, we should learn from other disciples. As we study the Scriptures together, the community of Christ followers helps each of us hone our thinking around what is true. As you prepare to write your own community covenant (and share it with other believers), review the following statement as an example of this capstone project.

We prize the family as a bedrock of faith formation,
we cherish marriage as a most holy and most sacred union,
we value parents as frontline shepherds to disciple their children,
we treasure friends as our own souls,
we engage society as godly citizens with redemptive purpose, and
we embrace our lifework with a God-centered focus.

We confess the church as Christ’s family, a family called to:
treat other members with genuine care,
steward our possessions for the common good,
honor appointed leaders and participate in Christ’s worldwide body,
engage the domains of the world with the truth of the gospel, and
represent Christ to all those who are far and near.

Imaginative Storytelling

Believers in Jesus look forward to the future with hope and anticipation. As you consider the overarching topic of this study, think about how God wants to mature you in the faith. Specifically, imagine how your life would be different as God grows you into a mature Christian.

If I could know the truth about life, these are some things I would want to understand…

If I could grow in my understanding of the truth, this is how my life would look…

Faith Practice: Following the Way

Discipleship involves a lifetime of following Jesus in a context of Christian community. Familiarize yourself with the growth outcomes of this study, identify an area of focus, and pray for God’s transformative work in the course of the upcoming weeks.

Growth Outcomes

Setting growth goals helps to refine our Christian walk. As you look ahead to the upcoming study, read through the following outcomes to clarify ways in which God would have you grow in your faith.

As a result of this study, disciples, families, and churches will …

• establish a mature Christian understanding of the essentials of the Christian faith
• cultivate a deepening commitment to biblical truth
• demonstrate clarity and capability in articulating Christian truth
• participate in teaching basic Christian truths to others

Focused Area

Growth in the Christian life often happens one step at a time. Identify one of the above outcomes in which you want to grow. Name this specific outcome to your community, asking them to support you in prayer.

Community Prayer

We depend upon God’s power to grow each step in our Christian journeys. Pray that God would help each person in your community mature in the identified growth areas. Feel free to use the space below to write out a personal prayer or record requests from other members that you can keep in prayer throughout the course of this study.