Southwood Presbyterian Church

On Mission Together

Wednesday, July 29, 2015

A grassy field, a bandana, and a partner. That’s all you need to compete in the three-legged race. It has likely been a while since most of us ran, stumbled, and limped toward the finish line in this event, but the three-legged race still seems to show up at nearly every Field Day in town. Like most races, the goal is to be the first one to cross the finish line; however, in this unique event you have to cross alongside your partner, having run in sync with your legs bound together near the ankle.

The three-legged race is a good analogy for what God has called us to at Southwood. God has given us a mission to experience and express grace – that is, while deepening our relationships with Him, we are to be about seeing the good news of Jesus transform our neighborhoods, cultures, workplaces, friendships, city, and world. We offer the hurting and hopeless the hope of Jesus. We pray and work to see Huntsville flourish. We bring the light of Christ into the darkness of racism, poverty, and systemic abuse. We’re going somewhere, moving outward, seeking to make a difference – not merely to “play church.”

I trust you’re excited about the mission God has given us. I also understand that you might be confused when you hear that small groups is the place to start such a mission. It may seem counter-intuitive. Get in a small group? Don’t we need to be moving outward, not turning inward? Don’t we need to be running as fast as we can to reach our goals? Absolutely, we need to be on mission now, and we need to be on mission together. This is a community project, which is where the three-legged race comes in. 

Everybody Grab a Partner: Relationships with Each Other
One thing I know you can’t do is win a three-legged race on your own; it absolutely requires a partner. You’ve got to get together and talk about how you’re going to run the race, you’ve got to know each other’s strengths and weaknesses, you’ve got to plan which foot you’re going to step with first.

I’ll explain in a minute why I believe this is equally vital for the mission of the Church, but it is exactly where we begin with small groups. Southwood small groups focus on three key relationships, and the first of those is our relationships with each other. This is where we connect as God’s people – sharing meals together, visiting each other in the hospital, investing in each other’s kids, learning to become real friends.

In other words, we start the race by connecting to each other, learning each other’s stories, sharing a variety of aspects of our lives with each other, and praying and planning with each other about why God has placed us here and put us together. It’s stage one of the mission to which God has called us because He hasn’t called us to this mission alone. Instead, in his great kindness, He has called us to be a part of a new community that is connected to each other by Him and moving to include others for the sake of his kingdom.
 
Locking Arms (or Legs): Relationships with God
If you have ever run in a three-legged race, you know the key to the whole race happens before you start moving: getting tied tightly together. If the knot is too loose, you will struggle to move in unison once the race begins. The more the bandana unites two legs into one, the better the chance you have to move quickly to the finish line together.

In the Church our bond, of course, is Jesus Christ. He unites otherwise different and disconnected people into one body and one family because through Jesus we are adopted by our Heavenly Father. Thus, our relationships with God are vital to our common mission. It is this relationship with our Father that is the second key relationship in small groups, where we consider his truth together. As we get to know each other more and share more of life with each other, we also have opportunity to discuss where God’s Word intersects with the joys and challenges of life. We learn more of his grace together, we help each other wrestle through seeking his will for our lives, and we help each other depend on Him in life’s hard places. Tied tightly together because of Jesus, we are ready to run on his mission.

Running the Race: Relationships with Our Neighbors
I hope this goes without saying, but you’ll never get a ribbon in the three-legged race if you stand at the starting line getting to know your partner, planning your strategy, and fretting over the tightness of the knot. Those things are important in themselves, but they also serve a larger purpose: enabling you to run the race to the best of your ability.

The race or mission God has given us as his people is to partner with him as He transforms Huntsville and beyond through the good news of Jesus. We want our neighbors and friends to know Jesus personally, we want our workplaces, neighborhoods, and relationships to be full of his grace, and we want our city to reflect the beauty, diversity, and justice of his kingdom.

This is no small task, and it’s one none of us is capable of on our own, which is why God has called us together into his Church. Imagine trying to run a Jobs for Life program on your own. Even if you worked full-time at it, you could never relationally engage with the number of students that you could with the church united together behind it. Can you single-handedly address the issues of ingrained racism, generational poverty, and systemic injustice even in your own local school? No way! Even if you decided to be a foreign missionary, you would need a support system of prayer and financial help.

And so God has given us each other. If you want to be a part of exciting things like these happening at Southwood and in Huntsville, start with joining a small group. It sets you up for being a part of a team rather than an individual hero. It connects you to others who share your need for God’s grace and your passion to see others impacted by his grace, too.

As we move outward on a mission to develop this third key small group relationship – our relationships with our neighbors – the beautiful thing is that what we are offering people is the first two relationships we started with. What we are seeking to do is to introduce them to the God we have been getting to know more deeply and to invite them into a community that welcomes and cares for broken and hurting people the way God has welcomed and cared for us. The honest, safe, and life-giving relationships we have developed with each other is exactly what our fractured, lonely world needs. And the gracious, compassionate, and forgiving God we know is exactly who our broken, sinful world needs. We need our relationships with each other and with God, and so do our neighbors. We introduce them to Him and invite them into our “family.”

Getting Back Up: Imperfect Small Groups
One last thought about three-legged races: they’re often not a thing of beauty. There’s the occasional pair that runs as though they’ve been practicing together for years, but there are usually more pairs tripping over each other and falling to the ground.

Merely being in a small group doesn’t make relationships and being a part of God’s mission easy. Sometimes it’s harder to run while your leg is tied to someone else’s, and sometimes it feels harder to be on mission together with a small group than to go do something by yourself. Relationships are just messy. The beauty of our relationships with each other, though, is that when we fall, we’re there to pick each other up and encourage each other to carry on with the mission God has given us.

Do you want to do big things for God? Start small. Grab a partner (or several), lock arms in Christ, and then run together where He has called you.