A Life Pleasing to God: The Eternal Impact of Transient Relationships

Pastor Fletcher teaches about pursuing deep relationships even in a transient community from 1 Thessalonians 2:17-20. Discussion points: Transient relationships can have an eternal impact on the world and our hearts, we can take courage to invest deeply in relationships, community requires commitment before certainty.

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  Scripture reader: [1 Thessalonians 2:17-20] But since we were torn away from you, brothers for a short time, in person, not in heart, we endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face, because we wanted to come to you - I, Paul, again and again - but Satan hindered us. For what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at his coming? Is it not you? For you are our glory and joy.

  This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

  Preacher: All right, good morning. How's everybody doing this morning? Good, good to see you all. in his classic book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell is very famous in saying that you can become an expert in anything if you spend 10,000 hours on that thing. So if you want to become a chess grandmaster, it's going to require 10,000 hours. If you want to, that's why it takes so long to earn a PhD, 10,000 hours before you can call yourself an expert in. Any particular field, an amazing computer programmer, 10,000 hours, a master musician, 10,000 hours, and I think you can take the same principle and apply it to relationships that it takes 10,000 hours to really know someone inside and out so well to where you, you can just think their thoughts after them and you can master that person.

  This is why so many of us build such great relationships in college because we have so much time, at least I did look, I did not go to Ivy League school like so many of you guys did. I went to a state school in Mississippi. It was very easy. There was, it was not, there was not a lot of studying happening there. I like to say that I got, I double majored in math and psychology and I double minored in intramural sports and Mario Kart Double Dash. That was like how we spent our time in college and the relationships that I built in college have really stuck with me. I have several friends that I stay in touch with to this day. For some reason I was at a secular school, but for some reason we all became pastors and so I have all these friends who are pastors all over the country and that I get to stay in touch with and and and continue our friendship.

  In today's passage, Paul's expressing a deep love and affection for the Thessalonians, but the thing with the Thessalonians is it's kind of weird because he didn't actually get to spend anywhere near 10,000 hours with them, even though he's expressing this deep love and affection. He spent like. Three weeks with these people before he was ran off and so it's an odd passage to think in that way, but what he's teaching us is that you can still make friendships that can fill up your soul for years to come in a short amount of time. let's dive in the passage. We like to just work through the Bible here. I'm just going to start in verse 17, and we're gonna work our way through.

  Verse 17, but since we were to, since we were torn away from you, brothers, for a short time, in person, not in heart, we endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face, because we wanted to come to you, I, Paul, again and again. But Satan hindered us.

  OK, quick recap, we've been going through the book of Thessalonians. This is probably the first letter that Paul wrote of several letters that he wrote to different churches, and in this, book we're reminded of the way that Paul originally came to Thessalonica, which is a city in Greece. It's still to this day the 2nd largest city in Greece and. When he came to the city, he preached for 3 weeks before a mob of angry Jewish, followers came and chased him out of town. In fact, he went to a town several miles away, Berea, and the mob followed him there and chased him out of that town as well. And so when he says that he was torn away from the Thessalonians, he means that he was chased away by an angry mob and what he says though, is that he has endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see the Thessalonians again face to face.

  What's actually happened is Paul has sent his disciple, Timothy to go and check on the Thessalonians, be like, Yo, we were only there for 3 weeks. Can you go make sure that the church still exists? And if they have any questions, which yeah, they should have questions after 3 weeks. Send them, send the questions back and I'll write them a letter and answer their questions. So that's what's happening here. And so, he says that we long to see you face to face with great desire.

  There is a great value in face to face relationships. We all felt this during the COVID pandemic, did we not? Well we long to see each other face to face? And if you're online today, we're so glad that you you found us. We're glad that people watch our YouTube videos where maybe you're checking out different churches and trying to decide where you need to be, or maybe you're one of these people that can't make it to church for one reason or another, but we would encourage you that if you are able. To come in person because there is just a value, something sacred that happens with face to face relationships. It's not church isn't just this thing that you consume as like a message, OK, there's way better preachers than I am out there and so if it is, you can find someone better than me online, but it's the value of the face to face relationships.

  And so Paul says that Satan hindered them from coming to visit. Now he doesn't elaborate on how Satan hindered them, and so anything that I share would be a conjecture. And so I'm just gonna stay away from that. Verse 19, for what is, what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord at his coming? Is it not you? For you are our crown, our glory and our joy.

  Now the word crown here, this is actually really interesting. I didn't know this before this week in Greek there's two words that are often used for crown. we use a crown, we only have one word for crown in the same kind of way. So this, this word here is Stefanos, Stefanos, and it's specifically talking about a victor's wreath. So you know, like the wreath that you would make out of olive branches sometimes they actually made them out of celery so I learned and it was something that you would give to those who completed a race in ancient times. They, they would wear a victor's wreath and this is completely different than the word for royal crowns. Now if a crown made of gold, that's a different word, it's diadema, and you would. get them confused unless you're an English speaker and you only have one word for crown. So when it talks about like crowns in heaven, don't think royal crowns because that's not the right word. It's talking about the victory crown, which is a, a cool nuance.

  And that let's go back to the verse one more time. For what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming? Is it not you? For you are our glory and our joy. Now the word for coming here, Perusia, is oftentimes used for Jesus' second coming. Paul is looking forward to the day that Jesus comes to restore the world back to working order. It's what many of us refer to heaven, but really the Bible talks about a new heaven and a new earth when Jesus comes to reunite heaven and earth, so that we can live forever with him. And he says that what will be his crown, what will be his boast, what will be his hope and his joy on that day will be the faith of the Thessalonians and the relationship that he has with them. What he says is that his investment into the life of the Thessalonians is what will really matter when his days are done.

  And I think that the principle that he's teaching us in this passage is really simple principle. It's this. Transient relationships can have an eternal impact. Transient relationships can have an eternal impact. Though Paul did not know the Thessalonians for long, Paul made an impact on them, and they made an impact on Paul. And even though they don't get much time together on earth, they will get the opportunity to spend eternity together.

  Now it's really interesting how we just preach through books of the Bible, and then we get to passages like this and you're like, well, Fletcher, you obviously chose that one for our church today. Because we're going through a period in the church of amplified transience, are we not? Where people that we love dearly who have served our church faithfully are moving too far away to be a meaningful member of what we're doing in our community here. And so the Lord has provided for us and he will provide for us, but it's one of those difficult times. And in fact, I would just say that a place like Somerville is a place with amplified transience more often than other places we have people, amazing people who come and study at one of the great universities that we have in the area. We have people who take great jobs at one of the, the jobs here that tend to churn through people on a regular basis, and we have people come and go here. I would say that in my 7 years as pastor of this church there probably been 500 different people who have called this their church home, although that is not how large of a church we are whatsoever, right?

  And so the transience it has its pluses and minuses, but what Paul wants to remind us of is that transient relationships, temporary relationships can have an eternal impact, and I will just say, even though Somerville might be a place of amplified transience, I've lived in the Boston area for like 13 years now and all of Boston is that way but I've come to find out from talking to friends in other places that like the world is just more that way these days than it used to be like it's not just Boston you might move away from Boston being like I wanna find somewhere with less transience and then you're gonna get there and be like, it's still transient here. I think the world's just more transient than it was 20 years ago. People just move more often and then that's just the thing. It's not right or wrong, it's just, it just is.

  And for those of us who call the Boston area home though, it can be so difficult to say goodbye so often, right? Emotionally exhausting might be a word that we could use here and sometimes we could be looking at our relationships and we think. Why bother? Why bother investing in another relationship? If you have not been here for longer than like 5 years, a lot of the sermon might not apply at this point, OK? Because you're like, yeah, relationships, let's go, new people, but if you've been here and you're like a gritty, like you've been here for a long time, you've been through it, you've been to that point where you're like, I will not go to your goodbye party. Like, I, I just cannot do another goodbye party. if you've made it to that point, congratulations, this sermon is for you. And but we, we oftentimes have this thought, why bother?

  I have a story. I hope it is not too cringe. I cringe a little bit with this story. when I was in college, I worked at a camp called Central Hills, and at Central Hills it was, it was a royal ambassador's camp, which is like Baptist Boy Scouts, basically is what's happening here and so I worked there they would. People, this was crazy. I don't know why people did this sort of thing. They, they would come and drop off like 200 of their young elementary school boys and people would come and drop off all of their, their boys, and we had a great time. We would walk them around the woods and do horseback riding and swimming and swimming in the lake and just a great time and at the end of every week, and I still remember a lot of these kids that I was the camp counselor for, but at the end of every week we would, the counselors would all get up on the fireplace mantel and we were secretly very, very happy that they were leaving. It was, it was the best time of the whole week, but they were all very sad, so we got up in front of them, we locked arms and we would sing the Michael W. Smith classic Friends Are Friends Forever. Does anybody know it? Friends are friends forever. If the Lord's the Lord of them, cause a friend will not say never, know it well. It the welcome will not end though it's hard to let you go in the Father's hands we know. That a friend? It's not long to live as friends. Thank you, thank you. Well done. The first and only time I've sung in front of people. It's corny, it's corny, but there's a truth to that song, that our temporary transient relationships have eternal potential.

  A few years ago there was a member of our church, a young man, by the name of Jeff Houston, who you guys remember Jeff, a few of you do at least, and, Jeff was a member of our church for like 2 or 3 years. He had no idea what he wanted to do with his life. I hope he listens to this and, and hears me say that, and he just came in and he like was wearing a backpack his first week which I'm like, where are you going with that backpack, bro? And and we built a relationship and he was a baby Christian in many ways and around the same time that he joined our church, my family bought a house and with the Vioba family and and we started a major renovation project in our house so we tore out our entire kitchen. I ripped it out all the walls and then I went home and I laid in my bed and I said I'm not sure I know how to put it back together.

  So every Friday night I would watch YouTube videos until about midnight and then I would wake up and and beg all of my friends to come help me work on the house and many of you came and helped work on the house and Jeff was at my house almost every Saturday for like 8 weeks in a row. and we're not talking just for a couple of hours, like 8 to 10 hour days, like swinging a hammer, working on the house, and we would talk and hang out and a couple, about a year ago, I went and visited Jeff, and he, he only was here for 2 or 3 years, then he moved to New York where he's still at. And I was hanging out with Jeff and he was like, man, you guys, you remember when we were working on your house? I think I got more out of that than you ever could have with the time. And it hurt so much when Jeff moved, like it's someone I had poured my life into. But forever, our lives are together and also impacted because of this transient relationship.

  A few years before that, maybe 10, 12 years ago at this point, there was a young couple who came and joined our church back when Megan and I, I was working at City on the Hill Brookline as the executive pastor over there, named Joel and Bailey Wilpis, and, Joel and Bailey, they got married. One week and then the following week we're moving into a 4, 4 story walk up in Jamaica Plain where Megan and I were living at that point and they did not know a soul in Boston so I recruited like 3 people and we went and helped them move and they had, I kid you not, like 70 nutcrackers in that in that U-Haul and I was like, Joel, what are you doing, man? He's like, I had no idea that she came with so many nutcrackers. And so we, we were friends for a couple of years. They joined our community group.

  We got to know them quite well, but after they were only here for like 2 years, Joel, showed up at our house one day and told us that they were moving to Amsterdam or somewhere in the Netherlands. it's in it all Amsterdam? And so they they were moving and it hurt. We weren't like, we weren't hardened yet, you know, we were still young, little babies in, in Jamaica Plain. And it's like, no, we're not coming to your goodbye party. I think that was the first good part goodbye party that we skipped just because it was too hard to say goodbye to people who we thought we were gonna do life with for so long. So they moved to to the Netherlands, then they moved to Chicago then randomly enough they moved to Louisville, Kentucky, which is where Megan and I met. I went to seminary in Kentucky. Megan went to high school in Kentucky, and so we, we got to kind of guide them and tell them about the church that I worked at when I was in seminary called Sojourn Community Church, and they, they joined that church actually.

  Then about 2 or 3 years ago, Bailey was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. they had had 3 children, bought a house in the suburbs, live in the dream, and she has this cancer and she fought quite hard, until late last year, just a few months ago, Bailey went to be with the Lord. She was early 30s, left 3 kids with Joel. Just a really terrible situation. And then Joel gave me a call like last week actually. I think I had the flu and I was like, I'm just gonna pretend like I don't cause I wanna talk to him, and he just wanted to encourage me.

  He wanted to say, I, I want you to know that we spent 2 years in Boston. And I thought a lot of the things that you guys did as a church were really weird. Like, you sang sad songs. I never had wanted to sing a sad song in my entire life. You did this thing during your worship services called a lament where you were sad intentionally. Why would someone ever wake up to go to that on a Sunday morning? But I get it now. And those 2 years that we spent in Boston, even though we lived in the Netherlands and Chicago in between, they led us to the church that we joined in, in Louisville. And they had, Bailey had over 1000 people at her funeral, well loved. And he's staying in Louisville even though he's from Texas because the church has cared for him so much so he just wanted to let me know that the short time that I invested in him, he joined like this Tuesday morning book club that Mark and I, Mark Schmeissing and I were a part of. The short time that I invested in him had an eternal impact on his life. Because he was able to make it through, and he's still making it through with this community that has surrounded him, because he found it through the time that we spent here.

  When I was a young man, I had a youth pastor for 2 years. 10th grade and 11th grade, formational years in my life. His name was Jason Robertson. Spiritual father? And That man took me under his wing. My father wasn't around. And so he took me to Like, hang out all the time. We spent so much time together. He would take, he took me to every home Mississippi State football game, which was exciting back then. I don't know how exciting it is these days. that was 2.5 hours away from my home, a lot of time in the car. I don't remember anything in particular that we talked about, except for one time, I was telling him about a girl and he was like, I don't think that's a good idea. But that was the only time I can remember him saying anything negative to me.

  He's actually the one that after a year of this, he said, I think the Lord's calling you to ministry. I think that you're gonna be a pastor. And so, I look at my life and I say, every bit of fruit that I've experienced in my life. From a spiritual perspective, whether that be something like pastoring a church and pouring into the lives of others, or it's just being a husband and a father. I thank God for Jason. This man who invested in my life for a short period of time, and we did not talk much after that. We've gotten, we talk maybe every other year at this point. And we didn't talk much after he moved, honestly. Temporary relationships have the potential of eternal impact.

  And if you invest yourself wisely, that eternal impact can be exponential. No matter how long someone is in your life, whether it's 3 weeks or 3 decades, there's eternal potential in that relationship. Which is why I take meetings with people that I oftentimes probably shouldn't from a productivity standpoint. And it's like, I don't, this person probably isn't gonna live here in 6 months. Why am I taking a meeting with this person? But it's each, these temporary relationships have the potential for eternal impact.

  Listen to what Paul says again after 3 weeks with the Thessalonians. For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at his coming? Is it not you? For you are, for you are our glory and joy. I have two points of application for us from that. And there are two points of encouragement, and I mean that in the literal sense, because there are two things to take courage to go and do. They're going to take courage, and so it's a literal encouragement. I want you to take a step of courage after today, whatever that might look like for you.

  And the first point here is you need to have the courage to dig into relationships. Now, when I preached this sermon. And when I get to this point, I oftentimes feel like pastors approach this, like, you need to, you introverts need to have the courage to be more extroverted. And that is not the point here, OK? I'm not saying be someone you're not. I'm saying have the courage to enter relationships. Because an introvert has this gift to have a much deeper relationship oftentimes than an extrovert does. It's not just have a a a breadth of relationship, it's like dive into relationships, have friendships. The average human lives to be about 75 or 85, and that means that you live about 4000 weeks. There's a famous book about this. That's a shockingly short amount of time, is it not? 4000 weeks? Are you investing yourself into what will live after that 4000 weeks? Which are relationships.

  To have a relationship with another human being is a risky thing, because to have a real relationship with another human being is to open yourself up to hurt. Each of these relationships that I just shared about. I felt hurt at one point in that relationship. And I'm sure they felt hurt from me. But you cannot have a real relationship without the potential for her. I love the way that CS Lewis describes this in his book, The Four Loves. He says this, to love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything in your heart will be wrong and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it around your hobbies and little luxuries. Avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. Put in the casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken, it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable to love is to be vulnerable.

  Friends, my, my encouragement to you is to have the courage to be vulnerable. To invest yourself in a relationship, that might break your heart. That might hurt at the end of it. In fact, you might be looking at relationships and say, is this worth it? Is this really, is it worth it for me to do this? And I would just respond with saying, aren't all relationships temporary? I mean, I've been married for almost going on 15 years this this year. I hope that I have another, you know, 40 in me, maybe a few more than that, Lord willing. But still, our, our marriage is momentary. It's, it's not gonna last forever. There's no there's no marriage in heaven and marriage is meant to reflect what heaven's all about, which is intimacy with God. And so all marriage, all relationships are temporary.

  Some people will move 12 times looking for community that takes a lifetime to build. Some people will go to 10 different churches a year looking for community that you cannot have without commitment. That's why we have this, this community commitment that we make with one another, just something that we say here all the time is that community requires commitment before certainty. Because our FOMO so much, so often keeps us from really committing to a community, to a group, and saying these are my people, cause we might be afraid that there might be better people out there for us somewhere. But if you want to find your people, you're never gonna know they're your people without committing to them first.

  Community requires commitment before certainty. Some of us have likewise been looking for certainty with God before engaging in relationship with Him. And I would say that community requires commitment before certainty in a relationship with God as well. I'm not trying to tell you to put your doubts on the back burner. There are answers to many of your questions. I want you to investigate those. we can get you connected with someone to talk through those things. Talk About Doubts.com, former member of our church, put that together.

  But what I'm saying is if you really wanna have a relationship with God, there will come a day where you just have to say faith is important and. I'm going to take a step of commit committing myself to the Lord without all of my questions answered because some of us have that scientific inquisitive mind that can just, if you're a scientist, you all of your questions are never answered, OK? That's, I just know that about scientists after living here for long enough. You're never gonna answer them all. And, and so it requires some commitment before you get to that certainty. You have to be willing to open yourself up to him. Here's the thing, we were created, created to live in a relationship with God.

  That's the whole point of the gospel, that Jesus came to establish a relationship with us. He paid the penalty that we deserve, so that we might have a relationship with God. He was resurrected from the dead so that we might live with him. And the second encouragement that I have for you, OK? So that's the first one, the courage. To form relationships and honestly, that one is easy compared to the second one to have courage to do. Cause I think that a lot of you are like, OK, I buy it, you know, I'll, I'll have the courage to step into a relationship and maybe you just need to jot down a name right now, someone that you're gonna, gonna try to reach out to a little bit more. Don't put too much pressure on it, OK? That's a good way to smother a relationship.

  But have the courage to put yourself out there, to step into relationships, to show up to community group regularly to say I'm gonna be there every week and and to be there, to show up to church regularly. I'm gonna, it's, it's that face time, that regular face time that oftentimes builds a relationship. It's amazing. Just how much an hour on a Sunday of just being in the same room can build you up with another person. But then you also have to have conversations and everything. So that, that's one step, take that courage of of relationships.

  The second step is the courage to bring Christ into the relationship. And that one's a lot harder for a lot of us, is it not? Relationships centered on Christ have maximum investment potential though. Because a relationship centered on Christ doesn't have a cap. Relationships in this life have a cap. It's like 80, 90 years maybe if you're lucky. Relationships centered on Christ have an eternal. Growth potential. You can know that person into the next life. As Christians, we do face the reality that our friends who don't know Christ, are looking at eternity separated from us and separated from God.

  And so therefore, we must invest into those relationships, not just with our own love, as Paul said, he said he laid himself out, he, he invested himself, but we also invest the love of Christ. That's why they're his joy and crown, not just because they're people that he knows and he loves, but because he's invested the word of Christ into them, the revelation of God, because they've come to true faith in who Jesus is. That's why they are his crown of boasting, and his joy and his glory. I know this takes a tremendous amount of courage, a tremendous amount of courage, but honestly, you're limiting your friendship if you refuse to bring God into the relationship, because there's so much more potential for joy and glory in a relationship where Christ is at the center of it.

  And I'm not trying to say, I think that some of us make a mistake here, and we say, OK, I'm gonna limit my relationships to Christians then. That's called living in a bubble. That's also not what Paul is wanting to do. He's meeting people who aren't Christians and trying to bring Christ into it. Maybe we have relationships with Christians or a marriage that we won't need to bring Christ into our marriage, Christ into my relationship with another believer, we can do that and that's a really thing, a great thing that requires some courage, but it requires even more courage to share your faith with another with another person who might not share it.

  But let me tell you this, that feels really scary to us. We're afraid that we're gonna make it weird or, or something, and it's OK sometimes you play the long game, but some of us have been playing the long game for way too long, and I, I'll tell you this that people that I've talked to about faith oftentimes have been waiting to have the conversation. They want to talk about these things. They don't wanna make it weird. They don't wanna put you on the spot if they know you're a Christian, but it's not hard to start a simple conversation. Don't be pushy, but be invitational into my life, into the message of Christ, into the good news of the gospel.

  What you have is not snake oil that you're trying to like deceive them into. You are not a used car salesman. You have the message of the hope of the world. Why keep it to yourself? Why keep it to yourself? It is not something fake, you're not trying to deceive anybody. You're trying to give them the good news. It does require courage. It requires a lot of confidence in what Christ thinks of you, that Christ loves me, and even if I'm rejected by this friend, I'm still loved. And I, it also requires a church community, because you, if you go and do this by yourself and you get rejected. Without a church community to like fall back on, how much is that gonna hurt? It's gonna be worse. I don't know where you're at with these things. Maybe I think that the steps for us are one, if you are new to Christianity or you're questioning your faith, maybe today is the day that you take a step of courage into that commitment before certainty with God. And so you might want to pray with someone after the service and tell them I want to invite God into my life. And that would be an opportunity for you to trust in him.

  Maybe you need to take that step of courage into a real relationship with another person. Maybe you've been hurt and you've closed yourself off to others, or maybe you're just starting to go down that path. Today could be a day where you say, OK, I'm gonna open myself up again to being hurt again, but to stepping into a relationship, or maybe you have a relationship, a friendship that you could bring Christ into it. And you might need to pray with someone about a specific friend today, and I would invite you to to pray with, we have prayer counselors in the back after the worship gathering today.

  But wherever you are in that, if you are a believer here today, you're called to friendship and relationship with God. It's such a wonderful invitation and each week we participate in a sacred meal that symbolizes our friendship with God. It symbolizes what he has done to establish relationship with us that his body was broken for us and the body of Christ was broken, the blood of Christ was shed, that we might enjoy fellowship with him forever. So each week we take a a sacred meal. On the night that he was betrayed Jesus initiated the sacred meal, and it, it's almost as if we go back in time to sitting around that table with Jesus, and we remind ourselves of what Jesus has done for us and that we get to have a relationship with him throughout all eternity. So if you're a believer here today, we're gonna encourage you, to come and receive this communion meal. With that being said, I'm gonna invite you to receive this over the next song and why don't we stand up if you're able as we prepare our hearts to receive this communion meal.

  Father, we thank you for the good news of the gospel that encouraged us day in and day out. Would you give us courage today? Would you fill our, our souls with the joy of, of Christian relationship with the joy of the fruit that you've invested in us. God, we pray that you would give us the courage to step out there to share the good news of Jesus, but also the courage to step out there in relationship and to really be willing to allow ourselves to be hurt again, even though it's difficult. God, we pray that you would bless this communion meal. Anyone who, who needs fellowship with you today, would they come and, and receive it in a special way? Would you be with them in this time? We ask this in Christ's name, Amen.