Welcome to the Mariners Church Life Group Leader podcast. This week the conversation is designed to equip and resource youth to build a healthy life group community that studies God's word, practices spiritual rhythms, and changes the world together. Well, welcome leaders to week four of our sermon series Life Making the Most of It. This is going to be a great discussion this week.
This is bread and butter for you, Life Group Leaders, because we are talking about making the most of your relationships. Something that you are well integrated with or passionate about as you lead your Life Group weekend and week out. You have seen the direct impact of how God works in community. And so, this is going to be a really fun, engaging conversation to have in your group.
This week, this week we have new to the podcast, but not new to our Mariners community. This is my good buddy. Yokey, who is our discipleship pastor at Mariners Oceanside. What's happening, Yokey?
Hey, everybody. So glad you guys are joining us today. Hello from Oceanside too. Even though I'm in the room, I'm saying hello from Oceanside.
Greetings in Salutations from Mariners Oceanside, North San Diego County. Amazing what God's doing down there. And as it always says, God does the stuff, but he doesn't do that independent of his people. And you're really in charge down there with the band and the entire team.
And God's just doing great things. But look, look, you're just maybe a little bit for folks that maybe haven't been or haven't heard some stories of how God's working through Oceanside. A couple of weeks ago, when you were shepying elders, Ron. Ron, it's amazing.
It's a incredible journey that he's gone through. Oceanside is filled with a lot of people who have been faithful for a very long time. And they've encountered a lot of suffering and have leaned into God in the same way. And so we're building a congregation there, where God is building a congregation there, and people that have gone through the hard times and want people to experience the safety, the security, the healing, the wholeness that God can bring.
And so we're really excited to be seeing that on new people every single week coming in, jumping into rooted, joining life groups. I just want to give a shout out to my life group leaders if you're listening. I have so thankful all of you guys. And what you've done to help us transition this church from what it was into what it is in just about a year and a half.
It's a really special thing that's going on down there. Yeah. Yeah. And that's a really good point, too, the season that Oceanside has been through.
It's been amazing. And the fact that there is such a solid foundation of what you're building through rooted in life group leaders, the investment that's happening there. It's paying dividends, right, for the way people are shipping the leadership. And you're passionate about the community, too.
It wasn't like you moved across the country, Oceanside, North San Diego County. You were there for a bit. I was at a church locally for about five years. I've been able to love and the ins and outs and the nuances of North County, San Diego and the Tri-City area.
It's an interesting area. It's changing really quickly, but it's also a really fun place to be. So, Oceanside, this weekend, you would have had your Leopaster van as teaching this. Congregations, you've got a lot of your Leopasters every week that are teaching this weekend.
Doug Field is teaching this weekend here at Irvine, but we're looking at how to make the most of our relationships, the power of community. So we're going to work through our questions a little bit, interact with them together. We've got a lean-in question here. It's a fun question.
It could be a dangerous question. It says, what's a fictional family you would have liked to have grown up with? Yeah. Not saying anything about your family of origin.
You could get into that. But just take fun, create a fictional family. You could get into that. I think there's two.
So, one, growing up I loved the Cartoon Network. She was a lot of kind of opera. So, like, to Jetsons. We were always a really cool.
I just imagine myself, I thought we'd be doing it by now floating around and dad dropped me off. I just thought they were a really cool family to watch. The other one was Family Matters with Asdeep Ergo. Yeah, dude.
Right? And so, I knew that and all that kind of stuff. And they just seemed like they were learning a lot together, but also having a lot of fun in the awkward moments to do it. So, those are two families that I thought.
How about you? You know, the first one I gave to mine, it's fictional family, so that's okay. And it was a slightly dysfunctional family. And I was like, oh, I love the movie.
I know there's a new movie out. I've heard it's horrible. Hit the comments in the comments section. That's the first one that came to mind.
That might be a little bit weird. I don't know if there's any other, the Brady Bunch and K-Aud egg and all kinds of stuff all over the place, but those are the two that came to my mind. So, it probably says a lot about you and I. Yeah, right.
So, which Ninja Turtle are you? Totally, absolutely. Lea Pardam, see the blue, I don't know. I forget, I forget.
Apparently, my daughter, my high school daughter wants to go see it because they talk about a Gen Z terms. And she wants me to learn how to talk to kids. Talk to me. So, edit.
And then, of course, we're talking about the family of God, the family that he grafts us into, not because of our own identity, not because of what we can achieve by ourselves, but we see that God creates a new community because of what Christ has done on the cross. And again, leaders, you're on the front. You're experiencing that. You're leaving that every week.
And we've got one passage here. Of course, we're going to do several other passages that you can note this week. And this is a big, big week as you're sitting and hearing to the sermon right till the passage. They're highlighted and interact with them in your questions.
But the anchor passage we have is Hebrews 313, that great passage it says, but encourage each other daily while it is still called today so that none of you is hardened by sin's deception. So there's a lot of implications in there about encouraging each other, the daily rhythm. Don't be hardened by sin's deception. Just talk a little bit, and Yogi, I know it's one verse, but what do you learn about the role of the power of relationships from this passage?
Yeah, I think for every single one of us, we have this internal struggle called sin. And every single day, it is trials, temptations that we're going through that are coming at us. And the scripture is clearly saying that part of the way that we overcome sin is through the power of daily involvement in healthy Christian, God-feary relationship. And so the more we can dig into that kind of community, the easier it is for us to turn our backs on sin to repent and turn away.
That's right. And then I think lots of other great foundational passage that highlights the rhythms of community. Even the rooted Acts, 247, that's the blueprint. And I think sometimes we have this idealistic picture in the Christian community that yes, it's God's gift to us.
But because you and I were in it, I think we're in it, is it perfect? No, not always. And you're probably sitting there listening right now thinking of all being perfection in your groove. Totally.
But when we really lean into God's grace, it is one of the best environments where we can grow, what we're challenged. I mean, to think about all the New Testament verses about the one another's, you know, and they're all built on the understanding that it's not always easy, that we have to serve. We have to forgive one another. We have to bear with one another.
You have to encourage, encourage one another, which implies to us that there are things that are often difficult in community. But it is a space where we can be encouraged, challenged, where we can be held accountable. We don't use that word often very much in our video show. There are many more, but we should.
Yeah. That's right. I think there's other part too of like as we realize the tension of all the brokenness in our group that oftentimes what we want to do is lean away because it is a little bit messy, a little bit dirty. But scripture clearly says do not get in the habit of not meeting like other people.
That's right. Precisely because God is saying it takes, it's in that messy relationship that you formulate your spiritual foundation that you learn how God loves despite maybe our own failures, our own mistakes and we get to opt in and do that to others. The show mercy to show grace like the Father shows mercy and restorments. So it's just one verse and there's so much that you can know that you can interact with.
But again, this week, take note that the other passages that are highlighted, bring them into your group, interact with them as you look at God's word together. Then we move to the lookout section. The question here is how is the way that we are called to encourage and relate towards one another different from those outside of biblical community? What does this look like when we get it right?
What does it look like when we don't? My mind immediately goes to the scripture where Jesus says that they will know about God's love because of your love for one another. And so when you are in that kind of healthy community, when you lean into relationships that we got, desires to you to, there's this clear picture of that is a clear testimony of the power of God because nothing else in the world can bring strangers together, broken people together like the work that you did on the cross. We love you to stow us.
That's really good. I love that you're highlighting that because I think the temptation towards biblical community is just for us. It's our healing. We found our sense of belonging and that's beautiful.
You're hitting that emotional impulse of it's one of the great evangelistic tools of the world can see the way that we love each other is so radical, so subversive. And this is one of the reasons that the church exploded because it was that diverse. And part of the story of Ocean Side Right Now is we talk to people at Welcome to Mariner and all that kind of stuff. What is keeping you here?
It seems like you guys have real relationships and community here on them because it's not hidden behind any walls. It's something that we try to say, no, live this out everywhere you go with your neighbors or friends that work. That should be a clear testimony of who you are. Totally.
It is very attractive. It's a tool for evangelism. When we don't get it right, when we become maybe just inward and we don't share it can be exclusive. Yes.
Or we don't get things right all the time, but when there's a big ring in fact that fight with within the Christian community, it can repel people from it. God's great. He does all the work through it. Right.
But isn't there also beauty in the fact that when there is a big ring, and lean into Jesus that people can see how the problem can be solved differently and healthy can be told right? It's just about the perspective that you bring into that space. That's really good. Awesome.
So again, lots of things to pick through there. Where have you seen this? What does it look like when we get it right? So then we moved in from looking out to how we see the passage that work in the world around us.
And now it's looking at this. It's typically where we ask the spirit to illuminate things for us. Where are we seeing this? Where are we challenged by it?
There's a couple of questions here to help you along this section. Move into the type of God, use community to challenge you. Another one is where have you experienced healing and encouragement through community. So a couple of ways that you can interact with this question.
Anything I like for you, Manoke, how you might lead it or how you might even respond to yourself? Yeah. I think there are people in your space right there that have experience that they've been through with it if you guys have gone through this together. You can bring out some of those things as examples, especially if the room gets quiet.
Remember, they share their testimonies. They share each other's stories. You saw it. And so point that out.
Remind of what God has done through the commitment to community, through the root of experience, and even in life group over the last year or so. That's right. I love that callback. If you're in a life group, you've done root it together.
So you've had these moments of affirmations and prayer of blessing over people. It's a good time to call that out again and shout that out again. And even look outside of your group, just along all of our journeys. I can't even do that.
So I'll give you the credit. I'll give you the credit. I'll give you the quote. I'll give you the quote.
I'll give you the quote. I'll give you the quote. I'll give you the quote. You're like a man.
You're like a man. You're a man. So I don't care if it's been laid round or whatever. You're a good kid, but it's not so true that often we are hurt by others, but God uses others through his grace, through what he's done, to bring us into his healing.
So have a good interaction conversation around that. And then I love what you said about the way we love one another. I love what you said about our love for one another. You might want to even take this question.
Okay. How can our group display love for others? So not just here. How are we using what God has given us to make an impact on those?
I think it's a great cut that you brought up to the conversation. Hey, anything else you'd like to share with them, our incredible life group leaders before we sign off for this week? we are a better church week with you. Amazing, thanks me, Yoking.
Glad to have you jumping in. First time, I'll be the last time. It's good to have you, dude. All right, after your leaders, be encouraged this week.
Go forward, engage your conversation, and we'll see you next week for week four of Life, making the most of it.