The Bible is full of these statements. Love, encourage, confess your sins to, bear burdens of, don’t judge, speak truth to, comfort, pray for… one another. And the list goes on.

The Bible, through its many authors, writes a lot about how we as the church should relate to each other. A lot of these commands and encouragements are simple and straightforward, but actually doing them is difficult.

As CORE has been reflecting on this past year, evaluating feedback from the “notes” activity a few months ago and other feedback from leadership, we’ve noticed a common theme: community (I know.. obviously!). This is why many of us have come and stayed in our church. Our community has been shaped and formed by the Lord through each of us, but there’s still many ways it can still grow. We want to move even more into being an intentional community that points each other towards God. If I may be so bold to say… it’s not enough to feel welcome and accepted by the church, if we never move each other to see the God who welcomes and accepts us through His Son. We want our church community to provide even more spaces for discipleship, healing, accountability, encouragement, and much more… but ultimately pointing ourselves and each other to Jesus Himself.

In the simplicity of the “one another’s” that we walk through, we hope that these encouragements will move us towards that intentionality and provide a practical way for us to do so. We know it’s not enough to simply hear what should be done, but we pray that the Lord would mold and shape in us willing hearts.  A willingness to love and obey Him through the people He’s placed in our lives. May our desire be for Jesus to be seen in the ways we act towards and treat one another.

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” – John 13:34-35 (NIV).