Making Sense of Doing Life Together

Make It Make Sense Series | Part 7

"Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity." — Psalm 133:1

You've seen what happens when people try to do things alone.

Five robotic lions going up against an enemy, individually, they get molly wapped. Nothing lands. Nothing sticks. The enemy barely flinches.

But when they form together? That's a different story. That's where the problem comes. That's where the battle turns.

Brother Griff opened Sunday with Voltron. And it's silly, and it's nostalgic, and it's exactly right. Because that is the picture GOD has been painting for us since Genesis, of people formed together, dwelling together, doing life together. Not as a nice idea. As a necessity.

Psalm 133 opens with one word that changes everything: behold.

David doesn't say "notice, maybe." He says behold. Pay attention. Look at this. And what he wants us to look at is what happens when brothers dwell together in unity, it is good, it is pleasant, and it is guaranteed. Not a possibility. Not a conditional. A certainty.

When is not the same as if. If is a condition, you might experience it, you might not. When is a certainty, when this happens, that always follows. And the when of Psalm 133 is dwelling together.

Dwell together in unity, goodness and pleasantness come with it. Every time. No exceptions. GOD commanded it.

During the Plague of Cyprian, roughly 249 to 270 AD, a disease was killing 5,000 people per day at its peak. The cultural response was self-preservation: families put their dying loved ones in the street to avoid infection.

And then the Christians pulled up.

They nursed the sick. All of them, believers and unbelievers, strangers and neighbors, at the risk of their own lives. And the result? Survivors converted to Christianity not because of an argument they heard or a sermon they attended. Because of love they had never seen before.

“If you can love in the midst of all of this, there must be something you know that I don't know.”

That is the witness of doing life together. That is the distinction GOD is calling His church to. Not distinction for its own sake, but distinction that draws attention to Him.

And here's where it gets practical.

Brother Griff called out the praying hand emojis.

Someone posts they're going through something devastating, and we send 🙏🏽 and scroll past. We don't even pray. And that is not what GOD called us to.

He called us to proximity. To presence. To showing up.

Acts 14, Paul gets stoned, dragged out of the city, left for dead. And when the disciples gathered around him, he rose up. Something supernatural happened that had no natural explanation. It was the presence of his people.

That is what dwelling together does. It produces supernatural refreshment. Not because of anything we can manufacture, because GOD is always in the midst when His people gather in His name.

The invitation of Psalm 133 is not complicated. Dwell together. Show up. Do more than an emoji. Invite someone to dinner. Make a meal. Offer a skill. Pray with people, right there, right then, not later. Take care of your pastor. Listen to the word and apply it.

Because there is only one Westside. And it's Jesus' side.

And when we form together, the enemy has a problem.