SMALL  GROUPS

“What is the greatest commandment?” Jesus is asked by a group of pharisees. “to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind,” He replies.

And so the whole of the Christian faith is summed up for us. In fact, it’s not just a summary of the Christian faith, it’s the summary of the very meaning of life itself. “Our soul,” Saint Augustine wisely said, “is not at rest until it finds rest in [God]” and we cannot rest in God if we do not love Him.

Loving God, however, is not something that can be done as an isolated individual. Saint John’s first letter is emphatic that love for God is only evident if we have love for one another. He is so clear on this that he tells the church that the only way to know if they have passed “from death to life” is by finding evidence in their own lives of love for one another.

So, how do we love one another? Well, to love another person we must begin by knowing who they are in some measure or other. And if we don’t know who they are then we are going to have a difficult time in bearing their burdens (Galatians 6:2) and offering them friendship and peace in the name of Jesus Christ.

This is what ‘small groups’ are really about. At its core, these groups are opportunities for Christians to meet together on a regular basis to worship God (through prayer, reading, and spiritual direction) and to love one another (through friendship, the bearing of burdens, and of life lived facing one another).

Grace and peace to you,

John Nash