12-14-2018

 Good Morning All,

           1 Thessalonians 5:11; “Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing”

         I remember reading an article a short time ago which was describing how people view relationships.  I almost quit because the article began with the over generalized statement; “There are two types of people in the world”.  I really despise this thought; there are rarely “two types” of anything but I trudged on through and I am glad that I did.  The author’s premise was that there are two types of people; there are “builders” and there are “collectors”.  He thought you could gauge the success of a relationship by figuring out if the people involved were builders or collectors.  He thought the strongest relationship, the most lasting and most fulfilling, was between two builders.  This was followed by a dominant builder and a weaker collector, then a dominant collector and a weaker builder then the least successful was two collectors.

    The idea is that builders are forward looking and will almost always try to fix, recreate, or reconstruct the important things in their lives.  So, if a relationship is strained or even broken a builder will try and repair it in some way.  Builders tend to be quick to forgive and then start over.  This is based on the author’s view that builders are always trying to improve their life and they do this by improving their relationships.  Collectors, on the other hand, want the relationship to maintain the level that it had from the beginning.  Thus, builders tend to have fewer but more meaningful relationships while collectors have more but less in depth.

    Our verse would thus encourage us to be builders.  We are to treasure our relationship with God most assuredly but this verse relates to our relationships with our fellow Christians.  We are to be builders.  We are to fix, recreate, or reconstruct our relationship with our fellow believer.  We are to forgive each other, we are to bear one another’s burden, we are to encourage and elevate each other, we are to come to the aid of each other to uplift, restore and encourage each other.  We do this because we can see that building all; elevates all, strengthens all, and brings all into closer fellowship and union.

     Throughout Scriptures, especially in the New Testament, we are told to build up one another.  Building up each other strengthens not only our relationships but also our faith and the faith of those who are weaker or under assault from the devil and the world.  Building is a forward-looking event, recognizing that lifting up our brother or sister will bring about healing and hope; two things that this broken world is in desperate need of. 

Father of all mercy, create in me a clean heart.  Make me a builder within your Church.  Use me to uplift those who are suffering or in pain.  Guide me to those in most need of your grace.  Lead me to see them as the greatest in your kingdom.  In the precious name of Jesus, we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret