a drop of water

We declare our intentions to uphold, our friends, with faith in word, hope in prayer and love in action.

In faith, under God who is our savior and redeemer through Jesus Christ, we vow to live life alongside you in experience, regardless of distance or obstacle, to write, to call, to email, to text, to facebook feed, and to video chat for the sake of (but not limited to) “give and take” correction, rebuke and encouragement.

In hope, when evil comes knocking at your door, we pledge to stand alongside you in battle, regardless of time or circumstance, to pray the impossible, to dream the unimaginable and to rejoice in the truth of victory, in our dependence on the all-surpassing power that is from God, whose power is perfected in our weakness.

In love, having no greater example than laying down their life for their friends, we commit to running alongside you in adventure, spurring on an overflowing spirit of patience in the friction of pressure, kindness in the scowl of hatred, generosity in the shadows of envy, humility in the spotlight of pride and calmness in the face of rudeness.

This promise is a glimpse of our response to our love for you. We promise to jump with you during your uncontainable joys and to huddle with you in your unspeakable sorrows. We promise to be vulnerable with you when we are in need and to include you in our greatest happinesses. We promise to never condemn, to always protect, to always trust and to always persevere in locked-arms, allowing you to depend on us in confidence. We promise to be your poignant critics, your undaunted supporters, your blood brothers and sisters, your timely encouragers, your loudest cheerleaders, your tireless cooks, and your fellow workers as we engage life as a community of believers.

We want to partner with you emotionally, financially, and spiritually in building a foundational lifestyle that grows in understanding of who God has created you to be together and in application of how God has planned for you to worship together. We want desperately to share life together, sharpening each other and bearing with each other as we risk what little we have for the sake of the kingdom.

Jenn was sharing some deep thoughts with me yesterday as we were driving to small group.  The reading for small group had mentioned how the Israelites would annually renew their covenant with God every year.  In the past, we’ve sometimes foudn it difficult to identify with why people renew covenants so systematically.  It feels ritualized, and almost not really needed if the first covenant act was truly “real.”  But the exciting articulation and understanding discovered by Jenn was that covenants with God are living covenants.  Everyday we have the choice to renew our covenant, our relationship, our love, our commitment, our promises, and our joy of knowing, depending and looking to God.  It’s the same thing with marriage too.  Like, we could just say our vows with all the heart felt emotion possible at the altar and leave it at that, but everyday, in every interaction with each other, we are given the opportunity to renew those vows, that covenant to each other.  There is so much new life born out of the renewing of covenants and promises.  The covenants and promises can grow in breadth and depth as we grow too!  Its like in my commitment to my friends, my commitment to them will manifest itself differently as we live through different seasons of our lives.  There will be times when I am needed by friends for this and other times where I will be needed by friends for that.  Sometimes we will fail each other, but that just leaves room for the commitment to strengthen.  This view of covenants as being living, able to grow, morph, and adapt is exciting to me.