The Church Is Your Family: Be Planted, Be Present, Be Connected

Introduction

Gaetana Le Veo is part of the leadership team at SOS Lyon Church. That Sunday, with pastors Mat and Sarah away, she was the one bringing the message, and she opened with a personal testimony. She's about to turn 33, and she loves celebrating birthdays because they remind her of God's faithfulness at every stage. She's seen the Holy Spirit at work in her, small changes each year, but deep ones. And she says it plainly: who she is today, she also owes to the people God placed on her path to encourage her, build her up, give her courage, love her even in the worst moments. Her conviction: it's in community, in the spiritual family, that we can fully experience growth.

You too can probably think of one or more people who have made an impact in your life. Take time to thank God for them. And ask yourself the reverse question: have you been that kind of person for someone around you?

This message closes out a month of teaching on relationships at SOS Lyon: family, marriage, and now the spiritual family that is the Church. Gaetana wants to show why it's so important to be part of the Church, built around three words: be planted, be present, be connected.

Message Outline

1. The Church isn't an event, it's a family

• God didn't use any other image than family to describe the Church. He didn't speak of a company with himself as CEO, or an association with himself as president, but of a family in which he is a Father and we are his children.
• When we choose to follow Jesus, to accept him as Savior and Lord, we're adopted into God's family. Ephesians 1:5: he "predestined us for adoption to himself as children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his desire." We're not his workers, not his subjects, but his children.
• The Church isn't an event, nor a building. Sunday gatherings, home life groups, Thursday nights to grow together: the goal isn't the event itself, it's living out family life and growing.
• No one is strong alone. Independence has no place in the body of Christ. God himself is triune, three in one, relational within himself. Jesus didn't operate alone: he lived out his entire ministry with twelve apostles.
• Ephesians 2:19: "so then you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God." That's part of our identity. God created us to live in communion, and family is his design.

2. Be planted: the olive tree and the sheep

• A family is a place where you live daily life together, where you share, where you grow, where you ask your questions, where you love and forgive one another. Family is God's invention so a child grows up nourished and taught; the Church is God's invention so we grow up protected, loved, spiritually fed.
• Psalm 92:12-13: "The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree. He shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the LORD's house. They will flourish in our God's courts." To grow in your relationship with God, you need to be planted. Without being planted, there's no growth, no matter whether you're young in the faith or have been a believer for years.
• Gaetana's olive tree: for her son's birth, she was given an olive tree, one that would grow alongside him. New pot, new soil, a windy terrace in the middle of an August heat wave. She wondered if it would survive. After a few weeks, it settled in and grew new branches. It never would have occurred to her to move it to a new pot or spot every day: it needed to stay in one place for a long time to put down roots and bear fruit. It's exactly the same for us.
• The lost sheep: why did the shepherd notice one sheep was missing out of a hundred? Because he knew it belonged, he knew it was part of the flock. So he went looking for it. Being planted in a local church is a guarantee of protection and love for you.
• That's where you're surrounded by people who speak into your life, who help shape your character to look more like Jesus, and that's where your value system takes shape. Family is where you learn who you are: your name, your DNA, your place in the world. In God's family, you become a son, you become a daughter, and Jesus's DNA runs through your veins.

3. If the word "family" hurts you

• Maybe it's hard for you to hear that God's design is family, because you never had a family and that word rhymes with disappointment. Or because yours was so dysfunctional that you say to yourself: if that's God's plan, I don't want it, I've been hurt too much.
• Gaetana believes God uses that exact image precisely because he makes no mistakes: he knew each of us needs to be restored in the Father's love and in family bonds, and for that he uses the spiritual family that is the Church.
• He is a perfect Father, even if your brothers and sisters are imperfect. He loves you perfectly, he gave everything for you, he never tires of pursuing you with his love. And he lets you experience that love alongside imperfect brothers and sisters, people through whom we'll be confronted with God's perfect love so much that we'll heal, change, be transformed.
• God created everything and created human beings to live in relationship with him. Humanity chose to separate itself from God, to decide good and evil for itself: that's the fall, which distanced us from the Father. But God never stopped pursuing us: he sent his only Son, another family bond, so that whoever believes in him would not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16). He wants you to have a restored relationship with the Father and to take your place in his family.

4. Be present: God works with those who show up (John 21:1-14)

• John 21 tells of the third time the risen Jesus appears to his disciples. The first time (John 20:19), everyone is there except Thomas. The second time (John 20:26), the disciples are all together. The third time, by the Sea of Tiberias, how many are there? Seven: Simon Peter, Thomas, Nathanael, the two sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples.
• Peter throws out an idea: "I'm going fishing." Being the natural-born leader he is, everyone follows him. And while they're together, three extraordinary things happen: the risen Jesus appears, he multiplies the fish (153 large fish, and the net doesn't tear), then he feeds them and spends time with them.
• Gaetana admits it: if she'd been one of the absent disciples, she'd have been sick about it. Imagine Peter and the six others coming back: "We saw Jesus today, he multiplied the fish, he cooked for us. And where were you?"
• This passage speaks to the power of community. God reveals himself, God blesses, God feeds, but he reveals himself, blesses, and feeds those who are present. Pastor Mat often says it: God works, God acts with those who show up.
• There are appointments you shouldn't miss. The first ones are those in your room, heart to heart with the Father, every day. Then there are certain events in church life. Family is so much better when you're there.

5. Be restored: Peter among his brothers (John 21:15-19)

• Context: before Jesus's death, Peter denied him three times, just as Jesus had told him he would. Peter has already seen the risen Jesus twice; their eyes must have met, but Scripture doesn't say they spoke. His heart must have been so heavy from having failed his friend and his Master. He's likely broken inside.
• After the meal, three times Jesus asks: "Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me?" Three times Peter answers: "Lord, you know that I have affection for you." And three times Jesus sends him back to his mission: "Feed my lambs... Tend my sheep... Feed my sheep." Then he tells him by what death he will glorify God, and says to him: "Follow me."
• Does that ever happen to you, wanting to hide, to run from others? When you're raw, tired, vulnerable, the first thing you want to do is flee community.
• Testimony: Gaetana spent nearly two and a half years living in community in Canada, during a Bible school with her husband. One bedroom for the two of them, everything else shared. When she was hurt, tired, frustrated, her first reflex was to flee: close her mouth, her heart, her arms, and shut herself in her room. But in community, you can't hide. Friends knocked on her door many times, slipped notes under it, left small packages: "We need to hear from you. Don't hide. We accept you and love you as you are." She experienced some of the strongest moments of her restoration in that little room.
• It's easy to live out your faith all alone in your corner, when no one confronts you with what it means to fully live out the Word. It's easy to love only in words, when you have no one in front of you. But without community, we don't grow.
• This conversation could have happened one on one. Why does Jesus restore Peter in front of the others? Three reasons: the denial was public, so the restoration needed to be too (the others might have wondered whether Jesus's affection and Peter's calling, "you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church," still stood); the other disciples had all abandoned Jesus at the moment of his arrest, so if there's restoration for Peter, there's hope for theirs too; and Peter's closest friends needed to be there so they could tell him, in hard moments: "Remember what the Master said, we were there, don't get discouraged."
• Jesus reaffirms Peter's calling, surrounded by his community, because he knows very well Peter can't do it alone. If John hadn't been there, we probably would never have known this story: John is the only one who records it in his gospel. Being planted also means being restored. God uses family as a place of restoration.
• Maybe you're rooted in a church, physically present, but you struggle to be present spiritually because you've been hurt by the Church. There's an invitation for you: don't doubt God's design. However imperfect it may be, family is his design for our restoration, for our growth, and for impacting the world.

6. Be connected: understanding God's love "with all the saints"

• Ephesians 3:17-19: Paul prays that we would be "rooted and grounded in love," so that we'd be able to grasp "with all the saints" the width, length, depth, and height of the love of Christ. You already need to be rooted in love to understand love: it's a source that gives and receives at the same time.
• Four words caught Gaetana's attention: "with all the saints." She can't understand the dimensions of God's love alone. She needs Kelly, who takes her in her arms to show her the Father's gentle love; Matteo and his wise counsel to understand the Father's wise love; Josias to understand Jesus's shepherd heart; a message from Ruben that very morning to understand a love that carries you; her husband to understand a sacrificial love that gives itself. We need each other.
• The kaleidoscope: a tube with mirrors and small colored stones, which creates a different pattern depending on how you hold it. We're the kaleidoscope. Each of us looks at God's infinite love from our own angle. The light is the same, God's love doesn't change, but together we see different facets, and that's what enriches us all.
• It's in family that we talk about God, about who he is, about what he's doing in our lives. We don't pour out our hearts to strangers, but to people we feel safe with. We can't fully know God on our own.

7. An extravagant love to impact the world

• John 13:34-35: "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, just like I have loved you... By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." We're Christians, "little Christs." If Jesus's DNA runs through our veins, we ooze the love he gave us.
• The challenge: when was the last time you carried out an extravagant act of love? Giving each other a little pat on the back on Sunday isn't what will make people fascinated by the love we have for one another. It takes a love so deep, so supernatural, that it drives us to do things the world hasn't seen yet.
• John 17:22-23: Jesus prays that his disciples would be "perfected into one," so that the world would know the Father sent him and loved them. Jesus will be known by others through our love and our unity. The gospel that makes an impact is the one that's lived out. Actions speak louder than words; the greatest testimony isn't found in our words, but in our love.

8. Conclusion: Psalm 133

• Gaetana loves that the Word isn't just for our information, but for our transformation. She invites you to take stock of where you stand in God's family and to make a decision: be planted, be present, be connected.
• Psalm 133: "See, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to live together in unity! It is like the precious oil on the head, that ran down on the beard, even Aaron's beard... like the dew of Hermon, that comes down on the mountains of Zion: for there the LORD gives the blessing, even life forever more." It's when we live together that we experience life and blessing, and that forever. That's what God desires for each of us.

Key Takeaways

• God chose the image of family to describe the Church: he is a Father, we are his adopted children, "of the household of God." The Church is neither an event nor a building.
• Be planted: like an olive tree that isn't repotted every day, you need to put down deep roots in a local church over time in order to grow and bear fruit (Psalm 92:12-13).
• Be present: in John 21, Jesus reveals himself, blesses, and feeds the seven disciples who were there. God works with those who show up.
• Be restored: Jesus restores Peter in front of his brothers, because family is the place God uses for restoration. Don't hide from community.
• Be connected: we can only understand God's love "with all the saints" (Ephesians 3:18), and it's through our love and our unity that the world will recognize Jesus.

Personal Application

1. Who are the people God has placed on your path to encourage and build you up? Thank him for them. And for whom are you that kind of person?
2. Are you truly planted in a local church, or are you an olive tree that gets repotted every day? What's keeping you from putting down roots?
3. What appointments are you missing right now: your daily time with the Father, or certain moments of church life? What will you change this week?
4. When things are hard, is your reflex to flee community and shut down? To whom could you open your door and let God restore you?
5. When was the last time you carried out an extravagant act of love toward someone? What concrete gesture can you make this week?

Scripture References

• Ephesians 1:5: predestined for adoption as children through Jesus Christ
• Ephesians 2:19: fellow citizens with the saints, of the household of God
• Psalm 92:12-13: planted in the LORD's house, they flourish
• Luke 15:4-7: the shepherd and the lost sheep
• John 3:16: God gave his only Son
• John 20:19-29: the first two appearances of the risen Jesus to the disciples
• John 21:1-19: the miraculous catch and Peter's restoration
• Matthew 16:18: "you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church"
• Ephesians 3:17-19: grasping with all the saints the love of Christ
• John 13:34-35: the new commandment
• John 17:22-23: that they may be perfected into one
• Psalm 133: how good and pleasant for brothers to live together

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does the Bible compare the Church to a family?

God didn't choose the image of a company with himself as CEO, or an association with himself as president, but that of a family with himself as Father and us as his children. When we accept Jesus as Savior and Lord, we're adopted into God's family (Ephesians 1:5). The Church is neither an event nor a building: it's a family, the household of God to which we belong (Ephesians 2:19).

Why does Jesus restore Peter in front of the other disciples in John 21?

According to Gaetana Le Veo, three reasons: Peter had denied Jesus publicly, so the restoration also needed to be public; the other disciples had all abandoned Jesus, and Peter's restoration gave them hope for their own; and finally, his closest friends needed to witness it so they could remind him, in hard moments, what the Master had said. Jesus reaffirms Peter's calling in the midst of his community, because he won't be able to fulfill that calling alone.

What does it mean to be planted in a local church?

Psalm 92:12-13 says the righteous, planted in the house of the LORD, flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar. Like an olive tree that isn't repotted every day, you need to stay in one place for a long time to put down roots and bear fruit. Being planted in a local church means finding protection, care, love there, people who speak into your life and shape your character to look more like Jesus, and it's also the place where God restores you.