One friendship changed the course of my life

Pastor Max Lyons opens with walking into a thirty-person house church on the Upper East Side at age 23. A man named Josh invited him for sushi, they began meeting every week or two, and Max found himself wanting to be part of whatever church Josh was part of. That friendship led to Bible college in Australia, a job in London, meeting Juliet, and eventually God’s call to plant a church in Chicagoland. If Josh had not invited him for sushi, he does not know whether Elan Church would exist. Proverbs 13:20 says whoever walks with the wise becomes wise; you will rise or fall to the level of your closest friendships.

A friendship recession

The number of American adults with zero close friends has quadrupled since 1990, and the Surgeon General’s 2023 report compared lacking social connection to smoking fifteen cigarettes a day. Pastor Max tells of oil tycoon John Paul Getty, married five times and pictured alone at a banquet table, who said he would have traded all his millions for one lasting marriage. We struggle most to build the very thing we need most.

Created for community, adopted into family

In Genesis 1 God says “Let us make mankind in our image.” Father, Son, and Spirit mean God does not just do community; He is community, and we reflect that. The first thing Jesus does in Mark 1 is call Peter, Andrew, James, and John. Followers of Jesus are not part of an organization but a body, and more than that a family: Paul uses brothers and sisters more than 130 times. Yet there is no perfect family, friend, spouse, or church; Paul rebuked the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 3 for jealousy and quarreling. You cannot enjoy the benefits of community without paying the price of building it.

The crucible and the sword

Relationships are a double-edged sword; the best and hardest part of pastoring is the people. Closeness means vulnerability. A silversmith heats ore until the impurities rise and are scraped away. Community is God’s crucible for the heart: the people who rub us the wrong way raise the temperature so God can knock off our rough edges. Iron sharpening iron in Proverbs 27 is not comfortable either. Everybody wants to be sharp, but nobody wants the heat.

The cycle of community

Every relationship moves from honeymoon to frustration, and then we either exit or persevere. There are good reasons to leave, such as abuse or outright heresy, but most of the time we leave because someone irritated us or held us to a higher standard. Pastor Max recalls a young man who thought Elan was perfect but said every previous church was terrible, and warned him that unless he dealt with what was inside, he would feel the same about Elan within six months. Most people never deal with the deeper things because they never stick around long enough. If you do not want to do hard things, do not follow Jesus.

Bring your sins and struggles into the light

Most people let others into 97 percent of their lives and guard the last three percent. Quoting the AA saying that you are only as sick as the secrets you keep, Pastor Max points to James 5:16: confess your sins to each other so that you may be healed. You need not tell everybody, but you need to tell somebody trustworthy. Lions isolate their prey, and 1 Peter 5 says the enemy prowls the same way; isolated believers are easy targets.

In the temple courts and from house to house

Deep community does not come from Sunday attendance alone. A youth pastor named Dave spent two years around a table with a sixteen-year-old Max who argued with every sermon, and that is where Max decided to follow Jesus. Acts 2:46 shows the early church worshiping at the temple and meeting in homes with great joy, which is why Elan gathers in Sunday Gatherings and in Groups. The joy of the Lord is our strength. Friendship cannot be microwaved, and busyness, digital distraction, and flakiness all resist it. Even Jesus brought Peter, James, and John into His distress in Gethsemane. After a heavy week, Pastor Max says his five best friends responded immediately when he asked for prayer. His one call to action, repeated seven times, is to join a Group, meet one person, and become the Josh or the Dave whose friendship changes someone else’s life.