Editor’s Note: Scott Pilgreen is a lay leader and biblical counselor at Desert Springs Church in Albuquerque, NM. This post is a summary of Paul Tripp’s message from Friday evening at Clarus, March 8, “Self Examination Is a Community Project,” from Hebrews 3:13.

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What is happening in the little moments of your life? Dr. Tripp explained that we don’t live in the big moments of life but in the 10,000 little moments that shape our character. If God doesn’t rule us in the utterly mundane, He doesn’t rule us because the utterly mundane is where our address is.

To help us see the importance of relationships, Dr. Tripp taught from two passages. In 2 Peter 1:3-9, Peter is proposing that it is possible to be a true believer in Christ and yet be ineffective and unfruitful. Three questions naturally arise from this passage. First, Who are these people Peter is talking about? In a way, Peter is talking about all believers in Christ as being ineffective and unfruitful. Second, Why are these people ineffective and unproductive? In verse 9, Peter says: “…having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins,” and Dr. Tripp pointed out that the root of the issue is identity. If we forget who we are, we will quit pursuing what belongs to us in Christ. And third, How does this happen? Dr. Tripp suggests that we become can be ineffective and unproductive by evidence-denial – we deny our need for God’s grace in our lives. Evidence denial then leads to grace-devaluing. If the person doesn’t see the need for grace, grace has no value, therefore, that person becomes a grace-devaluer. Grace is only valuable to the person who knows that he or she is a sinner. In asking what all of this has to do with relationships, Dr. Tripp emphatically answered, “Everything.”

Dr. Tripp then led us to the second passage, Hebrews 3:12-13, which is both a warning and a call to believers in Jesus. The author of Hebrews is indicating a declining progression of an evil and then unbelieving heart that leads you to fall away from the living God. This is an alarming spiritual decline, but how does this happen? Dr. Tripp explained that it is because we are all extremely skilled, self-swindlers. We convince ourselves that our sin really isn’t that bad, and we harden our hearts. What once bothered us doesn’t bother us anymore. We aren’t open to change because we have become too satisfied where we are. The author of Hebrews then tells us we harden our hearts because of sin. Sin is deceitful. We become spiritually blind and we are blind to our blindness. Even though the power of sin has been broken, we can’t clearly see ourselves because the presence of sin still remains.

What then has God provided for the hard-hearted believer? He has provided help in the form of relationships. Hebrews 3:13a says, “But exhort one another every day.” We need to be encouraged and exhorted daily, so that we won’t be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. Dr. Tripp explained that God has designed people as “instruments of seeing” for our lives. Every day we all are capable of being significantly blinded to our own condition, so we need “an intentionally intrusive, grace-based, Christ-centered, redemptive community” that is able to see in us what we cannot see in ourselves.

Dr. Tripp offered some great applications to these passages. The first is to honestly ask ourselves if there is a person in our life who can be that “instrument of seeing.” Can you name that person? The second is a prayer that we can all consider implementing into our daily prayer life: Confession – I am a person in desperate need of help; Pray – that in His grace He would send helpers our way; Cry for help – that we would have the humility to receive the help when it comes.

We can come to our Lord Jesus in our time of need because all of our rejection has been fully borne by Him on the cross. May it be so, that we run to our King Jesus for His glory and for our good.

Editor’s Note: Michael Kelshaw is the Head Minister at Trinity at the Marketplace in Albuquerque NM. He is a member of the Albuquerque Chapter of The Gospel Coalition. This post is a summary of Timothy Lane’s message from Friday evening at Clarus, March 8, “Why Are Friendships So Important?,” from Ephesians 4:1-16.

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The 2013 Clarus Conference (One-Anothering the Word) is concentrating on the necessity of relationships within authentic Christian community. Dr. Timothy Lane opened by showing us Paul’s emphasis of the importance of relationships and how Christian relationships should look.

Dr. Lane unpacked the passage by asking three questions:

1. Why are our relationships so important?

Ephesians 4:1-16 gives us a great vision for why we need relationships with one another. The language of Ephesians 4:12-16 is all about being built up, growing up, and maturing. We need relationships with one another so that we might become more like Jesus, Himself—being conformed to His image. God is accomplishing something greater in relationships than we even thought—not just giving us happiness or intimacy—but making us into the very likeness of His Son, Jesus Christ. The reason why our relationships are so important is because of the glorious thing that God is doing in them.

2. What are some basic gospel virtues (character qualities) that are essential to this?

Dr. Lane, then defined the virtues that Paul mentions in Ephesians 4:2: humility, gentleness, patience, and bearing with one another in love. Humility is the ability to look at your own sin before we look at other people’s sin; gentleness is when one’s strengths and gifts are bridled by the gospel to empower others, rather than manipulate them; patience relates to how we deal with the sinful offenses of others; while forbearing love relates to how we deal with what simply annoys us. Both patience and forbearance have to do with being humble and gentle with someone for a really, really, really long time. This is how we are to walk in the grace of God in relationships.

3. Who is going to enable us to do this?

The reality is that we often are not humble, gentle, patient, or forbearing. So who will enable us to do this? Paul points us to Jesus—not just as a model—but also as Savior! Jesus is not just humble, gentle, patient, and forbearing, but he is humble, gentle, patient, and forbearing WITH US! Because Jesus saves us and acts toward us in this way, in His grace, we are able act this way toward others.

In Ephesians 4:4-6, Christian community is grounded in the Triune God, who redeems sinners and welcomes them into the rich communion of the Trinity. As His redeemed people we can enter into relationships in profound ways—but only because of His grace. That means that we are bound to one another in profound ways because of what God has done, and He enables us to now move out into relationships with other people.

Dr. Lane reiterated that this topic is vital for us to consider because our very sanctification is involved. So let us ask God to grow us in “One-Anothering the Word” with each other by His grace, for His glory, and for our joy in Him.