God Sets the Solitary in Families

God sets the solitary in families;

He brings out those who are bound into prosperity.

Psalm 68:6 (NKJV

What’s Grown Among Us

Something has happened over the years that I don’t think any of us planned.

We came looking for answers. We wanted to understand the times, to read the headlines against the pages of Scripture, to know what’s next. And along the way we found each other. You’ve watched the programs week after week. You’ve read the articles. You’ve written in the comments. You’ve prayed for people you’ve never met and been prayed for by people whose faces you won’t see until Heaven.

That is the Tipping Point Community. And it is not nothing. It is real. In a world that grows colder and more isolated every year, a group of people gathered around one hope, that Jesus is coming, is a genuine gift from God.

Content and Community

Not long ago our team sat down and asked ourselves a simple question. What is it that we actually offer to people? The answer came back in two words. Content and community.

We work hard on the content. The programs, and the articles alongside them, are how most of you found us, and we want them to be faithful and accurate, because you deserve the truth and nothing less, especially in days like these. But when we were honest with one another, we agreed that the teaching is not the most important thing we do. The community is. More than being right, we want to be faithful to each other.

That is the heart of the Tipping Point Community, and we are working hard to create and nurture it. We don’t want to be content that you simply read or watch. We want to be a family you belong to.

Many of you came to Tipping Point in a lonely season. Some of you had lost people. Some of you were the only one in your home, your workplace, or your family who still believed the Lord was returning and wanted to be ready. You felt like you were watching alone.

And then you weren’t.

That is not an accident. God sets the solitary in families. He always has. He did it for Ruth when she had every reason to walk away and instead said, “Where you go, I will go.” He did it for the early church, strangers by blood who became brothers and sisters around one table and one Lord. He has been doing it for two thousand years, and He has been doing it here.

How I Stayed

I can tell you from my own life that community is what keeps you.

When I first got saved, I did not have a single Christian friend. The only godly people I knew were Karen and Jesus. We started going to church, and I will be honest with you, at first I didn’t like Christians and I didn’t like church. Karen was the one who kept encouraging me to stay. So I stuck it out. And I met the best people I have ever known.

I didn’t stay because the teaching was good, though I came to love it. I stayed because of the people. I found my best friends in a local church, and more than forty years later I can tell you that is still where you will find yours.

The Next Best Thing

Because the Tipping Point Community exists to be faithful to you, I have to tell you something a group that only wanted to keep you would never say.

What we have here is real, but for most of you it is the next best thing.

A screen can carry teaching. It can carry encouragement. If you are homebound, or you live somewhere remote with no solid church nearby, I thank God for every bit of connection you can get, and I mean that. But for most of us this cannot be the whole of our fellowship, because something happens when we are around other believers that simply doesn’t happen when we are alone.

The devil is like a wolf, and a wolf does not go after the middle of the flock. He goes after the straggler, the sheep that has wandered off to the margins by itself. There is strength in numbers. We are safest when we stay close to the Shepherd and close to the rest of the sheep.

And here is what I most want you to hear. God has put gifts in you that other people need. When you only ever receive and never gather in person to give, someone in a church down the road is going without the very thing the Lord placed in you to hand them. You are not just missing out. They are. A community that truly loves you will always send you toward more of that, never less.

All the More as You See the Day Approaching

This is exactly why the writer of Hebrews tied it to the end:

“And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.” — Hebrews 10:24–25 (NKJV)

The Day, with a capital D, is the return of Jesus. The closer we get, the more we need one another, and the more we need to be present, not just plugged in. Watching the world come apart from your living room alone will wear you down. Watching it alongside a flesh-and-blood church family will hold you steady.

So let me put it plainly. Stay with us here. Keep watching, keep reading, keep looking up with the Tipping Point Community. But if you do not have a church home, find a Bible-believing church this week, walk in the doors, and tell someone you are looking for a place to belong. Get planted. Get involved. Let people learn your name.

Take It to the Lord

Think about where you actually receive the encouragement that keeps your faith strong. Is it only through a screen? Take that honestly to the Lord.

Then ask Him one question. Is there a local church, a small group, or a believer down the street that You are trying to place in my life, and have I been too guarded, too busy, or too weary to walk through the door?

He sets the solitary in families. Let Him do it for you.

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