There is no community without humility.

Doing life with other people means you have to live a laid down life. This pertains to marriage (Ephesians 5:21 – submit yourselves to one another); to friendship (Proverbs 17:17 – a friend loves at all times); families, churches, companies, nations, cities, anywhere there is people the call is to humility if we want to have community.

People that want to remain standing while others are laying down their lives reveal they do not know how to live in community. John 15:12-14 says, “This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends. You are My friends if you do what I command you.”

Jesus commands us to lay down our lives for one another. It is what love looks like. Wounded people struggle to lay down their life, because they are afraid of getting hurt again, so they remain standing while the call is to lay down our life.

If we want to look like Jesus, live in community like the disciples and do the works of the kingdom on earth as they are in heaven, we must live a laid down life. This is the only command Jesus gave us, love one another and love looks like a laid down life.

Jesus is our model of a laid down life. All He is commanding us to do is what He did. He called His betrayer friend, He died for the sins of the world, He fed people who only followed Him for food and He did miracles for people who others considered not deserving of them.

We were created for community, but to live in community it takes humility. To love and to be loved, we must lay down our lives for one another. It is in our laying down we will find ourselves rising up together as a community. Love always lifts up but it also lays down. Www.apostolicresourcecenter.org