I consider myself a people person. I just like to be around people and am able to relate to and interact with people. Growing up in a family with four brothers and four sisters probably equipped me for having an outgoing personality. There was never a dull moment in the Calloway household. We were brought up to love each other and to love and help our neighbors. It seemed like there were people around the house all the time, whether it was other family or somebody from the neighborhood. I define neighborhood loosely as most people around us had acres of land, not postage stamp size lots.

God is a people person as too! When you think about it, he has every reason not to be a people person. His greatest creation mankind, has shunned him, scorned him, secluded him, secularized him and saddened him. God loves people more than anything. We see this recurring theme throughout the Bible. The Old Testament Jeremiah records God saying, “”I have loved you with an everlasting love.” In the New Testament Jesus’ follower and closest friend John records Jesus’ words, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son” Don’t ask me to explain why God is a people person, he just is.

Why should you build relationships? I am almost too embarrassed to answer this one because I believe it is so obvious. It is because one day, God chose to build a relationship with me and he wants to extend that same opportunity to people who are in Cleveland, who are in Ohio, Who are in North America, and who are around the world. Kind of sounds like Acts 1:8 to me!

Church planting is about people. The biggest step for you regarding people is to see them as God sees them. How does God see people? He sees them as valuable. No, actually he sees them as priceless. As a follower of Christ, you and I must start viewing people as a priceless treasure of God. Doing things as simple as talking to people and listening to them are productive first steps. You have to make a commitment to slow your life down. Seeing people as God sees people and building relationships with them takes work and time that we think we don’t have. Building relationships with people will be one of the most satisfying experiences in life. I believe God thinks so.

People are here to help you through life, not to hinder you. God created us to have a relationship with Him, but also to have relationships with other people. Two heads are better than one, and three heads are even better than two! Planting churches must be about people. God never intended ministry to be a tool for us to beome famous or wealthy (that is very unlikely to happen). His vision always has and always will be about his greatest creation, people. His relationship with you was in the making before the beginning of time. I believe that God’s vision is worth living and dying for and it is one that I have committed my life to. Go build relationships!

What do you think? Are relationships all that important or can we live our lives in a silo? Let the discussion begin.