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“What we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed, our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ.” – 1 John 1:3
When Ted Kaczynski, aka, the Unabomber, was first charged with murder following his arrest in April 1996, the locals who knew him in Montana shared stories that painted him as a reclusive, private individual, but most did not suspect he was capable of violence. What the world heard from them is a phrase we are all familiar with: “You think you know a person, but you really don’t.”
Is it possible to say that you truly know anybody?
The Sternberg Center for Successful Relationships suggests that even in the healthiest of marriages, it is impossible to truly know someone. That means for married people, the person you arguably should know better than anyone else is not fully knowable. After being married for decades, a partner will continue to do things you didn’t expect and say things you never saw coming.
This idea might be troubling to some people. If you can never truly know anyone, is anyone safe, then? Perhaps it’s better to not bother with relationships at all and withdraw from people altogether.
Of course, that’s what Ted Kaczynski did, and we all know how that worked out.
Maybe we should approach this idea of relationships differently. Think about it like an investment you make. When you give your money to a financial advisor and he/she invests it in a mutual fund, that person is required to tell you that “past performance is not indicative of future results.”
In other words, investing is a risk. The goal is that you get your money working for you as it exponentially grows over time. Certain strategies have proven to work better than others, and certain investments have better track records than others. But it’s not a guarantee. Investing requires a willingness on your part to manage a level of risk.
That’s exactly how it is when you decide to make a friend or fall in love or develop a business partnership. You don’t truly know the person you are attempting to connect with. But by choosing to spend time with them, getting to know them, committing to them, we develop a deeper relationship with that person.
That leads me to a bibley word: fellowship. It’s used 20 times in Scripture, and in modern churches, its often associated with the activity of getting to know other people in the church. “Let’s have a time of food and fellowship” translates as potluck meals and socializing.
But that word “fellowship” comes from the Greek word koinonia. It has a small range of meaning, but the most accurate interpretation would be “spiritual intimacy.” One verse, Acts 2:42 says that the early followers of Jesus “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, to fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer.” That devotion was more than just food and socializing. They were growing in spiritual intimacy with each other. They recognized that while they might never fully know a person, they understood that spiritual intimacy required a willingness to invest deeply in other people.
And as the verse from 1 John 1:3 above clearly communicates, spiritual intimacy is both a horizontal and a vertical investment. We strive to achieve intimacy with other people and we strive to achieve intimacy with God.
That intimacy doesn’t just appear out of thin air either. It requires work. Getting to know someone means rolling up your sleeves and committing to loving them unconditionally. Spending more time with them. Listening more and talking less. Being the safe person for them to open up to.
Most of us don’t live in the isolation of the Unabomber. But if we are honest, most of us are relationally broken to some degree or the other. We resist getting to know others deeply because we see them as either too much work or too much risk. But Jesus put us here on this earth (and not in heaven) for a reason. Getting to know God and getting to know others well are part of the same process. So the work and the risk of other people is our calling.
It turns out the potential reward for investing in people is quite high as well. Like it or not, we are relational beings, and the people who are the happiest in life are the people who have reaped the benefits of healthy, dynamic relatiosnhips.
So, make the choice to invest in people. I know they are unreliable and risky, but then so are you. The real risk is to not develop spiritual intimacy with others and thus negate part of your reason for being here in the first place.
Let’s get to know each other. It’s a good bet.