Twos and Threes

Chapter 2 – How Twos and Threes works

 

For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them. (Matthew 18:20, emphasis mine)

 

In this verse, Jesus states the main building block of Christian fellowship and friendships – which is when two or three gather in His name.

 

In various 1-to-many settings this verse is often misquoted by the 1 to say “two or more” instead of its correct form of “two or three”. We will explore the reason for this misquote in the next chapter where we will look at the historic shift that caused the 1-to-many model to often upstage the primary focus upon 2s-and-3s. But in this chapter we will explore how 2s-and-3s fellowship works – including why it is so incredibly valuable and what Jesus is wonderfully bringing about through it!

 

Overall, Jesus has designed 2s-and-3s to be an integral and significant part of His freeing each of us to function as He has created us to function – which is for each of us to have wonderful friendships of agape love with Him and each other.

 

So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. (John 8:36, emphasis mine)

 

One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:28-31, emphasis mine)

 

I (Jesus) no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. (John 15:15, emphasis mine)

 

So, how does Jesus use 2s-and-3s in this process?

 

The following four steps show how this works. These steps use a group of 3 as an example, with you being 1 of the 3. The same would hold true if it was a group of 2 instead of 3.

 

Step 1: Jesus works continually in you through His Holy Spirit to both filter and enhance the data coming into you via your senses by giving you a sense of what is best for you to reject, and to give you insights into those things that are best for you to receive.

 

But when he, the (Holy) Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. (John 16:13a)

 

For example, when you hear someone speaking you may sense that something is not quite right in what they are saying and therefore it is best to not receive it – hence filtering the data coming into you. Or when someone shares something with you, something might stand out to you as the Holy Spirit gives you insights into it – hence the enhancing of the data coming into you.

 

Step 2:As you meet with two others, you are now in a 2s-and-3s. The Holy Spirit will work in your mind and heart, and will help you to share your heart with the other two people.

 

Step 3:As the other two people listen to you share, the Holy Spirit will work in both of them to filter and enhance what you have shared with them so as to uniquely tailor it to each of their lives.

 

Step 4: The ball of fellowship rolls along as the Holy Spirit helps each person to share their heart with the other two, and the Holy Spirit also filters and enhances the data going into each person.

 

Overall, if this 4-step process is working well, each person will be encouraged through the 2s-and-3s fellowship, and their friendships with each other will grow. And as each person grows in friendship qualities, it will in turn help them to grow in their friendship with Jesus – which is by far the greatest thing in life on earth and throughout eternity!

 

There are many additional benefits of 2s-and-3s fellowship – some that I know about and some that I do not know about. The reason for this is because the Lord is incredibly smarter than we can possibly know or imagine, and He is the Creator of life on earth. As such, Jesus has designed things in a way so that they tie to the two greatest commandments to love God and to love our neighbors as ourselves. And He uses 2s-and-3s fellowship as a key part of this. With this now said, throughout the rest of this chapter we will explore some additional benefits of 2s-and-3s fellowship that I currently know about. And over time may Jesus help us all to learn even more benefits – since He is the One who knows all of them!

 

The following are a few benefits I am currently aware of:

• Growing in knowledge
• Mutual encouragement
• Strengthening against sin
• Spiritual growth

 

Please note that these are not mutually exclusive categories since many of the items within each category also apply to other categories as well. For example, there are things in Mutual Encouragement that also apply to Strengthening against sin. So, you might categorize these in different ways than I have, but hopefully the above categories will give us a good place to start.

 

We will now look at each of these categories in greater detail.

 

Growing in Knowledge

 

In the 4-step process we looked at earlier, the Holy Spirit was mentioned in each step since He is the biggest key to 2s-and-3s fellowship working well!

 

The Holy Spirit helps each person with what words they share and also in filtering and enhancing what the others hear. This allows Him to work through 2s-and-3s to grow each of us in knowledge and a greater understanding of truth.

 

But when he, the (Holy) Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. (John 16:13a, emphasis mine)

 

The Holy Spirit could impart this knowledge directly to each of us – as He sometimes does through what we read in the Bible, dreams, and other means. But the Holy Spirit works through 2s-and-3s to grow each person in knowledge by their hearing the knowledge that He has grown the others in, and then He also helps each person to know how that knowledge specifically applies to their life.

 

An example of this has occurred during the many times where I had been learning a lesson from the Lord, and as I shared with one or two other Christians, I was quite surprised that they had been going through a similar lesson. As we shared back and forth, the combined knowledge helped each of us to gain a greater understanding. The Holy Spirit used and continues to use this process to help each of us to grow in excellent ways.

 

Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. (Ephesians 4:15, emphasis mine)

 

Through the 2s-and-3s we also grow in knowledge of each other. The Lord uses this to help us to appreciate each other more, enjoy each other more, understand how to pray for and help each other, how to be sensitive to each other, and so much more.

 

Through the 2s-and-3s we also grow in appreciation of Jesus. For example, if you and I are in a 2s-and-3s and we decide to look at the following well known scripture:

 

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

 

And then we share with each other what stands out to us. You might share how you were touched by how much Jesus loves us to do something so wonderful for not only you, but for all humans too! And I might share with you how thankful I am to know that the Lord is willing to preserve our existence forever! And through this 2s-and-3s sharing, both of us wind up appreciating all the more how wonderful Jesus is!

 

Mutual Encouragement

 

When Jesus sent out the seventy-two disciples, He did not send each of them out separately. Instead He sent them out by 2s.

 

After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. (Luke 10:1, emphasis mine)

 

In a similar way, people often use the “buddy system” and prefer going to places with a friend rather than going by themselves. Not only can it make them feel safer, but they can also be encouraged by each other’s company. And being with another person can also help against the loneliness that so many people struggle with.

 

In the book of Acts, we see numerous examples of teams of two or three, such as Peter + John, Paul + Barnabas, Paul + Silas, and Priscilla + Aquila + Apollos. And as they faced difficult situations together, they were encouraged by each other. For example, in Acts 16 we see that Paul and Silas went through a very difficult time.

 

The crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas, and the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten with rods....