Archive for the ‘Community’ Category
Tuesday, February 1st, 2005
“You are joined together with peace through the Spirit,
so make every effort to continue together in this way”
Ephesians 4:3 (New Century Version)
“He who loves his dream of community more than the Christian community itself becomes a destroyer of the latter”.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together
Rick Warren’s focus today is on the unity of the local church. He points out that God doesn’t seek uniformity but has chosen to give us different personalities, backgrounds, races, and preferences. For unity’s sake we shouldn’t let differences divide us.
Warren gives us a few tips on how to keep the peace…
Focus on what we have in common.
Be realistic in your expectations.
Choose to encourage rather than critisize.
Refuse to listen to gossip.
Practice God’s method for conflict resolution - private confrontation before public.
Support your pastor and leaders.
I’ve always warmed to the phrase:
“in necessariis unitas, in dubiis libertas, in omnibus caritas”
which translated from Latin into English says:
“in essentials (or certain things) unity;
in doubtful things liberty;
in all things charity.”
The quote is sometimes attributed to Augustine or Richard Baxter or Ann Baxter. Researchers are saying now that the phrase was first used by a German Lutheran theologian called Rupertus Meldenius, during religious wars in Europe
The trouble with putting this into practice is allowing that what I may be certain about, may not be held essential by all Christians. I’ve experienced this recently with debates and dissension over sexuality. I have friends and colleagues who insist that ‘faithfulness in marriage and celibacy in singleness’ is a core doctrine that must be subscribed to before being considered a true Christian. And yet I don’t see it mentioned anywhere in the early church creeds.
I like what Warren has to say today about realistic expectations. A couple of weeks ago I had a friend tell me he’s disillusioned about the local church. He’s been burnt by the attitude I referred to in the previous paragraph. I caught myself saying “What can I do to re-illusion you?” What was I thinking?!! Dietrich Bonhoeffer, quoted in today’s chapter, reminds us that disillusionment with the local church is a good thing because it destroys our false expectations of perfection.
The flip side of today’s chapter is the cult of harmony. I’ve seen churches sabotaged time and time again when healthy and much needed change is resisted in the name of ‘keeping the peace’. I’ve had members come to me and say “You wouldn’t want to make us upset would you.” There is a time when ‘protecting your church’ will mean making decisions that are painful and costly. But in the middle of that arena, I’m with Rick Warren on the need to find our unity with one another - not based on thinking the same, but based on our common connection to God in Jesus Christ.
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Monday, January 24th, 2005
God has restored our relationship with him through Christ, and has given us this ministry of restoring relationships. 2 Corinthians 5:18 (God’s Word Translation)
Once again Rick Warren brings our attention to a basic challenge of Christian community: reconciling.
I like Rick’s reality takes on Jesus’ beatitude:
Jesus didn’t say “Blessed are the peace lovers” because everyone loves peace. Neither did he say, “Blessed are the peacable” who are never disturbed by anything. Jesus did say “Blessed are those who work for peace”. Peacemaking, Warren reminds us, is neither avoiding conflict nor appeasement.
Reading this through reminds me of people with whom I don’t see eye to eye, and probably never will. What’s important to me is the capacity to recognise the other person as a person who is valued and valuable. But I don’t believe I am required to be on good terms with everyone. I am not commanded by God to be the friend of all people. It’s just not possible. But I sense a call to keep the air clear - making sure that my attitudes are clean of resentment. And of course there will be times when I need to collaborate with others who are different to me - and that will require me to work at being a reconciler.
And also, there’s the challenge of living out God’s vision of a unified humanity - based not on uniformity, but on reconciled diversity. A couple of weeks ago I was at a conference in Adelaide where 400 of the 1500 delegates were Aboriginal people. One of the speakers challenged us to treat one another as partners in the emerging future rather than as objects. In this case, it’s not a matter of trying to restore relationships that were going well before. Here it might mean overcoming societal blocks to forming friendships in the first place.
Having said that, I come back to Rick Warren’s seven challenging steps towards restoring relationships.
1. Talk to God before talking to the person.
2. Always take the initiative.
3. Sympathise with their feelings.
4. Confess your part of the conflict.
5. Attack the problem, not the person.
6. Cooperate as much as possible.
7. Emphasise reconciliation, not resolution.
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Friday, December 3rd, 2004
You can develop a healthy, robust community that lives right with God and enjoys its results only if you do the hard work of getting along with each other, treating each other with dignity and honor.
James 3:18 (The Message)
They committed themselves to the teaching of the apostles, the life together, the common meal, and the prayers.
Acts 2:42 (The Message)
In today’s reflections on Christian community, Rick Warren provides some very practical challenges for small groups. He reminds us that a small group will not work unless there is a shared commitment or covenant. He provides the following nine commitments based on nine characteristics of ‘Biblical fellowship’:
We will share our true feelings (authenticity)
We will encourage each other (mutuality)
We will support each other (sympathy)
We will forgive each other (mercy)
We will speak the truth in love (honesty)
We will admit our weaknesses (humility)
We will respect our differences (courtesy)
We will not gossip (confidentiality)
We will make group a priority (frequency)
Looking at this list I agree with Rick. Genuine fellowship is so rare because it means giving up our self-centredness and independence in order to become inter-dependent.
The phrase ‘Biblical fellowship’ is interesting.
What makes these nine marks of fellowship Biblical? Is it because they tie in with the quality of fellowship experienced by people in the Bible? I’m sure that the earliest Christians had as much trouble as us today living out the nine commitments outlined above.
Or is it because the nine commitments can be backed up by recommendations found in the Bible, in particular the Epistle section of the New Testament?
Maybe we’re given the term for the sake of people who feel they must have the word ‘Biblical’ attached to something before they can accept it.
I’m looking forward to starting a small group again at the beginning of next year. I’ll be challenging members of the group to consider the nine commitments, and any others they consider helpful. We can start with ‘intentional community’ and move towards the hard work of living out real community.
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