1. Community is God’s idea
We are made “in the image of God.” (Gen 1:27)
“It is not good that the man should be alone.” (Gen 2:18)
Holy Trinity, divine community
Rublev Icon of the Trinity
John 17:20
“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”
“Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them.” Matt 18:20
Building Community
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Worshipping
Worship is the central act of the life of the church community. If Christ is removed from the centre then it all comes down. Christ is the cornerstone (Eph 2:20) our peace (Eph 2:14).
In him we are bound together (Eph 4:3–6). We are diverse but the same in Christ. (Col 3:11). We are bound to together by our common faith in Christ Jesus and our need of his grace and forgiveness.
Put one another first “submit to one another out of reverence to Christ.” (Eph 5:1, see also Phil 2:3)
Worship evolves and changes with the community as they express their experience of God and proclaim the truth handed down through scripture and tradition.
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Caring
- For each other—Community is built on
relationships.
John 15:12. Love one another
How do we form significant relationships in church? How do new people find them?
Meeting together is important. Heb 10:25; Acts 1:6,12, 2:1, 2:44, 5:12—early church met together a lot.
Sounds lovely but there are always tensions!
“We are unified by our common weaknesses, our common failures, our common disappointments and our common inconsistencies.”
Henri Nouwen ‘Dancing with Porcupines’ - For those whom God sends
Who is God calling us to serve as a community, who do we already serve?
Are we open to new people joining us, and the change that they will inevitably bring?
- For each other—Community is built on
relationships.
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Prophetic
“Britain is becoming a nation increasingly ghettoised into ‘like’ groups.” Trevor Phillips.
We need to be a porous community.
We are called to be a distinctive community.
Further reading
- ‘Life Together’ Dietrich Bonhoeffer SCM press 1954 ISBN 978-0334009047
- ‘Celebrating Community’ Emma Ineson and Chris Edmondson (ed) DLT 2006 ISBN 978-0232526592
- ‘Everybody’s normal until you get to know them’ John Ortberg Zondervan 2004 ISBN 978-0310250845
- ‘Reaching Out: The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life’ Henri Nouwen Zondervan 1998 ISBN978-0006280866
2. Community of the Imperfect
Henri Nouwen “We are unified by our common weaknesses, our common failures, our common disappointments and our common inconsistencies.”
Mark 2:1–12—‘The Fellowship of the Mat’
Paralysis in 1st C Israel was very hard. No welfare state, no rehab, and people thought it was your fault that you were paralysed. It was punishment for wrongdoing. See John 9:1–5
Choosing Community
His friends choose to be his friends. They choose community.
- Choosing Community takes time—‘its a slow
cook not a microwave.’
What prevents us spending time together?
- Choosing community means choosing to be vulnerable.
We all have our mats, our imperfections. Are we willing to let our mats be seen and be carried by others? This has to happen in order for true community to form.
Our mats are great opportunities for receiving love and grace.
To be carried on your mat you must be vulnerable and trust.
Bear with one another in love (Eph 4)
“There is no ideal community. Community is made up of people with all their richness, but also all their weakness and poverty, of people who accept and forgive each other, who are vulnerable with each other. Humility and trust are more at the foundation of community than perfection.” Jean Vanier
- Choosing community means trusting
“Community gets built by servants, great community gets built by roof crashers”. John Ortberg
Roof crashing—taking risks of faith for others.
The paralysed man had to trust his friends—that was risky.
- Choosing community means choosing spiritual growth
The mans friends have a growth moment—Jesus heals
The man has a growth moment—Jesus forgives.
“Community is a place where our limitations, our fears and our egoism are revealed to us… while we are alone, we could believe that we loved everyone. Now that we are with others, living with them all the time, we realise how incapable we are of loving, how much we deny others, how closed in on ourselves we are.” Jean Vanier
We need the love and forgiveness of God at the heart of community.
- Choosing community means choosing to love as God
does… and learning to be loved.
‘Love one another as I have loved you.’
‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’
We need to learn to love and learn to allow ourselves to be loved.
3. Community at St Matthews
What is Church? … some biblical images.
There are 80–100 images used in the bible.
Jesus mentions church twice
- Matt 16:18—worldwide time long, cosmic.
- Matt 18:17—local gathered community.
Church—Greek is Ekklesia literally called out, meeting, gathering.
4 major images of church in scripture
- The People of God 1 Pet 2:9–10 set apart, called out.
- Body of Christ Eph 4:15, Rom 12:4–14, 1 Cor 10:16–17
- Fellowship of faith Heb 12:10 sanctified by God, John 17:18–26 called to witness to Christ Eph 4:12 created and sustained by Holy Spirit Acts 4:10–33
- New creation Col 3:10,11 Rom 8 cosmic, outside time, taking part in kingdom building.
We, the church community are called out to be
a distinctive Christ centred community of faith
AND also to be open, to welcome the stranger,
to go out and witness in the world as aliens in a foreign land
1 Peter 2:11,12
Called to be distinctive and engaged.
Models of Community
All communities need boundaries that ‘define’ them.
Possible models—Community as … (Set theory)
- Bounded Set—distinct boundaries, not very open, not engaged.
- Fuzzy Set—less distinct boundaries, more open, can lead to confusion and lack of belonging. Not that engaged.
- Open Set—no boundaries, very engaged and open. Not distinctive. Hard to know if you belong.
- Centred Set—centred on Christ, porous edges, which direction are people facing in, journey, relational.
Centred set is the most appropriate model for us at St Matthews in the current cultural scene—so what does it look like?
- Messy.
- High emphases on relationships.
- High reliance on small groups within which we can form relationships and be nurtured and discipled.
“Community exists only when persons really know each other. God as love is experienced not in large organisations and institutions but in communities in which people can embrace each other.”Jurgen Moltmann—The Open Church
Small Groups
Small groups are groups of people of such a size that they can get to know one another—so smaller than 60—but big enough that people aren’t thrust into too much intimacy—larger than 6.
UK Church research suggests that growing churches are those where;
- a new person makes 5 meaningful relationships within the first 3 months of arriving.
- where there is the opportunity to belong and contribute in some way.
- where there are small groups of people who share and pray and learn together in a supportive environment.
2 major stumbling blocks
- Consumerism—“church is there for me to get what I want” NT church was a local corporate expression of faith in Christ that each person contributed to and committed to
- Time—commitment to one another requires sacrifice of time, comes down to priorities.
Are we at St Matthews prepared to commit time for one another in order to form deeper Christian community?
