Living in Community

The beauty of community:

• Prayer support in times of need
• Friends to huddle around you in great faith for your situation
• People who weep with you as you weep and mourn with you as you mourn and laugh with you as you laugh
  
• Discipleship with full effectiveness
• Seeing the love of Christ through peers
• Provision, generosity, and power
• Generational blessings
• Effective discipline, when necessary

I can't express how blessed I feel because of being a true part of community. In the rigors of life, I often lose sight of true community and don't grab hold of it even within church fellowship. Community at church has become a once-a-month meal rather than an every day partnership. How can we change this?

Alan Hirsch suggests the idea of 3rd place ministries. This involves discipling people and being in community with people who share common interests (such as coffee shops, jazz clubs, skiing, hiking, bowling, book clubs) and meet there on their free time. How can we partner and fellowship with those we feel we should be discipling? Meet on common ground - do what you like to do. Foreign concep, I know. I hate to say this, and I may get stoned, but church as an instituation just isn't working for us. It's time to branch out. It's time to follow Jesus where our generation can best find Him, and maybe that's not ... inchurchasweknowit...........(pretend I didn't say that).

I'm blessed to know that one day we will all see eye-to-eye and live in perfect unity, but until then...

-Until the world's not worthy.

Nicole