C is for Community-Psalm 133:1

Psalm 133:1 (Hebrews 10:25)

“How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!” (“…not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another.”)

Ps 133:1 perhaps best describes the deepest desire of every human heart–the desire for genuine community.

Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer is perhaps the best book ever written about Christian community. Richard Foster, author of Celebration of Discipline, writes, “Most books can be skimmed quickly; some deserve careful reading; a precious few should be devoured and digested. Life Together…belongs to the third category.” Tim Keller writes in the forward of Bonhoeffer by Eric Metaxas that Life Together “is perhaps the finest single volume I have ever read on the character of Christian community.” Henri Nouwen says, “Seldom has the challenge as well as the joy of living together in Christ been articulated so clearly and convincingly as by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.”

For the last two weeks A is for Accountability and B is for Beauty was discussed regarding practical Christian living. C is for (Christian) Community is the topic this sermon.

Theme: Nothing hinders community more than when we impose ourselves and our “wish dream” upon the community. (Human beings long for community, for we are made in the image of the perfect community of the triune God.)

The following will be considered regarding community:

1. What it is: (Through and in Christ).
2. Why it is necessary: (We are made in the image of the Perfect Community).
3. How it is done: (Listen, Love, Lead, Dialogue, Silence/Solitude, Confession).
4. What hinders (destroys) it: (Wish dream, Human rule, Collegium pietatis, Pseudo-community).
5. How it is possible: (The Perfect Community was ripped apart on the Cross).

1. What Community Is

Christian community is created by God in Christ (1 Jn 1:3). “Christianity means community through Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ. No Christian community is more or less than this. Whether it be a brief, single encounter or the daily fellowship of years, Christian community is only this. We belong to one another only through and in Jesus Christ.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Faith in Community, (New York: HarperOne, 2009), 21. “Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize; it is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate” (30).

1. Why Community Is Necessary

The triune God existed in eternity in community and in perfect unity, love and intimacy. We humans–made in the image of the triune God–invariably long for community.

Created for fellowship. “To be a human being is directed toward one’s fellowmen. . . . What is being said in this verse (Gen. 1:27) is that the human person is not an isolated being who is complete in himself or herself, but that he or she is a being who needs the fellowship of others, who is not complete apart from others.” Anthony Hoekema, Created in God’s image, 76. “The man-woman relationship implies the need for fellowship between human beings. . . . Not only is man incomplete without woman and woman incomplete without man; man is also incomplete without other men and woman is also incomplete without other women. Men and women cannot attain true humanity in isolation; they need the fellowship and stimulation of others. We are social beings. The very fact that man is told to love his neighbor as himself implies that man needs his neighbor.” Anthony Hoekema, 77. Hoekema (1913–1988) was professor of systematic theology at Calvin Theological Seminary, Grand Rapids, Michigan.

III. How Community Is Done

1. Listen.
2. Love.
3. Lead.
4. Dialogue.
5. Silence and solitude.
6. Confession.

(1) Listen (Jas 1:19). “The first service that one owes to others in the fellowship consists in listening to them. Just as the love of God begins with listening to his word, so the beginning of love for the brethren is learning to listen to them. It is God’s love for us that He not only gives us His Word but also lends us His ear. So it is His work that we do for our brother when we learn to listen to him. Christians, especially ministers, often think that they must always contribute something when they are in the company of others, that this is the one service they have to render. They forget that listening can be a greater service than speaking.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Faith in Community, (New York: HarperOne, 2009), 97.

(2) Love others or yourself? (Mt 22:39; Mk 12:31; Jn 13:34) “The beginning of love is the will to let those we love be perfectly themselves, the resolution not to twist them to fit our own image. If in loving them we do not love what they are, but only their potential likeness to ourselves, then we do not love them: we only love the reflection of ourselves we find in them.” Thomas Merton, No Man Is An Island.

(3) Lead (Mt 20:25-26; Mk 10:42-44; Lk 22:25-27; Phil 2:6). “Jesus leadership is not one of power and control but of powerlessness and humility, in which the suffering servant of God, Jesus Christ is made manifest. Power must constantly be abandoned in favor of love.” Henri Nouwen.

(4) Dialogue (Rom 12:3; Phil 2:3; Eph 4:15; Col 4:6). “…we succumb to attitudes that do not permit us to dialogue: domination, not knowing how to listen, annoyance in our speech, preconceived judgments and so many others. Dialogue is born from a respectful attitude toward the other person, from a conviction that the other person has something good to say. It supposes that we can make room in our heart for their point of view, their opinion and their proposals. Dialogue entails a warm reception and not a preemptive condemnation. To dialogue, one must know how to lower the defenses, to open the doors of one’s home, and to offer warmth.” Jorge Mario Bergoglio (Pope Francis), (Rabbi) Abraham Skorka, On Heaven and Earth: Pope Francis on Faith, Family and the Church in the 21st Century.

(5) Silence and Solitude. Time alone with God enhances genuine community together with others. “One who wants fellowship without solitude plunges into the void of words and feelings, and one who seeks solitude without fellowship perishes in the abyss of vanity, self-infatuation, and despair.”

(6) Confession.

1. What Hinders(Destroys)Community

1. Wish dream.
2. Human rule.
3. Collegium pietatis (school of piety).
4. Pseudo-community.

(1) Wish dream. “Innumerable times a whole Christian community has broken down because it had sprung from a wish dream. The serious Christian, set down for the first time in a Christian community, is likely to bring with him a very definite idea of what Christian life together should be and to try to realize it.

Every human wish dream that is injected into the Christian community is a hindrance to genuine community and must be banished if genuine community is to survive. He who loves his dream of a community more than the Christian community itself becomes a destroyer of the latter, even though his personal intentions may be ever so honest and earnest and sacrificial.

God hates visionary dreaming; it makes the dreamer proud and pretentious. The man who fashions a visionary ideal of community demands that it be realized by God, by others, and by himself. He enters the community of Christians with his demands, sets up his own law, and judges the brethren and God Himself accordingly.

He stands adamant, a living reproach to all others in the circle of brethren. He acts as if he is the creator of the Christian community, as if his dream binds men together.

Even when sin and misunderstanding burden the communal life, is not the sinning brother still a brother, with whom I, too, stand under the Word of Christ? Will not his sin be a constant occasion for me to give thanks that both of us may live in the forgiving love of God in Jesus Christ?

Thus the very hour of disillusionment with my brother becomes incomparably salutary (favorable), because it so thoroughly teaches me that neither of us can live by our own words and deeds, but only by that one Word and Deed which really binds us together—the forgiveness of sins in Jesus Christ. When the morning mists of dreams vanish, then dawns the bright day of Christian fellowship.

When a person becomes alienated from a Christian community in which he has been placed and begins to raise complaints about it, he had better examine himself first to see whether the trouble is not due to his wish dream that should be shattered by God; and if this be the case, let him thank God for leading him in to this predicament. But if not, let him nevertheless guard against ever becoming an accuser of the congregation before God.

Let him rather accuse himself for his unbelief. Let him pray to God for an understanding of his own failure and his particular sin, and pray that he may not wrong his brethren.

Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize; it is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate. The more clearly we learn to recognize that the ground and strength and promise of all our fellowship is in Jesus Christ alone, the more serenely shall we think of our fellowship and pray and hope for it.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Faith in Community, (New York: HarperOne, 2009), 26-30.

(2) Human rule. “In the community of the Spirit the Word of God alone rules; in human community there rules, along with the Word, the man who is furnished with exceptional powers, experience, and magical, suggestive capacities. …besides the Word, men bind others to themselves. …spheres of power and influence of a personal nature are sought and cultivated. …devout men…do this with the intention of serving the highest and the best, but in actuality the result is to dethrone the Holy Spirit, to relegate Him to remote unreality. In actuality, it is only the human that is operative here.” pg. 32.

(3) Collegium pietatis. “Life together under the Word will remain sound and healthy only where it does not form itself into a movement, an order, a society, a collegium pietatis (schools of piety), but rather where it understands itself as being a part of the one, holy, catholic, Christian Church, where it shares actively and passively in the sufferings and struggles and promise of the whole Church. Every principle of selection and every separation connected with it…is of the greatest danger to a Christian community. …the human element always insinuates itself and robs the fellowship of its spiritual power and effectiveness for the Church, drives it into sectarianism.” pg. 37.

(4) Pseudo-community.

1. How a True Community is Possible

The ultimate reason why a true genuine community of God’s people is possible is because the Perfect Community of the Triune God was completely ripped apart through the Cross and the crucifixion of Christ. Christ the Son was ripped apart by sinners on the cross. God the Father was ripped apart when He turned His face away from the Son as He cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” The Holy Spirit was ripped apart by the devastation of the Godhead because of the crucifixion. But unless such a devastation of God Himself occured, mankind could never ever be restored in friendship and fellowship with the truine God.

Only because of the Cross, Ps 133:1 was and is and will be possible: “How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!” (NIV) “Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity!” (ESV) “How wonderful and pleasant it is when brothers live together in harmony!” (NLT)

Reference (The 5 chapters of Life Together):

1. Community. Chap. 1: Community.
2. Chap. 2: The Day with Others.
3. Silence and Solitude. Chap. 3: The Day Alone.
4. Listening is Greater than Speaking. Chap. 4: Ministry.
5. Pious Fellowship Permits No Sinners. Chap. 5: Confession and Communion.