One of the first things that comes to mind is that we choose to share our lives. It doesn’t matter if we came together, or if we were put together by other circumstances; what matters is how we choose to respond to the fact that we are together. As we can clearly see in our culture it is entirely possible to live in close proximity, even in the same house, and barely interact. In fact some people spend their whole lives together only to find out they hardly know each other at all.
How then do we avoid this pitfall? How do we really get to know people? How do we ourselves become known? We could go through our lives hiding behind this fake image that we think people like, keeping our real feelings and ideas and passions to ourselves where no one can disapprove. But what would be the point of that?
Getting to know each other, really getting to know each other, is tough. You have to be willing to take risks, and you have to be prepared to work through disappointments. The reality is that we all have issues. We all have baggage that affects the way we perceive things. If we can’t be honest with ourselves and each other about what we are thinking, we will just go on assuming things about each other that just aren’t true. Two months or two years down the road you have developed this identity that has little of nothing to do with the real person.
Part of community for me is choosing to get below the surface. It means laying the real stuff out on the table for all to see. It also means having a whole lot of grace when others lay their stuff on the table. We have to be willing to look beyond offenses and weaknesses to see the heart of the person in front of us. On the surface you may see claws and fangs, but when you look beyond the defenses you will find a heart beating and a soul searching for mercy.
Community should be a place where we can let it all hang out, and still find love and acceptance at the end of the day.
I don’t want to minimalize all that community entails. There is certainly much more to it than that, but I think it’s a pretty good start.
