The Word is “Community”
When I was much younger, there was a game show on television called Password. In this game, two teams of two people competed against each other. One partner on each team was given the secret password at the beginning of the game. When it was their team’s turn, that partner tried to get their teammate to guess the secret password by giving a one-word clue. Teams took turns until one of the partners guessed the password. The partner who guessed the password won points for their team.
At the beginning of the game, the announcer would always give the secret password to the TV audience in a soft voice, saying “The password is tablecloth,” for example. So, the TV audience was always given the password before the game began.
Lately, I feel like God has been playing a similar game with me, but in this game, the word has been repeated to me over and over. My job has been to realize that God was speaking to me, and to grasp the full meaning and significance of the word He was speaking.
I’m sharing this with you, because I have a feeling that a lot of us may be experiencing this. We may be entering a new season, and we need to understand it.
The Non-Traditional Christian Community
I think it started a couple of years ago when I left the traditional church I had been attending. It was the right thing to do. I was given clear direction by God that it was time for me to leave. In one of my dreams, I was packing my bags while the pastor was in the room.
After several weeks, I had another vivid dream in which I was carrying my luggage up the steps and into the home of a Christian leader. After entering his home, I was immediately shown to my place and then given a heavenly blessing.
This dream spoke to me about the Christian community of which I am now a part. I have full confidence that I am in the will of God. I am exactly where He wants me to be. The odd thing about this is that it is not a traditional church. We do not meet in a building. Our meetings are online. There is the option to meet in person, but the in-person meetings are many miles away from me, so it is not practical for me to attend in-person on a regular basis. People attend these online meetings from many different countries.
Maybe the most non-traditional thing about this group is that there is no pastor. There are wise, mature leaders, but no official “pastor.” And yet, this may be the best and most healthy Christian community of which I have ever been a part. Everyone is welcomed and valued, and leaders humbly serve the people in the community instead of trying to control and manipulate them.
The Business Community
Later I was welcomed into a smaller Christian organization that is probably the most supportive Christian group of which I have ever been a part. There are clearly defined leadership positions, but the leaders act more like servants than overseers to the members. The organization is actually a for-profit business, but it is unlike any business I have ever known before. The purpose of this business is to help Christian leaders in religious and secular arenas to reach their full potential and to fulfill the purposes for which God created them.
The organization does not focus on using other people to enrich and empower itself. Instead the organization serves its clients in the best way possible—by partnering with them to achieve what God has already called these clients to do in life. This organization models true servant leadership. In fact, when I attended my first meeting with this organization, I couldn’t tell who the leaders were. There were no inflated egos on display. No one was monopolizing the time. No one was trying to control or manipulate anyone else. No one was pushing himself or herself into the limelight.
But my introduction to healthy communities didn’t stop there.
The Fitness Community
After being impressed with a particular non-traditional approach to exercise and fitness, I purchased a package of training materials from a health and fitness company. But unlike almost every other purchase I have ever made, this company encouraged Its customers not to stop there, but to continue participating with the community of customers who were achieving their goals and enjoying real health benefits from applying the principles and consistently working through the exercises as they were explained and demonstrated.
Of course, there was some sales pressure to sign up for more personalized coaching, but that was optional. Getting connected and becoming a part of the community was encouraged as an important part of the health journey. A difficult challenge is always easier to conquer if you have a supportive community cheering you on and celebrating your successes.
The Language Community
A couple of months ago, I visited friends in Brazil. To help prepare for my time there, I used the Duolingo app to improve my Portuguese language skills.
After I returned home, I stopped using Duolingo because it had served its purpose for me.
A few weeks after I returned home, I got an email from one of the Duolingo users asking me to come back to the app because our competition for points in Duolingo had motivated him on his language journey.
I hadn’t even thought about Duolingo as a supportive “community” until I read that email.
The Writers’ Community
About the same time, I started using Substack. As I learned more about this platform, I heard from several sources that if I just think of Substack as a traditional blog platform, I will miss the full potential of Substack, and my writings will probably go unnoticed by many of the people who might appreciate and benefit from them.
One of the main keys to success on Substack, I was told, was to view the platform as a community. (There’s that word again!) It would be my personal engagement with the community members that would propel my writings to more prominence on the platform.
This concept of community was slowly beginning to sink in. As an introvert, it is not my nature to seek out and participate often in communities. I’m very comfortable hibernating in my man-cave and pounding out article after article. But all of these communities to which I had recently been introduced were healthy and supportive, and I was slowly warming up to the thought of becoming an active member of each one and participating as part of a lifestyle choice.
The Clincher
I live in a beautiful apartment community next to a large park that is within walking distance to a lake. Just before Valentine’s day, our apartment manager arranged a come-and-go get-together for residents.
At the get-together, I started a conversation with a resident I had not met before. She told me that she had just recently moved here from another part of the city.
“What brought you here?” I asked.
Her answer seemed like a confirmation from God.
She told me that she was looking for a real community, and she emphasized that word. She explained that she wanted to live among people who really shared a sense of community. Not just a neighborhood, but a real community.
She must have used the word “community” seven or eight times, stressing its importance as she said it.
I feel like I understood what she meant. I feel that this may be something that God is also emphasizing in this season.
What is God Doing?
In this season where we see some traditional Christian organizations being scandalized and exposed as unhealthy communities, God seems to be quietly repositioning many of His people into healthy, supportive communities to accomplish His purposes.
These healthy communities may not be traditional churches. They may not look like the “church groups” of our past, but God may be repositioning us in strategic relationships that will bring a powerful synergy that makes us healthier and more effective together than we could be as individuals.
These communities may not be as large as traditional church groups of the past, but they may be more effective, and they may accomplish greater things than those traditional church groups.
In these communities, leaders will humbly serve people in genuine love, rather than controlling and using people in order to enrich themselves and build their own empires.
These will be healthy communities that will see the value in each of us, build us up, encourage us, comfort us, and heal us, rather than leaving us hurt, scarred, traumatized, neglected, and undervalued.
A healthy community will respond to its community members as Paul described in Romans 12:15:
“Rejoice with those who rejoice [sharing others’ joy], and weep with those who weep [sharing others’ grief].” (AMP)
And in 1 Corinthians 12:26:
“And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; or if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it.” (NKJV)
These communities will enable and empower us to fulfill our individual and collective purposes in life. We will not just be people who fill seats and contribute money. We will each have a vital role to play. There will be a greater sense for each of us that we really matter! We are really important! The community needs us and will not be the same without us!
A healthy community will realize the truth of 1 Corinthians 12:20-22:
“As it is, there are many parts. But there is only one body. The eye can’t say to the hand, ‘I don’t need you!’ The head can’t say to the feet, ‘I don’t need you!’ In fact, it is just the opposite. The parts of the body that seem to be weaker are the ones we can’t do without.” (NIRV)
Prominent Christian leaders have been prophesying for years that God would bring His people together in “apostolic hubs” that would equip and prepare the members of the Body of Christ for specialized ministry in these last days, and then send them out to fulfill the purposes of God.
We may be seeing this coming together now, in this season.
How healthy are your “communities?”
God is repositioning and reconnecting many of us into new, healthy, supportive communities. I encourage you to be open to God’s leading, even if He seems to be leading you into something that looks very different from what you might expect.
