Looking More and More Like Community Everyday!

Our vision at BCC is to see a whole community united to build life around Jesus. Not united around our careers. Not united around our families. Not united around our hobbies. United to build life around Jesus.

As I discussed in our 5 part video series, community in America has been lost. Not overnight for sure but over time, and it is the challenge of the modern-day church to build community again- around Jesus.

It is my strong belief that the Holy Spirit is so often hindered from working among us today because of the way we live as Christians. We have adopted the American way of life just as much as anyone. We live isolated. We live exclusively independently not interdependently. We live out our Christian lives, but not together. We are individuals who inhabit buildings on Sundays, but we are generally not community. We are rarely community in the sense that the early church was community and we are rarely community in the same way the early Americans were community.

When we do not live communally the fruits of the Spirit have trouble growing. If I do not have a close body of people I can express love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control to- regularly- my fruit (good works) lose their power to impact others and the world around. That's the importance of a becoming a "city on a hill" not a "person on a hill" (see related blog post)

To rebuild community once it has been lost is difficult, but it is happening!

This past Sunday a woman approached me at church about whether I thought giving a monetary donation to a certain individual would be a good use of her money. She wanted to know if this person had been stewarding well what little he did have.

I assured her that I had confidence that he was stewarding well his finances. She proceeded to write a check to the church on behalf of this member and asked me if I could work out getting the money to him. I said "surely".

That evening after church as I was getting ready for bed I pulled out the check she had given me and about fell over. $1,000!

What awesome news I got to deliver on Monday morning to this struggling member. I think he almost had a heart attack when I told him how much another member of the church gave to him. He could not find the words to express his gratefulness to his anonymous giver.

Praise the Lord when the church acts like the church of Christ! Praise the Lord when the church fights to become community again! Though I see many ways in which BCC can grow to become more of what Christ intends us to be, I do believe we are looking more and more like genuine community everyday.

I believe the Holy Spirit worked on Sunday night and Monday and I am almost certain word has spread since then.

You can build Christ's Christian community again too. In fact if you are a Christian then that is your commission. Christ builds His church (Mt.16:16) but He has enlisted us to help. Building Christ's church starts by having the right vision for His church. If our vision for Christ's church is an exciting Sunday gathering then an exciting Sunday gathering is all it may become. But if our vision for Christ's church is the vision of the church we read about in the New Testament, then we will become more and more like that church even in the midst of all of our technological advances.

So first get the proper vision. Then team with other Christians of like mind to begin living out that vision incarnationally.