"While individual effort is good, it is always limited. There are things that we can do together that we cannot possibly do alone. God has so arranged human life that we are dependent upon one another to come into all that he desires of us. We need each other’s help in order to know how to love God. We need each other’s help in order to know how to love our neighbor. Lone Ranger Christianity is a contradiction in terms."
Here Foster affirms what I expounded on in my previous post: people are made to increase our capacity to love God. We are in need of people. God gave community for a reason. The community is a good thing, a purposeful thing…. And part of this purpose for each of us individually involves doing life together with others. We are meant to meet each other’s needs – financial, material, emotional, spiritual, physical. We are meant to have things in common, for the sake of others and oneself. Commonality, or sharing, is a way of living in generosity and love, while also keeping our own grasp of “things” from being too tight lest we forget the “things” are never ours; we are stewards. These things don’t go with us beyond the grave, so why give them greater significance, like that we’d give of a living being? We share life because it is a gift, as are the people we share it with, and in sharing we affirm in them, “yes, you are valued, valued enough to impact and shape my life.” We share life because Jesus shared his. He shared meals, he shared his talents, he shared his wisdom and understanding, he shared time, he shared experiences, he shared in others’ agonies, he shared the life that is given through his blood. He’s sharing eternity with us. (Why is it so hard for us to share the mere temporal with one another?)
2 comments:
I would say it is difficult for me to share (anything...temporal or otherwise) because I am greedy, scared, and sinful.
I am greedy because I want to be happy -- so I try to hoard everything that might bring me pleasure to myself. I am maximizing my benefit, not thinking of others.
I am scared because I long for security in all things. I need the love and happiness and goodness of life to not merely be transient. Because of this I do not open myself to other options -- only those I feel, or maybe have experienced, fill me and (whether in truth or folly) make me feel steady.
I am sinful, and so is everyone else. This contributes to all of the above, and more. I hurt people with my thoughts, my words, and my actions. People also hurt me.
This is why Jesus is so important. He took on all of this to take it all away from us. Beauty for ashes. And so our life must be the same -- taking on others' burdens, giving them life instead of death.
The Kingdom of Heaven is near. Life starts now.
I love this quote by Foster. It's interesting though because I have personally found more of a challenge (recently, not so in my college days) finding this "sharing" of LIFE than the sharing of material THINGS. Perhaps this is because God has taught me a lot in the past few years about sharing material things so I've grown somewhat in that area - realizing my finances are not my own but can be used for blessing others and for the kingdom.
I first learned about true community, sharing of life, while in college. Of course, being married, I have the privilege of experiencing that community day-to-day now, and have learned the depths of true community through that. It is truly awesome and an enriching experience. Maybe easier for us than for others because we love sharing life. But with other believers? I have found that to be a challenge... I desire it, but I think many are afraid of the true vulnerability it requires and the getting out of the "single family home" mentality that isolates us. (not necessarily the homes themselves, mind you, but the isolated mentality that has been created through a lack of true community in our modern culture.)
I think in many ways we're missing out on the fullness of life by not intertwining our lives with others more. I definitely want more of that.
*karen
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