Christianity and Community

           The essence of Christianity is community.  If we don’t have each other, we don’t have much at all.  We need each other to get through the things that drive us crazy or cause us pain.  That isn’t a particularly new thing to say, we all know it.  We have all had times of loneliness when we didn’t know what we would do next.  It is at times like this that having somebody close to us makes a radical difference.  We don’t always know this.  It is hard to reach out when we are lonely.  Sometimes it takes another’s touch to reach us. 

            Rosie and I do meals-on-wheels every week.  One of our clients is a little old lady who is blind and who has a cat.  The cat is probably her only relationship.  She talks about her late husband every so often and we know that she misses him.  She always greets us with great joy, takes the meals that we offer and spends a few moments telling us that she hopes that we have a nice day.  That is always nice to hear, and I know that our touch of her makes her day a bit brighter.  That isn’t a small thing.  

            Meals-on-wheels is currently under threat.  There isn’t enough money because of the “sequester” to take care of all of the people on our route, to pay the tiny salaries of the people who run the program and to do what is necessary to keep the program viable.  That is really tragic.  We do what we do for free, as volunteers.  That is profoundly necessary, not only for the program, but for us.  We do what we do because it needs to be done, and for what it does for our day.  I can’t imagine how the program would survive if they paid people to deliver the meals.

            Jesus taught us to care for each other.  He brought his disciples into community so that they could take care of each other and take care of the people whom they met in their ministry.  There is a section in Luke’s Gospel when Jesus is described as walking along the road and he calls people to follow him. They all want to, but they also have excuses. There are things at that moment that are more important than following Jesus.  They sound like me.  I always seem to have something more important, too.  Jesus says to them, No one who puts his hand to the plow and then looks back is fit for the Kingdom of God.  This sounds harsh, but it is simply the truth.  Jesus was trying to build community, to bring people together.  The Kingdom of God is always immediate.  It is always before us.  It always requires our attention.  When we have our eyes focused elsewhere, we miss what is essential.  That is what Jesus is trying to tell the people who want to follow him.  It is a full time job that takes all of our attention.  That’s why it isn’t easy.  But easy isn’t the issue.  If we want this world to be better and fairer for all of us, we desperately need community, and community demands our constant attention.  God bless us as we struggle with all of this and try to build community in a world that isn’t particularly interested.