Community - Messy yet Lovely

Humanity, to me, is made in the image of God yet is sinful but renewed in Christ.

Being created in the image of God means humans find identity in each other. To take it even further (since I am a Christian), I believe there is a connection made among all humans who seek identity in Christ to be in community with one another in mutual love. Anthropology, therefore, carries with it a significant sociological function. To be fully human is to bear the image of Christ in community.

But I also believe the world carries with it an ontological anxiety that comes from a sense of fallenness and an utter sense of lack. Rene Girard, a philosophical anthropologist, calls this sense of lack the Mimetic Desire. He argues that because of humanity’s fundamental lack we are all forced to settle for cheap imitations of fulfillment.

Communities (although they attempt to be Christlike) are formed around cheap fulfillment options and inevitably developed charged emotions against other communities. Violence ensues and a scapegoat is created in order to stop the violence. Girard argues this process is how human civilizations revolve.

When I was twenty-three years old, I was hired to be the camp pastor for LifeWay’s Mission-Fuge International team just outside of Quito, Ecuador. While there, I preached one sermon on the necessity of Jesus’ resurrection and another on gender inclusivity. After the sermons I was met with sincere opposition. The theological insights I developed through academia and personal spirituality were trumped by the more conservative beliefs of the Southern Baptist leaders present at the camp. My words were used against me; I was fired, put on an airplane, and sent back to the United States to never work for LifeWay again. Even though this experience left me with tremendous wounds, it helped me see the complexity of the Christian faith and the anthropomorphic capability of clashing communities.

It is no secret that within the Baptist world the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and Southern Baptist Convention have been clashing communities. It is the one area in my life where I still find sincere yet extremely charged negative emotions present. But are these emotions wrong? Should everyone be forced to cohabitate with communities that are different? Maybe. Maybe not.

The formational question we must all seek to answer is,
“In our search for fullness (for Christians – our search to become more like Christ), are we going to intentionally live in community with people that push against our communal theology?”

When our quest for understanding doctrinal beliefs trumps having unconditional, positive regard for everyone then we are answering the formational question with an emphatic "no!" When relationships, however, become our means for desired community then will we see two distinctly different groups (CBF/SBC) living peacefully in community.

Over the past two years, I have walked alongside a church community getting this formational question right. It is a community that accepts their fallenness but embraces the notion that humanity is made in the image of God yet is sinful but renewed in Christ. In this community I have performed weddings, funerals, ordination services, and baptisms. I have been invited into sacred moments of birth and death, walked beside others through surgery, pain, and divorce. I have witnessed people’s faith deepen, strengthen and blossom. I have seen people walk through a metaphorical hell only to find peace and rest in a mysteriously loving and present God on the other side. In short, I have been blessed to be a part of God’s activity in the world. These experiences have painted a vivid description of the nature of God – alive, moving and redeeming all levels of creation at all times – and the sincere messiness of what it takes to actually be in community.

It’s messy.

It’s lovely.

It’s all about relationships – not doctrinal supremacy.

It’s the clearest depiction for me of who God is in this world.

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