This is a stinging indictment of the American church by an outsider, demonstrating that we clearly live in the presence of a watching world – a world that longs for that which only Christ can give, whether they realize it or not.  And, one of the things all human beings need and long for is love and acceptance by their fellow human beings. We want to belong and when we do; this is community! This innate longing emanates from our imago Dei and its absence exists because of the Fall. It is for remedy that Christ’s victory and reign serves, and it is His body, the church, in which the firstfruits of this redemptive work should be seen.  

I am quick to add that this witness-bearing community is not inwardly focused and separate from the world but rather it represents a distinctly different way of living through which the church serves, and engages the world. In addition to local Christian communities expressed in and through the local church, there is also the larger “community” represented by all followers of Christ from various traditions and denominations, which at present is sadly and deeply divided.

As if the present diminution of community were not bad enough, we as a culture appear to be descending further into an almost hyper-individualistic sense of “community.” An example of this can be found in the phenomenon of social-networking websites such as Facebook and MySpace that have gripped the next generation in particular.

Writing in the Spring 2008 issue of Culture Magazine, Felicia Wu Song, Ph.D. makes the point:

Social-networking sites may have lasting consequence because their very design articulates what sociologist Barry Wellman has long argued: the local community is no longer a meaningful category for many Americans…. The best way to describe contemporary sociability is in terms of “networked individualism,” overlapping networks of social ties that have individuals at the core of each. People understand “community” in terms of multiple systems of friends, contacts, and acquaintances that span time and place—but are oriented around each independent self.

I would add that many Christians likewise view the community of God’s people as merely one of their many “systems of friends, contacts, and acquaintances” from which they can obtain the benefits common to networking. Dr. Song adds that these sites are not a causal force in this condition but merely “reflect and reinforce the basic dispositions toward networked individualism.”  

So, let me ask you: If Christians living within a distinct community is an essential witness to the mission of God, and because so many of us seem unwilling to surrender the independent self, and since our present understanding and expression of this community falls painfully short; what can we do to remedy this situation?

Clearly, this problem is enormously complex and deeply embedded in our collective psyche. I don’t claim to know the solution (I have some ideas) but I think we the church, by God’s grace, can through prayer and reflection turn our greatest challenge into what could be the church’s greatest opportunity: the recovery of distinctly Christian community.

So, I am asking you: What practical steps can churches and individuals take to foster and promote a healthy, distinctively biblical, and witness-bearing community? Share your ideas HERE.

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S. Michael Craven is the Founding Director of the Center for Christ & Culture, a ministry of the National Coalition for the Protection of Children & Families. The Center for Christ & Culture is dedicated to renewal within the Church and works to equip Christians with an intelligent and thoroughly Christian approach to matters of culture in order to recapture and demonstrate the relevance of Christianity to all of life. For more information on the Center for Christ & Culture, additional resources and other works by S. Michael Craven visit: www.battlefortruth.org.
Michael lives in the Dallas area with his wife Carol and their three children.

© 2008 S. Michael Craven