Sermon Cloud

Introduction

What do you think of when you hear the word “community”?  Do you think of something beautiful?  Or do you think of something painful?  Do you think of something you’re included in?  Or do you think of something you are excluded from?  Do you think of something you want to experience?  Or do you think of something you want to avoid?  Do you think of something real and tangible?  Or do you think of something idealistic and unrealistic?  The word “community” is a powerful word.  Depending on our experiences we associate it with any number of different thoughts and emotions.  And this influences how we live, how we make decisions, and how we relate with other people.  Let’s just use church as an example.  In my experience I have seen people go from church to church, each time hoping that this next church will be the one that provides “true community.”   In some cases people have come to this church because they didn’t feel that their last church provided “true community.”  And in other cases people have left this church because they didn’t feel that this church provided “true community.”  This idea of community wields a very powerful influence in our minds and hearts.  So much so that in some cases people will stay in very unhealthy and unbiblical churches because of the sense of “community” the church provides them. 

In recent years it seems that the word “community” has become a buzzword in our entire culture, including our churches.  Everyone is talking about it.  Every organization is promising to provide it.  And yet it seems like everyone is still looking for it.  But my concern is this:  I am concerned that we don’t even know what community is – that we don’t even know what we are really looking for.  What is community?  Is it a group of people who meet together at church each week?  Is it a bunch of people exchanging messages, photos, and videos on MySpace?  Is it co-workers who spend 40 hours together each week?  Is it the family who sits down for dinner together each night?  Is it people united together because they share a common enemy?  Is it friends who text message each other every detail of their lives?  Is it people who love to spend time together because they have common interests, likes, and dislikes?  What is community? 

What is community?  This may seem like a silly question on the surface.  After all we use the word all of the time, don’t we? When people are convicted of misdemeanors we often ask them to do “community service.”  When the Blazers draft new players we hope they will “give back to the community.”  We often group people within this “community” into sub-communities that we refer to as the “black community,” the “Christian community,” or the “arts community.”  We even refer to certain neighborhoods as the “New Columbia community” or the “Jefferson community.”  We have “community churches” and “community centers,” and “community colleges.”  We use the word “community” a lot and we use it loosely.  The word literally means “unity together.”  But we don’t use it that way.  We use the word to refer to virtually any group of people who are somehow associated with one another, regardless of how deep or shallow, tight or loose that association may be.  But is that the proper use of the word?  Even though we use it that way I think there is something within us that knows that community is something else, something much less common, something more profound.  Because at the same time that we are calling ourselves a part of this community and that community we are complaining about not experiencing community, we are longing for a sense of true community.  We are not satisfied with a community of loose association or common interests.  We are looking for a “unity together” community.  But what does that look like?  Where do we look for it?  What can we do to create it?  How do we know when we’ve found it?

Community – Where it Begins

Thankfully the Bible is not silent on the subject of community.  As you look through the Scriptures it becomes obvious that God is very concerned about it. The Scriptures devote lots of space to community, telling us about what community should be, where it comes from, and how it should be maintained.  We’ll talk about a lot of this today but I want us to focus on one passage in particular.  Turn your Bibles to Ephesians chapter 4 verses 4-6 and let us read that together.  “There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” 

We could have started this series by looking at any number of passages that address community.  But this particular passage is unique.  It is unique because it is not original to Paul, the author of Ephesians.  It is a quote.  Many scholars believe that Paul, as inspired by the Holy Spirit, is quoting a creed of the early Church.  A creed is a concise and formalized statement of belief.  Communities often develop creeds to help define the core beliefs that unite them.  They can also serve as teaching tools to help people learn the essential beliefs of a new community.  At the time Paul was writing this letter, the Church had existed for roughly 30 years.  It was still very young but it was old enough to have developed several creeds that were used to express the core beliefs of the early Church and to help new converts understand the teachings of Jesus Christ and his apostles.  This is one of those creeds.  And though it is a very brief creed, Ephesians 4:4-6 communicates a lot of information that is absolutely core to the Christian faith. 

“There is one body” meaning there is one universal Church, one people of God and only one people of God.  “As you were called to one hope” meaning the Spirit of God has called us to the one and only hope we have for redemption and reconciliation with him, which is in Christ.  There is “one faith” meaning all that we need to know about salvation and about God, about knowing him, worshiping him, is revealed through Christ and the teachings of his apostles.  There is “one baptism” meaning that all Christians of all backgrounds have been immersed into Jesus Christ.  In just a few words this creed gives us a brilliant picture of our unity as followers of Christ.  We are united in our one faith in Christ, in our one hope in Christ, in our oneness in Christ himself and in his body, the Church.  It’s about community.  This creed was probably taught by the Christian community to new converts who then spoke it at their public baptism.  As they spoke this creed they affirmed the unique community that they now shared with all others who were in Christ.  So the Scriptures speak very clearly that there is such a thing as genuine community, a true “unity together” community, that human beings can share.  If we believe the Scriptures then we have to believe this.  But we cannot just believe this.  Because the Scriptures do not speak about community in the way we tend to speak about community.  When we think of community we think of a group of human beings uniting together, don’t we?  And this is why we struggle so much with community.  Because we think of it in strictly human terms – people getting together and uniting around something common.  But when the Scriptures speak about community they do not speak about human beings uniting together.  They speak about human beings who cannot unite together being united together by and in an already-existing community.  A divine community.  True human community cannot be understood and cannot exist apart from divine community. 

Which is why this great creed that emphasizes the community that Christians share does not do so with a human focus.  It does so with a focus on the divine community.  There is “one Spirit” and “one Lord” and “one God and Father of all.”  One Spirit.  One Lord.  One God and Father of all.  This is the divine community that we describe as “The Trinity.”  There is one God and only one God.  But this one God has existed eternally in three distinct persons – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  This is the eternal community.  The first community.  The perfect community.  For all of eternity these three distinct persons have been united together in the most beautiful of all communities.  They love one another perfectly.  They glorify one another endlessly.  They do not argue over authority or power or position or recognition but submit to one another in humility.  Though each member of the Trinity possesses his own will they never act in opposition to one another -- they are always united in their thoughts and in their actions.  They worked together in perfect harmony to create the universe.  They continue to work together in perfect harmony to sustain the universe.  And they are working together in perfect harmony to redeem the universe.  Their community is so intimate and their unity so complete that Jesus, the Son, can say, “If you have seen me you have seen the Father.” 

You and I were created by this God, who exists eternally in perfect community.  We were not only created by him but we were created in his image.   We were created to reflect the image of the Triune God, the Perfect Community.  This is why we crave community.  This is why we are always searching for some sense of community, even though we often look in the wrong places or try to fulfill this desire in the wrong ways -- because we were created by this God, who exists eternally in perfect community.  We were not only created by him but we were created in his image.  We were created to reflect the image of the Triune God, the Perfect Community.  To put it another way we were created by Community and we were created for community.  Community begins with the Triune God.  Community is defined by the Triune God.  And community is displayed by the Triune God.   

Community – Where It Goes Wrong

We must talk about The Trinity, we must emphasize The Trinity, and we must do our best to understand as much about The Trinity as God allows.  Because the truth is that we cannot understand human community until and unless we understand divine community.  But let me go further.  Not only can human community not be understood apart from divine community, it cannot even exist apart from divine community.  Why?  Because of sin.  When our first parents, Adam and Eve, were created they existed in perfect community with the Triune God.  So much so that the Bible gives us these intimate word-pictures of God in the Garden of Eden walking and talking with Adam and Eve.  Because they were in perfect community with The Perfect Community they were also in perfect community with one another and with all of creation.  But this community was destroyed when they chose to rebel against God.  Their community with the Triune God was shattered and, as a result, their community with each other and with creation was shattered.  To this day we live in a world that is at odds with God.  Because we are at odds with God, The Perfect Community, by default we are at odds with each other and with creation and cannot experience the true “unity together” community that we were created to enjoy with God and each other. 

So some of us hunger for it but we cannot seem to find it no matter how hard we look.  Because we keep looking to human beings to create community.  But they cannot create community because they are not in community with the Triune God, the Perfect Community.  So what do we encounter every time we try to enter into a new “community”?  Usually we begin with excitement and hope.  But within days, or weeks, or months, or years we end with frustration and tears.  Because we don’t encounter true “unity together” community.  We encounter lies.  We encounter betrayal.  We encounter selfishness.  We encounter power-struggles.  We encounter abuse.  We encounter neglect.  We encounter gossip.  We encounter backbiting.  We encounter racism, sexism, classism. We encounter broken relationships.  In short, we encounter sin.  We crave community so we go to group after group hoping to find it but all we find is group after group infected with sin.  The sin of others and the sin of self.  

I know what some of you are thinking.  You’re thinking, “Cole, you’re wrong.  It is not true that all of us crave community.  I don’t want community.  I prefer to be alone.  I don’t like people.”  I hear your complaint, but you are just proving my point.  It is not that you don’t want community.  It is that you don’t want what has been passed off for community.  You don’t want the lies, the betrayal, the heartbreak.  You don’t want to experience what you’ve experienced in the past.  So in one sense you’re wrong about not wanting community, but in another sense you’re right.  As much as we long for some sense of community almost every single one of us fears true, genuine community.  Why?  Because we know our own sin.  And we fear being exposed.  We fear being found out.  We fear allowing people to know us – not us as we present ourselves – but us as we really are.

It’s interesting.  The world tells us that it is our differences that separate us and divide us.  But the world is wrong.  It is something we have in common that divides us.   Specifically, it is our common sin. It is our common sin that destroys every human attempt at community.  It is our common sin that keeps us in isolation.  It is our common sin that causes us to fear genuine “unity together” community.  We can try all we want to create true community and find true community – we can go here, we can go there, we can go anywhere – but we are wasting our time and running from the truth.  We will never, ever, ever, ever, ever find true “unity together” community unless and until the sin problem is dealt with.    

Community – Creating and Sustaining it

We cannot deal with our sin problem.  Only the Triune God, the Perfect Community, can effectively deal with our sin problem and restore the image of God in us and in our communities.  This is why Paul speaks about human community in the context of divine community in Ephesians 4:4-6.  Remember that it is one Spirit (the Holy Spirit) who calls us into one hope and unites us into one body, one Lord (Jesus Christ) who baptizes us into one faith, and one God and Father who is over all and through all and in all.  We can only be “one body” when we are freed from sin by the Triune God and united to God first and then  united toeach other. 

And the Triune God has determined to make this very thing happen.  God the Father of all loved the world so much that he chose to deal with our sin problem at great cost to himself.  He gave his only begotten Son.  God the Son became like us and came to us in Jesus Christ, clothed in human flesh.  As the perfect God and the perfect man he did what we cannot do.  He lived the life we could not live.  He lived in right relationship with God, and humanity and all of creation.  Unlike us, he did not suffer from a sin problem.  Which made him uniquely qualified to deal with our sin problem.  And he did this by dying the death that we should have died.  Though he was creator of the world he allowed his very creation to murder him.  Though he was completely innocent he bore God’s wrath for our sins in his body.  He became sin for us so that we could be forgiven of our sin.  He became righteousness for us so that we could be declared righteous in him.  Three days later he rose from the dead confirming that he had defeated death and sin and Satan for us so that we could be victorious in him.  It is only through the person and work of this Jesus that the sin problem can be dealt with.  And human beings will only experience this freedom from sin and reconciliation to God when God the Holy Spirit draws us to this Jesus, heals our willful blindness, makes our hard hearts soft, and our dead wills alive, so that we can respond to this gospel.  If we believe this gospel we are instantaneously restored to a right relationship with God, the Perfect Community.  And as we are restored to a right relationship with God we are also restored to a right relationship with one another and with creation at large.  Now we are freed from sin so that we can experience true “unity together” community first with the Triune God and then with one another as the image of God is restored in us through the work of Jesus Christ, the only man to perfectly bear that image.

I want you to think about what this means.  What it means is that there is nothing any company can do, nothing any government can do, nothing any local church can do, nothing you and I can do to create community.  Nothing.   Even though all of us try we cannot create community.  We will always fail.  And if we look honestly at our attempts and the attempts of others to create community we will see that.  Only God can create true “unity together” community because only God exists eternally in The Perfect Community.  Only God can create true “unity together” community because only God can deal with our sin problem.  When people and organizations try to create community we try to create it around a common place, common interests, a common sub-culture, common beliefs, or a common goal.  But in Ephesians, and in the rest of the Scriptures, we see that none of these things unite us.  We are united by Jesus Christ alone and we are united in Jesus Christ alone.  That’s clear in the creed we read this morning from Ephesians 4:4-6 but it’s clear in the rest of the chapter as well.  Look at verses 11-13.  Here we see that Christ gives gifts to his people in order to build up his body, his community, into the fullness of Christ.  The people do not build the body, he does.  And he builds it in himself.  Now look at verses 15-16.  Here we see that Christ is the head of his community and that it is through him that the body is joined together and functions in genuine “unity together.” 

This is true. And it is not just true of some Christians or some churches.  According to the Bible, Christ has united every one of his people into one body, one true community, of which he is the head.  If you believe the Scriptures there is no disputing this.  It is an objective fact.  To say that it is an objective fact means that it is true and exists as true outside of you.  It doesn’t matter whether you think it is true.  It doesn’t matter whether you feel it or not.  It is objectively true that Christ has united his people into one body and we have true  “unity together” community in him.  Instead of being pre-occupied with our personal subjective experiences we must acknowledge this as objective fact, believe it, and live in light of it.  As we do that we will experience subjectively what we already know to be true objectively.

Our core group has been gathering together for a year now.  Some of us have built some wonderful relationships.  But many of us have complained that we have yet to experience true community at this new church.  I understand your concern.  But the answer is not to complain about it – because that does not facilitate unity.  The answer is not to try to create it -- because you cannot.  And the answer is not to move on to another church in search of it.  Because I can tell you with 100% certainty that true community is already here.  Right here.  If we are in Christ we are united by Christ and in Christ into true community.  All we need to do is acknowledge it as an objective fact, believe it, and live in light of it.  This is why in the next few weeks we are launching two new home communities.  In these home communities we will share meals together, we will share life together, we will pray together, and we will talk about the gospel together.  But we are not doing this so that we can try to create community in a church that doesn’t have it.  That’s heresy.  We are providing this as an opportunity for everyone to experience the community that is already here by Christ and in Christ.  So I am asking every person in this church to commit to one of our two groups on either Monday or Thursday.  So that the community that is already here by Christ and in Christ can be revealed and experienced by each one of us.  We are a true “unity together” community.  Let us acknowledge it, believe it, and live in light of it. 

Conclusion

Of course to say that in Christ and by Christ we presently have true community is not to say that we will never have issues within this true community.  We will.  For two reasons.  The first is that not everyone who is a part of this church is a part of The Church.  Not everyone who sits at these tables with you or eats at your home community with you is in Christ, so they have not been united with you in true community.  This can cause issues.  The second reason we will have issues in the midst of true “unity together” community is because while sin was dealt with once and for all on the Cross of Christ we are still being restored to the image of God progressively.  We are saved immediately and declared to be righteous.  But sanctification, where we become righteous in practice, is a continuous work that will not be completed during this life.  So sin will enter our true community.  But it will not destroy our true community.  Because as long as we have true community with God we will have true community with the people of God.  And our community with God is not sustained by our righteousness.  It is sustained by the righteousness of Christ.  Our community with God is not sustained by our work.  It is sustained by the work of Christ who has dealt with our sin problem once and for all and united us together with the Triune God and with the people of God.  This is a glorious truth.  Before we pray together in response to this let us read this ancient Christian creed one more time. 

“There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”