Over the last few months, our church
has made the idea of “oneness” a unifying theme for our community and family of
faith. Upon becoming one we have
worshipped together, shared meals together, played games together, and, yes, we
have even hunted eggs together. As a result, our Kingdom community is being
built and family ties are forming from week to week. For the average
participant in a typical team building exercise or unifying endeavor, the adage
goes, “practice makes perfect.” So one might think that the more we interact,
the closer we will grow and as a result unity will flow out of the spiritual
bonds that are formed. But Christ’s Church is not just a social community or
team of which to show solidarity. Our family requires something deeper to draw
us together.
In his book
Life Together Dietrich Bonhoeffer
offers a few words to this effect. He states:
One who wants fellowship without
solitude plunges into the void of words and feelings, and one who seeks
solitude without fellowship perishes in the abyss of vanity, self- infatuation
and despair. Let him who cannot be alone be aware of community. Let him who is
not in community be aware of being alone. Along with the day of the Christian
family fellowship together there goes the lonely day of the individual. This is
as it should be. The day together will be unfruitful without the day alone,
both for the fellowship and for the individual.
Bonhoeffer is saying that we cannot
function properly in Christian fellowship without periods of solitude,
specifically in prayer with our Heavenly Father. For the Christian, right
speech and right fellowship are actually formed in the quiet times of reflective
prayer and meditation. “Practice makes perfect” only when our relationships
with one another flow out of THE relationship we have with the Father,
facilitated most intimately by prayer.
As a result
I must ask myself, when was the last time I spent time with God like my family
depended on it? What if my time with the Father was as sweet as my time with my
wife or closest friend? How much closer could I be to my church community if my
prayer life was at the forefront of all I do? This week, let’s take some time
to prayerfully reflect on these questions as we journey in faith together.
In Christ,
John Bennett
