Communication=Community.

com·mu·ni·ca·tion:
1. the act or process of communicating; fact of being communicated.
2. the imparting or interchange of thoughts, opinions, or information by speech, writing, or signs.
3. something imparted, interchanged, or transmitted.
(thank you, Dictionary.com!)


Focusing on definition #2, communication is an 'interchange.' This is what's needed for community. I get this feeling that in the world and even in the Church that we are a society that thrives on learning information. When we find one piece, we move on to the next piece so quickly that we have become people who refuse to do anything about the info we receive. This is not the way to build a loving community. In my opinion, it only encourages ungodly traits like gossiping, backbiting and slander. We have become people who listen to news while watching the ticker while checking the headlines on the internet news site. So we have trained ourselves to receive information but not to be vulnerable, not to be transparent, and most tragically, to become apathetic when we hear anything. We do not care enough.

Interchange in the community of God leads to inner change (pun intended). instead of hearing something and moving on to the next juicy tidbit, I am being challenged to really consider that in prayer and in cases where people are gossiping, my desire is becoming vulnerable right there in the situation and share my struggles in order to not only change the subject, but also to serve as a reminder that none of us in the Body of Christ is where we want to be.

Praise God for this day, when we will be:

"Think how much the Father loves us. He loves us so much that he lets us be called his children, as we truly are. But since the people of this world did not know who Christ is, they don't know who we are. My dear friends, we are already God's children, though what we will be hasn't yet been seen. But we do know that when Christ returns, we will be like him, because we will see him as he truly is." (I John 3:1-2)

until then, let's remember that communicating about our own struggles is always a better way to build community than alienating others because of their struggles .

(I got the idea from this post from a friend named Clayton King. He preached a sermon and addressed this idea. You should check him out. He is legit. www.claytonking.com)