3 positives of being in the community (Made for God, Made for community follow up)

So a few people wanted this follow-up/ expansion on the idea of being in a community and why, to me at least, it’s an important part of the christian lifestyle, so i thought I’d do what i normally do when I’m trying to explain something on this blog, and break down my opinion on this into three points, I’d recommend reading Made for God, made for community. before reading this post, but without further ado, here’s the three reasons I feel that being a part of the community.

1. Accountability

James 5:16 “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.”

Holding each other accountable for our actions is something that should be important to our Christian communities,  When we are not part of the body we have trouble holding ourselves accountable for our sins, we are called as brothers and sisters in Christ to show each other when we’re going wrong, we should hold each other accountable  for our sins, our failings and our struggles. This is not to say we should be running each other down, or that we should be judgmental towards our brothers and sisters of Christ, but we should help them see their errors and pray for them, as the righteous person would.

2. Encouragement 

Proverbs 27:17 “Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another”

As those that have followed this blog for a while may know, Proverbs is one of my favorite books in the bible, and it’s gems like this verse that really brings that love home. As the body of Christ we are called to encourage each other.

As i stated in the last post, I’m an extroverted introvert, which means i love being in social environments but i do need my time to myself, and i can’t do the former without the latter. This in its self isn’t a problem, as long as i have my time to recover, I’ll be fine, but it also means that some days i struggle breaking past that barrier and putting my self out there to serve others in more extroverted activities, such as the welcome team and the worship band. If it wasn’t for the Encouragement of my wonderful Church family I’d still be struggling with putting my introverted nature to one side in order to serve the lord. The way I’ve started many of my community activities is through a mutual friend or family member, they helped me become comfortable in that environment, but we don’t always get that option so the only advice i can offer in that situation is if you feel like that’s something you want to be a part of is to try to think of a new person as a future best friend in the making, so you show them the same love that’d you show a good friend.

But as a family we need to encourage each as iron strengthens iron.

3.  Fellowship

1 Thessalonians 5:11 “Therefore encourage one another and build up one another, just as you also are doing.”

Fellowship is so important to having a healthy Faith. We are social creatures, and we need to have people to turn to, God made others so we could be in relationship with them as well as him, because that’s the love he has for us, that he would give us even more than we need. But we need to in relationship with others in order to truly follow his word,  Jesus himself says “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” How could we be willing to show this love like he did for us if there’s no one that we can call friends? We need to study the word together in order to have a better understanding of his almighty word, because if we only have our perspective, then how can we be sure that we haven’t missed anything that the Lord is trying to tell us?

In fellowship we encourage and build each other, just as Jesus does with us.

So these are 3 reasons that i feel that being a part of the community is important to our walk with Christ, I’m sure there are a few I’ve missed so let me know in the comments below!

Thank you for reading and may God Bless you.

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