Last night, I checked out a local church in the area. It was refreshing to go some place new and see how another group "does church." My friend asked me afterward how I liked it, and I told him that it was good, but church services generally don't impress or disappoint me. What I'm interested in is how they do community. Most people who consider themselves serious Christians attend church in some form, but how many really have a significant experience in community? Most of us are yearning for more authentic fellowship without understanding how to get there.
 
My wife and I just had some friends visit us this past week while they were on a road trip across the country. They haven't been to church in six months. They expressed a general dissatisfaction with church and confessed that they didn't know what they were going to do for community in the future. Interestingly, their detachment from a church building has liberated them to be more generous in ways that they otherwise would not have felt the freedom to explore. They've experienced a lot of criticism since they stopped going to church, but their trust in Christ and faithfulness to the Scriptures is probably the strongest ever.
 
I'm seeing that this kind of re-imagining of church is becoming more the "norm" in the lives of Christ-followers who are wanting to go deep in their faith.
 
Another friend recently took my advice to be an initiator in a world full of followers and decided to put all her cards on the table at a recent church service. She expressed her discontent with bureaucratic religion, while sharing her desire to go deeper with Christ and his Body.
 
They shut her down. She's hurt and doesn't know where to go or what to do. But she knows that she can't give up on this longing to be understood, to connect with other people and experience God in the beauty of community. It appears that most people know that they were wired not just to connect with their Creator, but to also have meaningful relationships with other creations, as well. That, however, can be the messiest part.
 
Shaun Groves, a singer-songwriter-blogger wrote this about his search for community:
 
I once wanted, desperately wanted, a circle that needed me, that wanted me, a place full of people who felt something was missing when I wasn't there and noticed when I wasn't there.  I wanted a community that wasn't impressed with my name, income, accomplishments or anything else. 
 
I wanted intrusive relationships with the kind of people who, when they "saw that coming," did everything they could - at the risk of ticking me off - to stop that from coming.  I wanted intimacy, closeness that wouldn't become distance when I made a mistake, or twenty, or a thousand - because I knew I would; just give me time. I wanted people I would do anything for: make sacrifices, get messy and uncomfortable, gladly.  And I wanted them to do the same for me, not because they owed me but because they love me.

I looked for all this under steeples, on tour buses and in rental cars, in a cubicle farm, on-line, but found only crumbs: short moments, tiny glimmers of it. And as it sometimes does, lots of searching plus little finding added up to a head full of cynicism, a mouth pouring criticism and lot of other poisonous isms too.

We're all searching for community, but many Christians are over-spiritualizing church, making it the answer to all of their relational problems and the answer to all of their emotional needs, taking the place of God. Church can just be doing life together, which sounds awfully ordinary. And it is, but in that "ordinariness", there is something profound that connects one with the ancient faith of the Early Church.
 
Sadly, I find that most people would rather settle for an organization - something that is static, dead, and fixated on structure - than committing to an organism - something that moves, breathes, and changes shape. That's why I think many of us will be surprised at where we find true community. Shaun goes on to say that he discovered at least part of it in the unconditional commitment of family. In a recent interview I did with Frank Viola, he suggested that house churches are the answer.
 
Where have you found community?