Together

COMMUNITY by Joshua Dubois

 

TOGETHER

And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.

                                                                                                                                                                Hebrews 10:24-24

The value and dignity of the individual…is threatened whenever it is assumed that individual desires, hopes and ideals can be fitted with frictionless harmony into the collective purposes of man. The individual is not discrete.  He cannot find his fulfillment outside the community; but he also cannot find fulfillment completely within society. In so far as he finds fulfillment within society he must abate his individual ambitions. He must “die to self” if he would truly live. In so far as he finds fulfillment beyond every historical community he lives his life in painful tension with even the best community, sometimes achieving standards of conduct which defy the standards of the community with a resolute “we must obey God rather than man.”                       -Reinhold Niebuhr, the Irony of American History

Lord, wrap me not only in your love but also in connection with other people. Show me the way toward brothers and sisters who will edify me, and I them. Place me within your community. Amen

 

Tyrone R. Lawton

"As iron sharpens iron ...so does one man sharpens another"

                                                                      Prov. 27:17