Virtually Paul

Community and Perception

October 19, 2006 on 11:52 pm | In Church, Community, Faith, Friends, Ministry, The Life of Paul |

After a thoroughly worthwhile chat with a good friend, I have some ideas that I’d like to share with you. I invite your feedback. Here it goes…

I’ve been part of the same church community for a long time. At one stage, about three years ago, it felt like the community was firing on all cylinders. I was growing spiritually. I was maturing personally. I was enjoying life. I felt as though I had meaning and purpose to life. At the cynical old age of 22, I have come to realise that feeling as though life is meaningful and purposeful is pretty emotionally driven.

At the time, what I craved and needed the most was probably what everybody craves and needs the most: to feel loved and accepted by a community. I can honesty say, that for a period of time, that need was met by my church community. I was lucky enough to be a part of a small group of guys, all around the same age, who hung out regularly and talked about issues of life, faith and future. We became great mates and I am privileged to be able to count those guys as close friends to this day.

We were also part of a broader social group of young adults, all connected through the church. There were always people who I knew well who I could hang around with. I’d walk into church on Sunday mornings and Sunday nights seeing a sea of familiar faces. People I knew. People I loved. People who encouraged me. The whole experience made me feel wonderful about myself.

In amongst this, our church was undergoing rapid change for a community organisation with about 200-250 members. We had moved to a temporary premises with a view to building on the site. We had a great pastor who was well liked, who spoke well and encouraged many of us in our faith. Simultaneously, the youth pastor who’d arrived at our church 3 years earlier was at the height of his ministry. We were running some great youth programs and we were kicking goals. People were growing in the knowledge that they are loved. The community was working. Ultimately, of course, the reason I felt this way was because my deepest need at the time - for friendship, encouragement, love and acceptance - was being met by the peer group around me on a continual basis.

I am whole-heartedly grateful for the positive things that I took away from these experiences. I believe that the fond memories forged during this time are the gift of a loving God.

Fast forward to now. Things have changed. They always do. While the friendships have endured the test of time, the group of mates that gave me the acceptance I was looking for is seldom together as a group. The church still hasn’t finished its building, although things are not far off. Both of the pastors have left. I don’t always feel accepted or understood by the peer group I have today. At least not in the way that I once did.

So what’s my deepest need now? I think I’ll keep that one to myself. What I will tell you is that it often doesn’t feel as though it’s being met. So what do I do with that? Experience subconsciously tells me that something isn’t right - that I should be lavished with the support of a loving community. I look at the activities that happen at my church and I don’t see the vibrant buzz of activity that I once felt was there. I don’t have long standing, cultivated relationships with the pastors. We don’t even have a youth pastor. That’s where I usually stop.

“The church is broken”, I complain.
“It has no direction”, I moan.
“The church should be doing more about the youth programs”, I proclaim.

But it’s more than that. Sure it’s easy to look on the surface level and see the glaring administrative problems and the gaping holes in the ideal of what I used to think the church was. That’s not the point though.
It’s about the community. It’s about the family. It’s about being a part of it all. It’s about acknowledging that I have some unfulfilled hopes and ideas that haven’t come to fruition. It’s about not feeling loved or understood sometimes. Whenever I’m in a situation where my deepest need isn’t being met, it is at this point when I need the community the most. Ironically, it’s when I’m not feeling great that I blame the community for not doing its job and start to withdraw.

Your thoughts please, insightful observers.