Reading the Bible is Community

Reading the bible is community... These words resonate as I look up from the bible, taking a look around the church I find myself sitting in and registering what I see. I see a people, lost, within themselves or something greater. I see a single entity; one made up of hundreds of people with different lives but similar hearts. What is it that ties these people together? It is the brokenness of our lives and the knowledge of our own mortality, fallibility, and ambition to seek out the only one to ever do it right. In the act of putting our own selfishness aside, we find each other. We are brought together by hope and held together by our faith. An ineffable emotion given by something bigger than ourselves is what we crave, and when brought together in the climax of our worship through our reading of the Word... well, as the Good book says, 'ask and you shall receive'.

I look back and see someone sitting alone, maybe seeking out isolation, maybe not having a choice in the matter. So often i find those who seek acceptance turned away, intimidated by the sea of undignified belief flowing over the crowds, or maybe by having laundry list of presumptions confirmed in one sense or another. A feeling that is just as easily removed as it is gained by a kind word or gesture from the frequent fliers in the church, however, often this attention becomes misplaced in introspection or introversion. Sometimes people get so caught up in the act the reading the bible that they forget what it truly teaches; what it really looks like to be in a community full of neighbors loving each other.

To break this in-cohesion is what i seek. I want to throw away the suppositions that have gripped those that find themselves in church for the first time. I too wish to gain the acceptance of a community, but know there is something so much more satisfying in bringing that community to those who may need it more. Not to say that the church needs to be full of guys like me, because in everyone counts. Everyone is a different part of the body of believers that should be delivering their hope to the people. This hope all stems from the communal act of reading the bible. It is this habitual, and sometimes stubborn, faith in an invisible, yet apparent God that gives me the strength and desire to never abandon my faith. All this rooted in the bible, an eternal reminder of what a true community should look be.