Is there any encouragement from belonging to Christ? Any comfort from his love? Any fellowship together in the Spirit? Are your hearts tender and compassionate? Then make me truly happy by agreeing wholeheartedly with each other, loving one another, and working together with one mind and purpose. Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. -- Philippians 2:1-4
Dietrich Bonhoeffer is one of my faith heroes. After his martyrdom at the hands of the Gestapo in 1945, Bonhoeffer continued his witness in the hearts of Christians around the world. In his book Life Together he shares his love for Christian community. Bonhoeffer writes about Christian community as an essential experience rather than a theological construct.
Bonhoeffer was part of a unique fellowship in an underground seminary during the Nazi years. His recollection of that experience reads like one of Paul's letters. Life Together offers practical advice on how the community of Christ can be sustained in families and groups. He underscores the importance of prayer, worship, everyday work, and Christian service in developing a deep sense of community.
Here are a few quotes from Life Together:
We belong to one another through and in Jesus Christ
What does that mean? It means, first, that a Christian needs others for the sake of Jesus Christ. It means, second, that a Christian comes to others only through Jesus Christ. It means, third, that from eternity we have been chosen in Jesus Christ, accepted in time, and united for eternity.
First, Christians are persons who no longer seek their salvation, their deliverance, their justification in themselves, but in Jesus Christ alone…
The death and life of Christians are not situated in a self-contained isolation. Rather, Christians encounter both death and life only in the Word that comes to them from the outside, in God’s Word to them…
We live entirely by the truth of God's Word
Christians live entirely by the truth of God’s Word in Jesus Christ. If they are asked “where is your salvation, your blessedness, your righteousness?,” they can never point to themselves. Instead, they point to the Word of God in Jesus Christ that grants them salvation, blessedness, and righteousness. They watch for this Word wherever they can. Because they daily hunger and thirst for righteousness, they long for the redeeming Word again and again.
We need other Christians who speak God's Word to us
…When people are deeply affected by the Word, they tell it to other people. God has willed that we should seek and find God’s living Word in the testimony of other Christians, in the mouths of human beings. Therefore, Christians need other Christians who speak God’s Word to them. They need them again and again when they become uncertain and disheartened because, living by their own resources, they cannot help themselves without cheating themselves out of the truth.
They need other Christians as bearers and proclaimers of the divine word of salvation. They need them solely for the sake of Jesus Christ. The Christ in their own hearts is weaker than the Christ in the word of other Christians. Their own hearts are uncertain; those of their brothers and sisters are sure. At the same time, this also clarifies that the goal of all Christian community is to encounter one another as bringers of the message of salvation. As such, God allows Christians to come together and grants them community.
[Excerpt from Life Together, originally published in German by Christian Kaiser Verlag, Munich 1939. English translation by Donald Bloesch © Augsburg Fortress 1996.]
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