  Day 19- Community requires commitment Verse - We understand that love is when we realize that Christ give his life for us. That means we must give our lives for other believers. 1 John 3:16 Question to consider - how can I help cultivate today the characteristics of real community in my small group and my church? Cultivating community takes the following: Commitment Honesty Humility Courtesy Confidentiality Frequency The following statements stood out to me as I was reading this chapter about each characteristic mentioned above. HONESTY We cultivate fellowship in our community with the choices and commitments we make. You will have to care enough to lovingly speak the truth Real fellowship depends on frankness The tunnel of conflict is the passageway to intimacy in any relationship Thoughtless words leave lasting wounds. HUMILITY Self importance, smugness, and stubborn pride destroy fellowship Humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less. Humility is thinking more of others. COURTESY Respecting our differences Considerate of others feelings Patient with people who irritate us Community has nothing to do with compatibility The basis for our fellowship is our relationship to God CONFIDENTIALITY Only in a safe environment of warm acceptance and trusted confidentiality will people open up and share their deepest hurts, needs and mistakes. Gossip is spread by wicked people, they stir up trouble and break friendships. Proverbs 16:28 FREQUENCY You must have frequent, regular contact with your group in order to build genuine fellowship. Relationships take time A small group covenant should include the following characteristics Share true feelings - authenticity Encourage each other - mutuality Support each other - sympathy Forgive each other - mercy Speak the truth in love- honesty Admit our weaknesses - humility Respect our differences - courtesy Not gossip - confidentiality Make the group priority - frequency Fellowship means giving up our self centeredness and independence in order to become interdependent.
The way that I can cultivate the characteristics of community is by practicing each of them in every relationship that I have. That will take some courage on my part because ti will mean that I will need the Holy Spirit to enlighten me as to which characteristic is missing in the relationships that I have. I will need to practice courtesy with those people who are fearful or scared of going to a deeper level with their relationship. Perhaps I have already been practicing honesty and humility and that might be what scares people off.
I desire deep and meaningful relationships. I want to give and encourage others and I need to be willing to receive these characteristics of community in return. It is always easier to practice these on others but not so fun to allow others to extend the same to me. It is easier to focus on known failures and weaknesses but a bit painful for someone to speak truth about something I am not immediately aware of.
Receiving truth into ones soul can take enormous amounts of courage and humility. I feel that I need to grow in the areas of mercy, courtesy and frequency. As I study this book I am painfully aware that I am lacking in true biblical fellowship or community in my life with regards to a small group or the local church where I serve. Community and biblical fellowship only happens superficially. The largest common denominator for our church body is time.
We get together 2 hours per week at the most. You can not expect community or deep meaningful relationships to happen in a corporate environment. I am also reminded of the fact that there is a difference between the attendees at our church and the church membership who have made a commitment to play their part in the ministry at our church. The scariest part of all of this is that I am fearful that if I were to start advertising the need for folks in our church to read this book that one of two things will happen. The first thing would be that some people will read this book and nothing will change externally. In other words, they will probably get something out of the words in the book but it will not move them enough to make changes.
Perhaps that is because they as a church attendee are happy with the status quo and don't want to see anything change. The church attendee may be in a rut and comfortable with what is going on. The second type of person will look at the book as an attack against tradition and the denominational culture they have been raised in. They will see my promotion of this book as pointing a finger and rocking the boat. What good is knowledge if it is not applied to our lives and changes made? Would someone please get me a LARGE bandage? 
