Becoming Human Together

Made Flesh

I love church. I love singing. I love praying with others. I love when we weep with each other and when we whoop and holler in celebration. I love how the church feeds the hungry, cares for the sick, welcomes the stranger. 

Really, the only problem with church is all those other Christians. The ones I don’t agree with. The ones I don’t even want to be associated with. The ones I don’t think deserve to call themselves Christians. 

Jesus prays, “protect them, Father, so that they may be one, as we are one.” You want me to be one with those other Christians in the same way the Trinity is eternally Three-in-One? No thank you, Jesus. They’re pretty words. On paper. But in real life? 

In real life we hurt each other and we get hurt—nowhere more deeply than in the church. If you’ve ever been told (or watched someone you love be told) you can’t be part of this church because of what you believe, or how you act, or who you are…you know what I mean. I will never fault someone who leaves the church because it has become a place of bondage rather than liberation. They are following the Spirit. It’s the church that’s failed. 

Division in the church isn’t new. It’s as old as scripture itself.  

Maybe the deeper question here is why bother trying to be a church at all? Why should we keep laboring to build communities where we can walk the Way together? Might we be better off following Jesus on our own? Doing our best to pray, love God, act with justice and kindness on our own? Might that work out better? 

Maybe. But that wasn’t Jesus’ desire and it wasn’t his way. After all, he didn’t go it alone. He got started by going down to the Jordan River with a whole bunch of other folks to be baptized. Then he recruited a crew. They were bumbling, competitive, sometimes hurtful. But Jesus wasn’t going to go it alone. Why would we think we should—or even could—if he didn’t?

The truth is, we need each other. You simply can’t be human without other humans. It’s how God made us. Yes, being with others can cause deep hurt and harm. And still, we need each other. 

When I was a teen, it was other adults in my congregation who helped me figure out how to get along with my parents. I’m sure some of them helped my parents figure out how to put up with me, too. When my children have been gravely ill, it’s been my church that’s prayed when I couldn’t. When I sank into despair so deep that I couldn’t find my way out, it was siblings in Christ who threw me a rope. 

We weren’t made to be alone, and we won’t make it if we are by ourselves. We need each other. 

Even more, the world needs the church. 

There are many who say our world would be better off without any organized religion, and definitely without the church. It is true that much evil has been done in the name of our faith. 

And it is also true that the hungry are fed, the sick are healed, the captives are set free, the good news is announced each and every day by people working together in the name of Christ. 

We are called to be together in the church, because all of creation is groaning, longing for redemption, and God has asked us to be part of that. 

The world is longing for a persistent, tenacious, committed love—a love that is not fickle, is not fleeting, is not conditional; love that is as deep and wide and long and constant as Christ; love that shows in Christ there is no Greek or Jew, no male or female, no slave or free; for all are one, all are one, all are one in Christ Jesus our Lord.

---

Dwelling Among Us

Take time today to notice how many ways we are connected to one another. You might hold those connections before God with gratitude.

Consider praying for those who you cannot imagine being in community with. You might start with Jesus’ words, “Father, make us one.” How does it feel to pray that prayer?