"Christianity means community through Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ. No Christian community is more or less than this. Whether it be a brief, single encounter or the daily fellowship of years, Christian community is only this. We belong to one another only through and in Jesus Christ (21)."
"Because God has already laid the only foundation of our fellowship, because God has bound us together in one body with other Christians in Jesus Christ, long before we entered into common life with them, we enter into that common life not as demanders but as thankful recipients. We thank God for what He has done for us (28)."
Christian community is not something that we can manufacture, learn or practice(a tendency of church small groups), it is simply inherent in the Christian's life just as justification is (it is a grace).
"Because Christian community is founded solely on Jesus Christ, it is a spiritual and not a psychic reality" (31). The spiritual love of this community transcends natural human love.
Human love (naturally)is directed to the other person for his own sake, spiritual love loves him for Christ's sake. In human love we seek direct contact with the other person; it desires to be irresistible, to rule the other. (34) (selfish in its root)
Thus, because community (christian community) is founded in Christ, all its relationships are in him also. Just as Christ mediates between God and human, so he mediates between the members of his community. Through Christ's mediation Christians are capable to love others fully and purely. (selfless in its root)
It is also important to understand that the love of the Christian community does not replace the love of natural human relationships; rather it transcends it. Bonhoeffer cautions against the dangers of ostensibly "spiritual" community:
"A marriage, a family, a friendship is quite conscious of the limitations of its community-building power; such relationships know very well, if they are sound, where the human element stops and the spiritual begins. They know the difference between physical-intellectual and spiritual community. On the contrary, when a community of a purely spiritual kind is established, it always encounters the danger that everything human will be carried into and intermixed with this fellowship. A purely spiritual relationship is not only dangerous but also an altogether abnormal thing" (38).
Bonhoeffer move to practices of a Christian community in chapter 2. He surveys some of the disciplines of the Christian community: early morning communal prayer, song and reading, shared meals, work, and noonday and evening prayer. I love some of the things he says about communal singing.
'Sing and make melody in your heart to the Lord' (Eph. 5:19). The new song is sung first in the heart. Otherwise it cannot be sung at all. The heart sings because it is overflowing with Christ. That is why all singing in the church is a spiritual performance. Surrender to the Word, incorporation in the community, great humility, and much discipline–these are the prerequisites of all singing together. Where the heart is not singing there is no melody, there is only the dreadful medley of human self-praise. Where the singing is not to the Lord, it is singing to the honor of the self or the music, and the new song becomes a song to idols (58-59).
In the second chapter he deals broadly with the practices of community. There is tons of profound information in here. I do not agree with all he says as he tends to become much to definitive in these practices but non the less much profundity.
Bonhoeffer also argues in chapter 2 that if you are incapable of being alone you should beware of community. we need solitude silence meditation and prayer in order to be in community. thus the "life alone" is intrinsically connected to the "life together"
Another few favorites in this chapter are his discussion of the "ministry of holding one's tongue" in Christian community, (so often not used in our communities) and confession and communion.
in confession a man breaks through to certainty. Why is it that it is often easier for us to confess our sins to God than to a brother? God is holy and sinless, He is a just judge of evil and the enemy of all disobedience. But a brother is sinful as we are. He knows from his own experience the dark night of secret sin. Why should we not find it easier to go to a brother than to the holy God? But if we do, we must ask ourselves whether we have not often been deceiving ourselves with our confession of sin to God, whether we have not rather been confessing our sins to ourselves and also granting ourselves absolution (115-116).
The fellowship of the Lord's Supper is the superlative fulfillment of Christian fellowship. As the members of the congregation are united in body and blood at the table of the Lord so will they be together in eternity. Here the community has reached its goal. Here joy in Christ and his community is complete. The life of Christians together under the Word has reached its perfection in the sacrament (122).
LOVE IT... More to come
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