Campfires, Community, the Church, and Us

Community.  Church.  Identity.  Who are we as individuals coupled with the question of who we are together.  It's tough, because it seems like there are a million different answers to the simple question, "Who do you think you are?"  Particularly difficult is parsing who we are in this crazy thing called the church.  The following is taken from a video (embedded below) from the Rend Collective Experiment (and written out below if you're a word person instead of an aural person):

Is there anything quite like a campfire?  The community that’s built there by people sharing their stories and singing their songs is truly special and so intimate.  It’s like being 10 years of age again and sharing all your secrets with your best friend.  And that openness and vulnerability is exactly what we should see in the greatest community on earth, the Church.  There are no walls out here and there should be no walls of defense, towards god or each other, even if we have been hurt.  That’s why Rend Collective recorded a worship album around a campfire.  They wanted something really intimate and truly authentic.  And anyway, worship isn't just confined to the four walls of a church building.  And it’s certainly not exclusive, but it’s for every human being on the planet.  In the Kingdom of God there are no outsiders.
We need to be careful not to allow hurt or cynicism to drive us from church, otherwise we end up like a branch taken from the fire, lifeless and cold.  I know the pain we experience in life can be overwhelming, but we aren't meant to go through it alone.
All of us have the divine spark within us, and we so desperately need the breath of God to bring us to life and light.  Jesus wants to set the church on fire, so the world can warm themselves around us and find light and safety.  We are here on earth to be a home and a refuge to the lost and broken, but first we must learn the art of togetherness and celebration.  To welcome people into the party of true freedom found in Jesus, we first must be students of that very way of life.  We need to learn to celebrate; we need to choose His joy.
We are the church.  We are the hope on earth.
To be on a journey as God’s family, going through the highs and lows of life, suffering and laughing together, that’s what I want.  Not some holy huddle where we all pretend everything is okay, but a real community who believes in the God of the miracles, but also in the God of the trials.  That’s what the world needs too, so let’s give out the invites, put aside our selfish ways and celebrate Jesus around the campfire.
It’s time for you to start your fire…

I love this!  The Church is all to often guilty of creating walls around ourselves and excluding those who are different, smelly, poor, lost, or otherwise.  Not only that, but we exude a persona of perfection- we might have people fighting illness, cancer, finances, etc. but never people dealing with lust, lying, cheating, stealing, envy, or anything else.   Jesus said we were the light of the world, and not to be hidden, which we've taken to heart (just look at a church building) but we don't do much more than let that light shine on an edifice.  This idea of living together, sharing the ups and downs of life, is often more of a pipe dream than anything else for most churches in the US.  How can we change that?  Honestly, I think step one is being honest about who we are- sinners who were saved by grace through faith, never perfect but brought into right relation with God through His Son.  Second is understanding our mission and purpose on earth- not to build a building or body, but rather to be Jesus everywhere we can be so that those who are last, least, and lost become found, free, and faithful.  That requires vulnerability and sharing of life together at a fundamentally different level than Sunday/Wednesday attendance.  In fact, it shatters the paradigm of the pew, instead creating a culture of the circle, where we all are in relation with each other, not attending an event and staring at the back of someone's head. 

So here's the challenge: if we are the hope on earth, the remedy to a dying world's illness, light and warmth in a dark, cold world how should we live?  With vulnerability, openness, authenticity, joy, love, hope and unity  around the one who gave it all for us...

Go be the hope on earth, the remedy for the world's cancer, the light and warmth people are so desperately searching for, together...