This concept [the parish system] has helped Christians understand how interconnected all the pieces within a community are and the importance of pursuing the common good there. Jesus’ call to be peace...
Community is the fruit of charity and is expressed in friendship which brings forth and nourishes loyalty, trust, sincerity and mutual understanding. … Friendship in Christ not only favors the develop...
A well-known fact in community development circles is that if you want to enter a community, you introduce yourself to the leader, most often a man. But if you want to learn how the community function...
Everything significant starts with relationship. At the end of the day, your faith, your family, your work, and your leadership are all based on who you relate to and how you relate. Your life is moti...
In his extremely helpful book, The Economics of Neighborly Love , Tom Nelson argues that the church has an important part to play in helping Christians understand the value and place of economics i...
Leviticus 19:18, Proverbs 11:25, Isaiah 58:6-7, John 13:34-35, Matthew 5:16, Psalm 133:1
If you never left your home and avoided all interaction with other people, you couldn’t be characterized as a loving person. Instead, you might even be unloving because of your lack of concern for oth...
The good folks at The Center for Action & Contemplation and Mile High Ministries in Denver, Colorado, have written a beautiful prayer adapted from Walter Brueggemann’s Prayers for a...
John 4:20-21, John 13:34-35, 1 John 3:17, Matthew 5:23-24, Hebrews 10:24-25
We cannot be closed off to one another and be open to God. That’s not how this works. Do you remember the commercial when the woman says “that’s not how this works, that's not how any of this work...
Genesis 11:1-9, Isaiah 30:1-5 , Proverbs 14:12, Matthew 7:24-27, James 4:13-17, Psalm 127:1-2
Take the cul-de-sac, for example, which is my metaphor for the world of suburban monotony and triviality that so many Western Christians find themselves trapped in. The literal cul-de-sac (i.e., a dea...
Desegregation was one of the big goals of the civil rights movement. “Separate but equal” in the South became “separate and unequal.” The disparities were in things as small as water fountains and as ...
Ecclesiastes 4:12, 1 Corinthians 12:12-21, Ephesians 4:3-16, John 17:21, Galatians 6:2, James 5:19-20
In one of Aesop's familiar fables, an old man has several sons who are always fighting among themselves. He had often, but without success, exhorted them to live together in harmony. One day, he c...
The Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, in his book The Home We Build Together , points out to the reader that in scripture the description of the creation of the universe in Genesis is given a mere thirty-fou...
VOICE ONE: Almighty God, Maker of Heaven and Earth, you declared your work good and so do we. Empower us to continue your good work through the labor of our minds and hands. VOICE TWO: This Lab...
In 1970 John Perkins, an African American pastor and community organizer who lived on “the black side” of rural Mendenhall, Mississippi, was nearly beaten to death by white state police officers. The ...
I often found myself preferring the company of people outside my congregation, men and women who did not follow Jesus. Or worse, preferring the company of my sovereign self. But soon I found that my p...
The problem is not recognizing the importance of the individual. The problem is the glorification of the individual. When the individual self is glorified over the greater good of the community, right...
A simple refusal motivates my argument: refusal to believe that the present time and place, and the people who are here with us, are somehow not enough. Platforms such as Facebook and Instagram act li...
Gracious and loving God, you invite us to the table, yet we resist your grace. It is sometimes easier to float around outside of the Christian community than it is to invest fully in it. You invite ot...
I had been in Iraq for about two months when I heard about an officer conducting an impromptu habit modification program in Kufa, a small city ninety miles south of the capital. He was an army major w...
“Christianity promises to make man free,” Anglican priest William R. Inge writes; “it never promises to make them independent.” Freedom and independence are polar opposites. The former leads to wellne...
Acts 2:42-47, Philippians 2:1-5, Mark 2:1-2, Matthew 14:13-21, Luke 10:25-37, 2 Corinthians 1:3-4
God–Creator of the universe, Redeemer of humanity, Sustainer of your people, and our Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer. You hold the galaxies in the palm of your hand–and yet You know each of us by nam...
Luke 15:11-32, Psalm 51:10, 1 John 1:9, Psalm 103:2, 1 Thessalonians 5:18, John 17:21, Ephesians 4:3-6
The Leader and People pray responsively In peace, we pray to you, Lord God. Silence For all people in their daily life and work; For our families, friends, and neighbors, and for those who are...
God, our heavenly Father–from whom all families gain purpose, direction and life: When we need bread, you don’t give a stone; and when we ask for fish, you don’t give a snake; for you are good, you ar...
Exodus 2:23-25, 1 Samuel 1:10-11, 1 Kings 3:9-12, Acts 4:29-31, Luke 7:37-38, Exodus 3:7-10, Esther 4:16
God, you call us to prayer. Throughout the Scriptures, we read about your people praying. The Israelites cried out for you to rescue them from slavery. You sent them Moses. Hannah wept, asking you t...
Father-God, our burden bearer; Jesus, God the Son and lover of our souls; Spirit of God–giver of life and power: Thank You! Thank You for those we love and those who love us. Thank You for mothers and...
There have been times, not least the time of the birth of Athenian democracy, when most of the people who thought and wrote about human wholeness concluded that no one could be a whole human being, no...