On Christian Community

From Thomas Merton's The Seven Storey Mountain:

I needed this support, this nearness of those who really loved Christ so much that they seemed to see Him. I needed to be with people whose every action told me something of the country that was my home: just as expatriates is every alien land keep together, if only to remind themselves, by their very faces and clothes and gait and accents and expressions, of the land they come from.

Lately I've been thinking about Christian community and how it applies to the idea of being "in the world, but not of the world." That the necessary function of the church is to provide an alternative culture and story. I don't mean the subculture that Christendom too often creates, one that pulls out of society and yet lives by its values (of the world, but not in the world), but one that rebels against the narrative it has been given by the world. When I sing that "this world is not my home" I don't mean it as a rejection of the planet or of the people within it, but of the principalities and powers that preach fear and greed and selfishness and apathy. I mean it as a reminder, to myself as much as those who hear me, that we were not made to embrace the excess and tedium and shallowness that is offered up as success and security and love. Because we live in a world where my dreams and desires trump another's needs, I need a community that lives by the Lordship of Christ, His will, and His Way. A community that reminds me what the Lord requires; "to do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God."