LEARNING IN COMMUNITY

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Rita attends to the last-minute details before people arrive. She sets up the DVD and places her Bible, workbook, and notepad on the recliner in her living room where she will lead tonight's session. As she reviews her notes, Joel starts the coffee maker, mixes lemonade, and sets out cookies he purchased at the bakery on the way home from work. He carries chairs from the dinner table into their living room. With the couch and the other furniture, everyone will have a place, although a few people inevitably prefer to sit on the floor.

Rita and Joel teach an eight-week Bible study focused on the parables of Jesus. Six years earlier, they began their own journey into the exploration of Scripture. They'd been active in the congregation for several months when they responded to an invitation to a series on Philippians. The study stoked their curiosity. Later they belonged to the pastor's Bible study, a weekly series that focused on the Scriptures the pastor used during worship. They enjoyed the refreshing sense of friendship, but wanted something that delved more deeply. The next year, they joined a DISCIPLE Bible study, an in-depth, long-term study. They weren't sure how the daily readings and the weekly meetings would work, especially with teenagers at home, Rita's career, and Joel's travel; but they tried it anyway. They loved it, and between classes, they found themselves talking about the topics that came up in their readings. They appreciated how closely they were growing to the others in the group. "Belonging to that Bible study was one of the best things we ever did. We began to feel comfortable with the Bible and to feel at home with other people in the congregation."

They continued to participate in Bible studies, usually together as a couple, but sometimes apart. They were surprised and humbled when the pastor asked if they would teach a class themselves. Neither of them has a theological education, and they certainly are no experts in faith matters. The pastor assured them that their task involved facilitating the discussion, helping participants learn from one another, following the resource outline, and learning to explore Scripture together. They attended a two-hour training, and then agreed to teach the class and to host it in their home.

An interesting mix of people signed up for their house group: A thirty-something, new-to-the-church accountant comes with her friend who lives in her apartment complex; a physician and his wife who works at home with Mom duties; a woman who works as a bank vice-president; a younger couple who are both teachers; another dual career couple with technology backgrounds; and a recently divorced man employed at a sporting goods store.

With everything ready, folks begin to gather, welcoming one another, catching up, getting their snacks, finding their places. An air of comfort has emerged after only a few weeks together and there are handshakes and embraces and good-humored bantering.

Rita opens the meeting with prayer, outlines their time together, and introduces the three parables they will explore from Luke 15. Some have read the Scriptures and the workbook thoroughly, and others have spent less time in preparation, but everyone expresses initial reactions to what they have read. They watch and discuss a ten-minute DVD that corresponds with the workbook, and then Rita moves them through the parables, highlighting key images and offering questions that stimulate discussion. Members have developed a trust that allows intimate reflection. They share easily. While the topic begins with and returns to Scripture repeatedly, the discussion becomes intermixed with stories about friends, news events, personal experiences, concern about relatives. A sense of compassion, an atmosphere of winsomeness, a willingness to listen, and a mysterious and natural intimacy make this time together different from other gatherings, such as staff meetings at work or classrooms at college.

As the evening ends, Joel leads in prayer as people lift concerns: a sister with cancer, a child anxious about school, a youth project at the church, and a controversial election in the community. Afterward, people continue visiting with one another as they leave.

Having a Plan In Mind

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This scenario describes a typical Bible study that includes some of the key elements that mark a wide variety of small-group gatherings—a focus on faith and Scripture, a sense of community, the sharing of prayer. Some meet on Sunday mornings and others on weekday nights; some studies last six weeks and others continue for decades; some are formal, structured, and driven by lessons and resources while others are freestyle and unstructured. Some groups meet in church classrooms, others in members' living rooms, and others in workplace offices or at schools. Growing together in Christ takes many forms.

Faith development refers to how we purposefully learn in community outside of worship in order to deepen our faith and to grow in grace and in the knowledge and love of God. It refers to our active cooperation with the Holy Spirit in our own spiritual growth, a maturation we accomplish through belonging to a faith-forming community such as a Bible study, support group, Sunday school class, house group, women's organization, book study, choir, prayer team, or other small group. Faith development also takes place through retreats, camping ministries, seminars, and support groups that apply faithful living to particular contexts and challenges such as parenting, divorce recovery, living with Alzheimer's, and countless other topics. All of these ministries embed us in a community that helps us to mature in faith and to follow Christ more nearly in our daily living.

BY PREARRANGEMENT WITH MYSELF

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If learning in community fosters faith, why describe the personal practice as Intentional Faith Development?

Many followers of Christ desire and value small-group experiences and have benefited from them in the past, but their participation is haphazard, incidental, and infrequent. A short-term study piques their interest at one point and a few years later they attend a home Bible study. Years pass before they go with friends on a weekend retreat. The pattern lacks thoroughness, frequency, and focus. They never practice with enough depth and consistency to feel comfortable or confident with their spirituality. They dabble in religion without growing in grace. Scripture remains strange, mysterious, impenetrable. They enjoy the fellowship but never appreciate close, long-term bonds that lend a sense of trust, strength, and depth to their relationships with others in the community.

Intentional means having a plan in mind. It refers to our determination to act in a specific manner and our having a purpose to what we do. Intentional derives from Latin words meaning "to stretch out for, to aim at." Paul describes this yearning for greater fullness when he writes, "straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Jesus Christ"(Philippians 3:13-14). We seek the perfect love of Christ, to have in us the mind that was in Christ Jesus.

Intentional ratchets up the commitment and consistency. Those who practice Intentional Faith Development make room in their lives for learning faith. They plan to feed their spirits. Learning faith becomes a way of life, a practice that is no longer haphazard and incidental but which is central and important. They regularly participate in Bible studies, seminars, or retreats to focus on cultivating the spiritual life. They desire to know God and set themselves to the task of learning God's Word through Scripture. Learning becomes a lifelong priority, and they seek progressively more challenging experiences to deepen their understanding of God. They feed their curiosity. They desire to mature in Christ and put themselves in the most advantageous situations to do so. Priority, purpose, consistency, persistence, and commitment make faith development intentional.

The practice of Intentional Faith Development refers to our purposeful learning in Christian community in order to grow in grace and in the knowledge and love of God.

REFLECTION

Let's see how inventive we can be in ENCOURAGING LOVE and HELPING OUT, not avoiding worshiping together as some do but SPURRING EACH OTHER ON, especially as we see the BIG DAY approaching.

—Hebrews 10:24-25, The Message

Questions

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• When have you belonged to a Bible study or class that was helpful, sustaining, and spiritually satisfying? What qualities of the experience made it so?

• How do you tend to your spiritual growth? How have other people served as a catalyst for your own spiritual growth?

• What's the most advantageous setting or gathering for you to learn with others?

• How intentional are you about belonging to a learning community that deepens your spiritual life?

Prayer

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Your hands have made and fashioned me, O Lord. Thank you for deep-spirited friends and for all those people you send to me to share my journey to you.

A SCHOOL FOR LOVE

We learn in community because Jesus taught us to learn this way. He weaved people into a community around him and taught them through stories, parables, examples, and by modeling behaviors. What he taught filtered through the conversations, deliberations, and experiences of his followers as their relationship to Jesus formed them.

The practice of learning in community continued during the beginnings of the early church. The second chapter of Acts reports people gathering in home and temple to learn from the disciples. Before written Scriptures, they repeated the stories of Jesus, imprinting his teachings upon their hearts. The community provided a supportive network for testing ideas, gaining from other peoples' experiences, sharing the love of Christ, and holding one another accountable to following Christ.

The spiritual life is never a solitary affair.

John Wesley, founder of Methodism, intentionally organized people into small groups for the study of Scripture, prayer, and to "watch after one another in love." Early Methodists met in societies, classes, and bands. They gathered in homes and workplaces and schools. They inquired after one another's spiritual progress with a supportive intimacy. They shared their doubts and hopes and talked about how they had seen God's grace at work in their lives. They learned to "rejoice with those who rejoice" and to "weep with those who weep" (Romans 12:15). They encouraged one another.

Theologically, Wesley based the class meetings on the sanctifying grace of God. Sanctification involves our growing in faith, and how the Holy Spirit works within us to help us mature in Christ. Faith is not like a light switch, on or off. It is a growth process, as we step-by-step mature in grace intentionally following in the way of Jesus.

By the grace of God, we pray that we are closer to God and further along in our following of Christ now than we were five years ago.

And we pray that we will be closer to God and further along in our walk with Christ five years from now than we are today. Sanctification means our faith journey has direction, trajectory, purpose, a path. We desire to become more Christ-like. We grow in grace and in the knowledge and love of God.

According to Wesley, the Holy Spirit makes this maturation process possible. However, growth in Christ requires us to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in our own sanctification. We cooperate by placing ourselves in the most advantageous situations for learning God's heart, for walking in Jesus' way, and for remaining faithful in our practice of the spiritual life. A congregation or a community of Christ, such as a Bible study, Sunday school class, or support group, becomes a "school for love" as we learn to give and receive love, to serve others, and to follow Christ more nearly. Community provides the catalyst for growth in Christ.

SOLITARY RELIGION CANNOT SUBSIST AT ALL

We learn faith in community, not only because Jesus and the New Testament have taught us to learn this way, but also because spirituality cannot be learned alone. Peace, forgiveness, mercy, compassion, hope, gentleness, love, grace, serving—these and many other components of belief and practice are communal in nature. They are social and cannot be learned merely from a book. They become part of us as we practice them with other people. We learn them with friends, teachers, mentors, and fellow travelers on the path with Christ.

And learning in community provides accountability in our walk with Christ. Despite our best intentions and the promises we make to ourselves, our commitment to love God and others often wanes and weakens. When we share the journey with other people, they keep us committed just as we keep them on the path of growth in Christ. Practices are best honed with the help of others. With fellow followers of Christ comes a sense of accountability that we cannot achieve on our own.

As we follow Christ in the company of other Christians, we implicitly make a public commitment among people we respect and care for and who respect and care for us. Those who share our journey comfort us, provoke us, remind us, sympathize with us, confront us, and pray for us. The Holy Spirit uses them to draw us further along toward Christ.

Work schedules and travel may make regular engagement with community nearly impossible for some people. Supported by community, their faith development takes place mostly in solitude—reading, journaling, searching Scripture, and praying. Even in such circumstances, the Holy Spirit uses other people to prompt and encourage. An entirely solitary religion is an impossible contradiction in the following of Christ.

Growing in Grace

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Let's return to Rita and Joel and their Bible study. Look around the living room. An accountant and her friend, two young couples, a bank executive, a doctor and his wife, a divorcé. The reading of Scripture. Workbooks. A short video. Ninety minutes together. Conversation. Prayer. How does the Holy Spirit use these ordinary ingredients to resculpt lives in such extraordinary ways?

An interesting dynamic takes place when we read Scripture and talk about it together with others. Several things happen.

Perspective

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Focus on Scripture has the effect of pulling each person out of his or her immediate situation to give a larger view, a slightly more universal perspective. Even if people do not speak aloud about what they are thinking, a topic such as suffering, fairness, jealousy, forgiveness, peace, patience, or sacrifice inevitably draws each toward a personal experience that they are currently facing. The banker listens and mulls over a personnel issue that causes her stress. The divorcé hears the same conversation and reads the same Scripture, but replays in his mind a conversation with his daughter from the night before. The doctor thinks about the estrangement he feels from his sister; one of the young couples casts a knowing glance at each other as they think of the argument they had earlier in the evening. The Spirit moves where it chooses (John 3:8), and its gentle breeze rustles through the souls of each member of the group.

Amazingly, people from vastly different circumstances can read a parable prayerfully, or hear someone share a personal experience about God's activity, and each feels that the topic strikes the target to address a particular challenge in his or her own life.

WE NEED A NUDGE

The benefit of sifting through Scripture with companions is not merely the acquisition of historical facts, theological theories, or ideas. The benefit cannot be reduced to gleaning helpful hints for living or from the advice our friends give us. Each person learns something relevant to his or her soul's desire. Like standing on a balcony looking down from above at all our interactions with others, each person receives a wider perspective on the world in which they work, love, play, and serve. As meaning is unlocked by one person on a topic, an overflowing of insight connects to other persons at an interior level beyond conscious awareness. What we learn may be inexpressible with complete awareness. The Spirit of God works through the conversation, weaving, binding, penetrating, healing, provoking, correcting, reminding, reconciling.

And by the grace of God, with frequent and consistent participation in the faith community, various spiritually sustaining attributes are deepened, and people find themselves with more courage, more patience, a greater compassion, a deeper sense of fairness, a higher commitment to fidelity, more resolve, more peace. The transformation may be gradual, but it is significant and life-changing. Like a potter forming clay, God gently and persistently shapes us.