{"id":543,"date":"2012-10-21T22:10:13","date_gmt":"2012-10-22T03:10:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/?p=543"},"modified":"2016-11-02T22:11:49","modified_gmt":"2016-11-03T03:11:49","slug":"community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/2012\/10\/21\/community\/","title":{"rendered":"Community"},"content":{"rendered":"

The word \u201ccommunity\u201d has been floating to the surface recently in the language of the church in the same way that the word \u201cengaged\u201d took on new meaning in the education world a few years back. Community is a challenge for me. Community is what I desperately needed as a child in a world I didn\u2019t understand.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhy?\u201d you ask.<\/span><\/p>\n

I was a transient child. I went to 14 different schools between kindergarten and graduation. I learned early on that my safe place was church. But even that came with a caveat. You see shunning doesn\u2019t only happen in the Amish way of life. At church, I was the outsider usually, the \u201cnew girl\u201d.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t warm up easily, and perhaps my behavior revealed just how starved I was for normal.\u00a0 I struggled for some sense of identity and belonging even though I didn\u2019t understand it then.<\/span><\/p>\n

Community has a lot to prove to one who has discovered she is still not sure she trusts in the meaning of that word. I realize that I\u2019m happy as a clam all alone most days and I\u2019m ok with people I know really well; that is my true comfort zone.\u00a0 The easy route would be to stay at home in a velvet prison of my own making.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been\u00a0in<\/span><\/em>\u00a0community<\/em><\/span>. I\u2019ve been involved in work that required my accountability and made me responsible in ways I was no longer willing to accept. I stepped out of that community when I stopped working and have been floating alone and with family and I like it. \u201cBut,\u201d I hear you say, \u201cfamily is community.\u201d Well, yes, it is, just not the community I\u2019m talking about here.<\/span><\/p>\n

The idea of being a\u00a0part of a community<\/span><\/em>\u00a0implies more accountability and responsibility and frankly, I\u2019ve been worn out by those two words and taking that on willingly- well, that means stepping back out into the unknown It goes beyond the ties of blood out to ties that bind our hearts to one another through the Holy Spirit. God has told me that He designed me for community and that I have something to contribute and He wants me to be a part of\u00a0a<\/em>\u00a0community.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, Lord, what does that look like in Your eyes?<\/span><\/p>\n

I think I may be about to find out\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been given an opportunity to throw myself into community in a big way this week; Allume is a conference for Christian women who are bloggers. Like me, they write, type, and carve out their feelings, their impressions, and lessons they\u2019ve learned along the way to share with others who are traveling similar paths. They know that the Father is the Author and Creator of the universe; they share the same Spirit with me. We are IN Christ. Some have become entrepreneurs or published writers as a way of providing income and the ability to stay at home with their children. \u00a0Most of these women are much younger than me and may have babes in tow and new recipes, and ways to parent on their minds right next to finding the best bargain ever.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve lived through that part of the journey and am in a different season of my life. I have no expectations from these few upcoming days other than to learn, to see how God fits me into community, and to walk away knowing a few new Christian Sisters who are on the same journey-seeking to be a part of community.<\/span><\/p>\n

If that\u2019s you, I feel like I know you already!<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOne who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin,<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/span>\u00a0but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.\u201d Proverbs 18:24<\/span><\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/span>\u201cJust as iron sharpens iron, a person sharpens the character of his friend.\u201d Proverbs 27:17<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The word \u201ccommunity\u201d has been floating to the surface recently in the language of the church in the same way that the word \u201cengaged\u201d took on new meaning in the education world a few years back. Community is a challenge for me. Community is what I desperately needed as a child in a world I … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[267,278,266,279,179,9,34,11],"class_list":["post-543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","tag-allume-conference","tag-bloggers","tag-blogging","tag-christian-women-bloggers","tag-community","tag-faith","tag-god","tag-jesus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=543"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":544,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543\/revisions\/544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}