Our Christian Community - Visalia First Christian Reformed

Welcome to Visalia First Christian Reformed Church

Social Time After Worship

Our Christian Community

A church is much more than a loose knit group of individuals who happen to share a worship service.

As people of faith we cherish the Christian Community - as well as the greater common good.

This is reflected in a few pictures of our social time after worship.

A quote from Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Because Christian community is founded solely on Jesus Christ, it is a spiritual and not a ‘merely human’ reality. In this it differs absolutely from all other communities. . . . Christian brotherhood is not an ideal that we must realize; it is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate. The more clearly we learn to recognize that the ground and strength and promise of all our fellowship is in Jesus Christ alone, the more serenely shall we think of our fellowship and pray and hope for it.

Henri Nouwen writes about "Christian Community" in A Spirituality of Waiting.

The whole meaning of the Christian community lies in offering a space in which we wait for what we have already seen. Christian community is the place where we keep the flame alive among us and take it seriously so that it can grow and become stronger in us. In this way we can live with courage, trusting that there is a spiritual power in us that allows us to live in this world without being seduced constantly by despair, lostness, and darkness . . . Waiting together, nurturing what has already begun, expecting its fulfillment--that is the meaning of marriage, friendship, community, and the Christian life.

By entering into fellowship with Jesus Christ, who emptied himself and became as we are and humbled himself by accepting death on the cross, we enter into a new relationship with each other. . . . It is not enough to say that a new relationship with Christ leads to a new relationship with each other. Rather, we must say that the mind of Christ is the mind that gathers us together in community; our life in community is the manifestation of the mind of Christ.

From “Compassion” by Henri Nouwen

The word community has many connotations, some positive, some negative. Community can make us think of a safe togetherness, shared meals, common goals, and joyful celebrations. It also can call forth images of sectarian exclusivity, in-group language, self-satisfied isolation and romantic naiveté. However, community is first of all a quality of the heart. It grows from the spiritual knowledge that we are alive not for ourselves but for one another. Community is the fruit of our capacity to make the interests of others more important than our own. (Philippians 2:4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.) The question, therefore is not "How can we make community?" but "How can we develop and nurture giving hearts."

From "Bread for the Journey" by Henri Nouwen

Click here for a few more christian community pictures.

com·mu·ni·ty: A group of people having a common interest.

The common interest that we have also happens to be our primary interest.

To love the Lord our God with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our strength and with all our mind ; and, Love our neighbor as our self.
Luke 10:26-28

Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
Psalm 51:9-11

And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.
Micah 6:8

What GOD is looking for in men and women is quite simple: Do what is fair and just to your neighbor, be compassionate and loyal in your love, And don't take yourself too seriously-- take God seriously.
Micah 6:8 - The Message translation

Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers. Galations 6:10

Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Romans 12:15

Then the LORD said to Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?" "I don't know," he replied. "Am I my brother's keeper?"
Genesis 4:9

Real religion, the kind that passes muster before God the Father, is this: Reach out to the homeless and loveless in their plight, and guard against corruption from the godless world. James 1:27

"The aim of God in history is the creation of an all-inclusive community of loving persons, with Himself included in that community as its prime sustainer and most glorious inhabitant."
From an unpublished study guide by Dallas Willard.

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