Community

This weekend is all about community. Specifically, it is about building community between Missouri Street Church of Christ and Wonder City Church. Reflecting on the shooting that took place this past Monday at Virginia Tech Larry James wrote about the need for community on his blog.

The purpose of community building and community development is to see that everyone has a chance to be connected in a meaningful, enduring manner to at least a few other people...Building community must remain our clear mission, informing everything we do in the city. Our work cannot be just about charity or compassion or "helping" people. It cannot be fundamentally about providing people volunteer opportunities. The basis of what we seek to accomplish is fundamentally not about feeding people, housing people, healing people or educating people. We must go further. While we may decide to use activities like these to do part of our work, and while such actions often will prove necessary, our goal must always be to connect people to one another for improved well being and for the experience of authentic, human community.

This weekend there are several activities that will be used to build community between parent and daughter church. First, a group of men from the Just Brothers men's Bible study is going to come on Saturday and work on our building to make it more of a place to worship and learn about God. Secondly, Missouri Street and Wonder City will have a combined worship service on Sunday-the first in the 7 1/2 years of Wonder City. It is our goal and hope that these activities will serve as a catalyst for community development and growth between these two communities. I will write more next week and let you know my impressions of the weekend.