A Community Life
I am twenty-five years old and I love the Lord Jesus. I thank Him for leading me to the local church in Philadelphia where I have experienced the reality of the Lord’s prayer in John 17 in which He prayed for the oneness of all His believers.
I never thought I would find such oneness in practice anywhere. I spent most of my high school and college career searching for answers and remedies to the despairing division, inequality, and injustice I saw in the world around me. Academic theories, social-political groups and activist organizations all claimed to know how to deconstruct and reconstruct the world into a better place (i.e. a place of community, hope, and progress), but nothing satisfied me. The theories weren’t practical. The social-political groups couldn’t agree. Even the best activist organizations fell apart because of in-house fighting and self-interest.
Yet, the Lord was showing me something more. As a Christian, I had been meeting with the local church in Philadelphia since I came to college. Slowly, I began to realize that the community I was seeking for was the local church. Here were believers from every race, culture, and economic background. Here, we gathered multiple times a week to fellowship, to enjoy Christ, and to be with one another. Here there was genuine concern, love, and care for one another. Our lives weren’t perfect in the sense of being problem-free, but we still had joy, peace, and fellowship. And we were also one.
One in what? One in our love for the Lord. One in our love for one another. One because we all had the same Christ living in each of us. So I realized that the oneness the Lord prayed for in John 17 is a oneness that doesn’t exist apart from Himself. The oneness is only found in God.
My testimony is that I found God in the local church in Philadelphia and God is in all the believers. This is where there is a community of life. This is where I belong. Hallelujah, I have found it!
J.L.
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