Living in Community

BY Bailey Gillespie

Living in community is a beautiful thing. On the best days, it might feel like a good dinner party as laughter rings out and each person brings a dish for the table only they know how to make. Other days, it’s a disaster. Broken dishes and broken trust. Everyone trying to talk over each other. You throw up your hands and claim you’ll never host another party again—and even if you do, you’re definitely not inviting those eight people. 

In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul says, “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving one another, just as God also forgave you in Christ” (Ephesians 4:32). It’s much easier to fly off the handle or uninvite people from our lives, yet we are called to a “new self” (v.24), one that reflects God’s righteousness and His love for even the most unruly dinner guest. We have to remember how He shows us endless patience in our unruly behavior. 

On this journey of living in Christian community, God invites us into rhythms of deepening our relationships and, if possible, restoring them when they get broken. This is because we are “members of one another” (v.25). Isn’t that a crazy thought? God has created us as individuals, yet interdependent as His body. When we harm each other, we grieve Him. He wants us to forgive just as He forgave us (Colossians 3:13). 

This spring, a friend and I took a road trip from Tennessee to California, and somewhere around the plains of Wyoming, we found ourselves talking about what it means to truly forgive. Both of us have recent experiences trying to forgive a person or a group of people, and we had to ask the honest questions: Can you still feel anger and sadness after forgiving someone? Do you forgive only once, or is it an ongoing practice?

In my experience, choosing to forgive doesn’t mean I won’t continue to feel sadness or anger for a while. To be honest, it steals past me when I least expect us. Fortunately, Scripture doesn’t guarantee a timeline for moving through the pain. Forgiveness may be a one-time act, but like anything involving our hearts, it will also be an ongoing process. 

The truth is, sometimes God does ask us to step away from unhealthy relationships. It’s natural to mourn this loss, especially if a person or collective group once played a key role in our life. However, we can still practice kindness in the way we move forward, and we are still called to forgive them in our hearts as God has forgiven us. For now, on this side of heaven, they may no longer sit at our physical table, but if we are both pursuing God, we are a part of the same spiritual family. May Christ’s peace be present in our hearts as we seek to obey Him and love those around us (v.15).