(This is part 3 of a series on why we started Kingdom Deep Ministries, a non profit that provides guidance to young adults in their Spiritual Formation.)
In order to effectively guide others in spiritual formation Kingdom Deep focuses on 4 areas of discipleship: One-on-Ones, Practice & Pray Gatherings, Re-center Retreats, and Mission Experiences.
So focusing in on the Practice and Pray Gatherings…
Community is a discipline, or practice; just like
getting at least 8 hours of sleep each night, or
eating healthy things, or
budgeting well, or
prayer.
Maybe your a self-proclaimed extrovert and practicing community is something you’ve never really thought about because it’s just something you gravitate towards naturally. That’s awesome! We call that a downstream discipline: a practice that feels natural to your wiring and requires very little motivation to make it happen (“Well, if I must. Twist my arm why dontcha?")
Or maybe your a self proclaimed introvert and find group gatherings exhausting to your social battery. Sometimes community can feel like that. Other times it can energize our batteries (if we are doing it right). This practice might feel like an upstream discipline: a practice that feels more challenging to our wiring, and requires more effort and motivation to accomplish it.
However you initially feel towards the idea of community, at a core level we are built for it. Without getting into the science behind it all, we are communal beings designed for each other. We are wired for connection, to be heard, to be understood; to hear, and to understand. We share experiences and tell stories. We love and laugh together. We cry together.
Alexander Supertramp is a great example of this. Alex was made famous after the book “Into the Wild” came out. Author Jon Krakauer set out to tell the story about the 24 year old man who in the early 90s gave up society, burned his car, his cash, and his name to be free of suppressive systems and live free across the highways of America. Alex’s story is amazing for many reasons. The movie that came out back in 2007 portrays adventure, risk, reward, and life in all it’s richness. I’ve had several conversations over the years with students who, after watching the movie, were ready to ditch perceived societal constraints and hit the road. And I get it. The movie shows a beautiful picture of what this lifestyle can bring. Romantic.
However, the end of the story is less romantic.
Alex dies. (No spoiler. It’s in the description and on the book cover).
The movie’s telling is of a troubled, yet romanticized hero (from his perspective) of free living who dies living his life as he would have lived it, in the wilds of Alaska. Yet Jon Krakauer tells a more accurate story about Alex from the only things he left behind: stories from those he encountered.
While Alex left the world behind he also left his family. Not only that but on his multi year adventure he met folks with whom he developed deep relationships with. Consistently Alex would encounter an individual, jump into a quick-fleeting, deep relationship that forever changed that person, and hit the road again. He was always searching for something deeper and something more than what he had, and in his search he would leave a wake of pain and hurt behind him via the people that grew close to him.
Long story short, Alex found himself alone, sick, and starving in an abandoned school bus in the alaskan wild. One of his last journal entries came after looking back on his life and realizing his fate: “Happiness only real when shared”. Alex was seeking happiness and joy in all the wrong places, and it was only in the end he realized that he had it with the friends he made along the journey. We are not built to experience life solo.
We are primarily made for God, and then for relationships, community, and each-other. This truth is echoed in Jesus’ command in Matthew 22: 37-40 (“‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”) Jesus gives this both as a commandment to obey and as a simple truth of being alive. H. H. Farmer once brilliantly said “"If you go against the grain of the universe, you get splinters.”
Whether you find the practice of community an upstream or downstream discipline it is something we are built for, and something our intentional spiritual formation cannot be done without. Traditionally the practices of Christ were practiced in community, not just solo. Sure practicing the lifestyle of Christ on your own is good. But you can only go from good to great with other followers.
At Kingdom Deep we embody community together in various small gatherings and cohorts that we call Practice and Pray gatherings. Some of these will look like semester-long, weekly worship and prayer nights that focus on learning and practicing various types of prayer from church history. Others might be month-long, weekly cohorts to learn and embody a specific practice of Jesus.
I thank God often that he didn’t call me to be his Follower alone. Could you imagine that? Jesus calling you to follow him, only to have no one else on the journey? How amazing is it that we have a multitude of Followers-past, present, and to come- that are walking this road alongside us, learning, laughing crying, being carried, carrying another? God is indeed good to us.