Body Building: Considering the impact of ‘choice’ on community
Is ‘choice’ good for us?
Within some generalized parameters, we are given the privilege and pleasure of choosing many aspects of our lives. We choose where we live, where our children go to school and where we go to church. We choose our friends and even our leisure activities.
The positive side of this dynamic is that we can make sound investments in real estate (financial stewardship), provide academic opportunity (stewardship of talent) and be spurred on in our faith by those with whom we share doctrinal positions.
But what’s the downside?
We’re human, so in general we’re going to choose our comfort. That means we’re going to select the homes that position us around people with whom we’d like to associate. Decisions about schools will be based on the ‘kind of kids’ that go there and the parental demographic (whether or not we care to admit it). We’ll go to churches that never push us to wrestle out our faith because we like be surrounded by smiling faces that nod in agreement with us.
Affinity groups — groups sharing a common interest such as life stage, gender, martial status — quickly create a sense of community because of that shared interest. In various seasons of my life (newly married, parenting our first child, adopting from Russia), I’ve been exceedingly thankful for the solidarity and empathy I received from being with those groups because of the ministry of identification with one another.
Does choosing our own community short-circuit God’s design for the Body?
I think the self-selection involved in affinity groups runs contrary to God’s design for the Body. His desire is that we would build one another up in Christ and grow in our faith. If we always choose to surround ourselves with only those likely to agree with us, we won’t benefit from the sharpening that occurs from having someone love us enough to tell us where we’re wrong (Ephesians 4:15).
We recently launched a new life group at our church. My husband and I were handed a list of names and phone numbers with which to initiate relationship. I confess to you my initial struggle: I really wanted to be connected with ‘my people’ at this church we’re newly a part of. By ‘my people’ I mean (of course) the people who look like me: educated, middle class, mid-40’s, married with kids about the same age as my own. I had no idea who these names on the paper represented.
So, I prayed. And then I called to extend the invitation to meet.
We sat, circled around the table. Our diversity wasn’t the kind you can find in other parts of the country. (I do, after all, live in Idaho.) But I was thrilled at the age span, variety of professions, the range in Bible knowledge, and varying church backgrounds. Several times I heard the comment, “I’m so glad we represent more than just one age group or life stage.”
I reflected on the passage in Romans that describes the purpose of Spiritual gifts:
For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.
— Romans 12:4, 5 NIV
It dawned on me that the Body is beautiful because it has different members with different functions. We need all the Spiritual gifts and we need all the different kinds of people. We would be repulsed at the sight of an amorphous blob of eyeballs — the physical depiction of a self-selected affinity group — and it wouldn’t be an effective body. A conglomeration of feet would be no more attractive and no more functional. Quite simply, we need all parts.
This is what makes the Body as beautiful — as fearfully and wonderfully made — as the bodies God has given each of us.
- Where are you choosing your own comfort by surrounding yourself with only those who look (walk, talk, act) like you or share your opinions?
- How does the ‘body’ of that group look in light of that decision?
- Can you identify an area in which to choose away from your norms and thereby build the Body through mutual encouragement and sharpening?