On Monday morning when we met as a staff team and when I met with our board in the afternoon, we were unanimous that as far as possible we wanted to make on site provision available to families. In line with government guidance, we are open for children from Early Years, children of critical workers and vulnerable children while we provide high quality online learning for those who are unable to attend.
In one of those ‘just happened’ moments, a parent gave me a book in Christmas 2019 entitled, ‘Bonhoeffer’s Seminary Vision: A Case for Costly Discipleship and Life Together’. I found it a refreshing read through Summer 2020. It’s a vision of what community can be, even in adverse circumstances, and the same values which drove his vision underpin our own.
What makes life together possible?
“It is not the experience of Christian community but firm and certain faith within Christian community that holds us together.”
At the heart of being human is being social and being social entails risk, so we can’t resist our mortality without also removing the essence of our humanity. In a world full of risk, how can we continue to embrace and enjoy being social? At the heart of Christian faith is the confession that we don’t hold our lives together but that they are held together by the maker of the universe. In a world where we are in control there is fear, because we know deep down we lack the capacity to keep all the plates spinning. In a world where God is acknowledged in his rightful place, we can rest confident our lives are held in the hands of a God who has infinite capacity to protect, provide, and be present, especially as we live in community.
What makes life together important?
Life together is an expression of hope. We were made to be social and we are saved to be social. The new creation spoken of in the Bible is not a group of isolated people, but people interconnected around a common purpose of worship. So being together now, working together towards a common goal of knowing God and being known, is an expression of that hope for which we have been made and saved. And as we express that hope, God makes himself known. Not necessarily in fireworks and powerful acts, but in daily expressions of grace. Bonhoeffer recognised that being together is not always glamorous but the place where God grows us according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus which are without limit.
“If we do not give thanks daily for the Christian fellowship in which we have been placed, even where there is no great experience, no discoverable riches, but much weakness, small faith, and difficulty; if on the contrary, we only keep complaining to God that everything is so paltry and petty, so far from what we expected, then we hinder God from letting our fellowship grow according to the measure and riches which are there for us all in Jesus Christ.”
What makes life together good?
Life together is good because it’s a place where love can build something strong and lasting. Bonhoeffer is realistic that community is not something that should be lost in lofty visions but something we need to be intentional about. It’s built by individual acts of humble love which together weave a beautiful tapestry.
“The person who loves their dream of community will destroy community, but the person who loves those around them will create community.”
One of the special aspects of being a smaller school is that there is no option to walk away from relationships and just form groups with those you like. Everyone is known deeply and while this creates vulnerability it also provides the potential for Christian love: a love which drives away fear, a love which covers a multitude of sins and a love which welcomes others in. One of the features of the Emmanuel playground is how whenever a new person arrives, they are warmly welcomed. Christian love is attractional, drawing others in to what is good, true, and beautiful, and in this way it builds, brick by brick, a community which is strong and secure.
Last term we bought some new outdoor tables to facilitate constructive time together at lunchtime. To me they are a little expression of building community, a picture of a more important table around which God’s people gather to express their faith, hope and love. As Andrew Peterson sings in this song, ‘This joy is just a shadow of the resurrection life’:
