Crystal Clear

Nothing stays the same, does it? When we want to hold on to something it gets squished, or stale.

And then we might reminisce about how good it was – but that seems like only a shallow comfort. Grasping a shadow of what was.

I’ve found this to be true in friendships, in the church, and you can see it in history.

Maybe that’s because we’re supposed to develop and change. When we do, there are new experiences and new joys. New memories are made.

But we can’t hold on to those either. We have to keep living and writing the story. We can’t stay stationary. But moving means also that you lose some things along the way. Because times change and people change and places change.

I’m sad about the loss of the way things were – 3 years ago, or last year, or even a month ago. But I can’t stay here – I need to forge ahead with the new, with the changes.

The really sweet pieces are the ones you get to keep, the people that change too and continue with you along the way.

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I was asked to respond to an interview email for an article about intentional living. I don’t think I’m that eloquent, but I still think it’d be nice to share what I did spend some time thinking about:

1. What is an intentional community? What’s the difference between ‘intentional community’, ecovillage, and cohousing or is there a difference at all?

I define an intentional community as a group of people deciding to live in close proximity to each other with a shared goal and purpose. Yes, different from eco village (unsure definition – something like living together to have less impact on the enviornment) or cohousing (living together in the same building with others). I think an intentional community could have some of the outcomes as a eco village or look similar to cohousing, but not necessarily and it can be much more broad and larger reaching.

2. Why live in one? Why do you?

I feel this is one way in our Western culture to live out my faith in a way that speaks to many of the idols of it. I also crave closer connections to people and the increased accountability it can bring.

3. Can you describe your community a bit please?

7 adults and 1 child, 4 households across three houses. Our main purpose is: “Know Christ, Show his Kingdom, Grow his disciples”. We’ve been around for 1 1/2 years, and are still figuring out how to do this. We have two computer programmers, a stay at home mom (trained as a nurse), an architect, a social housing worker, a learning coordinator, and an educator. We have morning prayer weekly on Wednesday and Friday night potlucks. We also have business meetings and make plans and dream together. We also just bump into each a lot since our houses are right next to each other.

4. What does ‘simple living’ me to you?

Not buying the latest things. Not buying things that won’t last. Asking honestly whether I need something before I buy it. Fixing things. Making my own food. Growing my own food. Not doing so many things that I’m too busy to make space for people when they drop in and visit.

5. What do you think about the current trendiness of ‘simple living’?

I think it’s always a good thing to think about how much stuff we have and to make use of more with less. I hope that people return to looking for quality products over quantity and enjoy the stuff they do have – and also enjoy the people and food and environment around them.

6. What does believing in Jesus and the intentional community have to do with one another?

I strongly believe in what Dietrich Bonhoffer says in “Live Together”: that if the community is not Christ’s it will fail. He calls us into community, he gives it life, he makes it possible to live and love and forgive and grow together. A community based on my goals or expectations will cause problems and it will break down. We constantly need to remind each other and ourselves this, and pray that it will be our reality.

7. What does that mean to you personally?

I need to remain in Christ first. That allows me to truly be with people in community. I need to check my motivations and my heart when I feel I have been hurt by others. I need his forgiveness and love first and foremost.

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We all have those things about us that we don’t like, and which we’d like to change, or which cause harm to others – you may call it foibles, character flaws, mistakes, nastiness or something else. You can see it in the world too when people are harmed or brutalized. We cause pain in others, consciously or unconsciously.

In Christian circles, we often call this brokenness. The world is broken, and each of us is broken. And when something is broken, it’s not working the way it should and cannot do well what it was intended to do. (There’s also an entire theology of how and why, but that’s not important here.)

Lately I’ve been recognizing my own brokenness. I live closely with 6 other adults (one my spouse) and it’s not as easy to hide motives or patterns which aren’t quite right.

I was overwhelmed by how broken my spouse and I both are – and how that affects our relationship. We end up working at cross purposes, even though we do love each other. And yet that brokenness also prevents us from putting our own wants aside and looking out for the other.

In this awareness of reality, I remembered my faith. This is exactly why Jesus came – because God’s love and forgiveness is the only thing bigger than this, and the only thing that can actually change me, re-new me, so that I’m fixed into how I’m supposed to be.

And that means that there is hope too, for the 7 of us (and children) to also be re-newed to love, forgive, look out for, and maybe to show others there is hope and another way.

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I was at a conference recently on Faith and Social Justice, held at Redeemer University College. The plenary speaker talked briefly about transparency.

He said that while transparency is a way to share and explain to others what you are doing and what you’re about (especially for a business), it doesn’t necessarily mean you let people know you. It can still be a front to hide behind.

Vulnerability, on the other hand, means that you open yourself up to another, showing them your ’soft’ parts that can be hurt, and where you are sensitive. It’s in this place where true connections with others, true knowing of each other, can happen. But it’s also the place where damage can be inflicted and we can harm others or be harmed.

He then noted that the key in this is submission. When we submit ourselves to others, and open ourselves up, we are making ourselves vulnerable so that we can deepen our relationships. My tendency is not towards submission. Yet as I live in community I want to be vulnerable and to have others be vulnerable with me. So I will need to practice more and more submission to those around me.

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When I complain about something, I then find myself complaining about more things. And then my mood turns very sour.

There is something to be said for the power of positive thinking. In Africa, we met many people who were HIV positive. But they turned what could have been seen negatively into saying about themselves that they are “Living Positively”.

The Christian Bible admonishes followers not to grumble or complain. I think that complaining is a faith busting action. On the flip side, to be positive requires trust and hope, which will build faith.

I need to choose to live on the positive side, because this is choosing faith and life. Sometimes if I can’t do this myself, I find I do rely on the faith of others – those in my community. Maybe that’s part of what is meant by a community of faith.

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A friend of mine said to me once that there isn’t really a prohibition on pre-marital sex in the Bible. No adultery allowed (extra-marital) is clear. In Deuteronomy it says if you have pre-marital sex, you then have to get married.

So this would rule out being promiscuous, since after have one pre-marital sex encounter, you’d then have to get married, which would mean you then can’t have extra-marital sex as that is adultery. (cf. Deuteronomy 22)

Interesting.

As I was reading through Deuteronomy I also found some references to tithing, which was the giving of 10% to God. Christians often then extrapolate this to say giving to the church should also be 10%. Yet, most of the New Testament references encourage generosity, but no set percentage or amount. Deuteronomy 14 says the following:

• All must set aside a tenth of the crops, and then bring it to the designated place of worship and eat it in God’s presense. A great feast, it sounds like, and one you share with the Levites (priestly clan) since they don’t have land.
• Once every three years, the full tithe goes to the Levites (who have land) and also to the foreigners, orphans and widows in the town.

I guess I just find it interesting how common practises are deemed to be right and moral, and maybe even “what Christians should do”, but which may not resemble much what you find in the Bible. And I’m not talking about those who deliberately twist the meaning. I mean even those who really are trying to live out their faith.

The more Christians read the Bible, the more we will know what it says. Let us all be encouraged to do it more and more!

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