It's happening: Community...!!!

Well, last night was nothing short of amazing. At Harmony Ridge, we have been talking a lot about community and 'all that it means...' I guess I was rather skeptical that it would ever actually happen there (because I am a real butt-head sometimes) because we don't all totally agree about every little thing, because each of us seem to (as Rob says) 'like it how we like it.' Last night, we started discussing the whole stream of thinking and acting behind persecuting hospitality as discussed in Romans 12:13. We were all going 'round and 'round about how to apply this idea, since we are commanded to do it. Rob, I think, at one point opened the can about confessing our sins to one another (James 5:16-- Therefore, confess your sins to one another, that you may be healed...). Great in theory, but are we actually going to put it into practice? Yes! Josh M. spoke up. He confessed the sin that was in his heart. I won't go into it in detail, but it was beautiful to see him broken over his sin. I guess because we often TALK about confessing our sin to one another, but rarely do we put it into practice. Rob mentioned this whole idea about agreeing with God about our sin and allowing brothers and sisters to stand with us and also agree with God about our sin. There is such power in that. As Josh M. was speaking, I realized that no one could say that he/she was exempt from sin; therefore, we can all relate to having been entangled by something and wanting desperately for Christ to have victory over it. Lots of us confessed last night. It was both humiliating and liberating all at once. Now we can practice really loving one another...because now we know. We know a bit of each other's junk. And we know that sin is death and that Christ is life. We know that He put us together for this reason: that we love one another (John 13:34), that we bear with one another (Galatians 6:2, Ephesians 4:2, Colossians 3:13), and so that we can truly ascend Mt. Zion together and worship our greatly-to-be-praised God of the universe (see Psalm 87:2).