Evaluating 40 Days of Community

[*NOTE: Quotes from the 40 Days of Community Workbook are blockquoted.]

"We're Chosen to Fellowship Together...By Admitting Our Need For Each Other."

"Since we are all one body in Christ, we belong to each other, and each of us needs all the others" (Rom 12:5, NLT).

There is truth in this chapter in that the body of Christ is in need of all of its parts. This is because all the gifts God has built into the church are necessary for the proper function and health of the church as a whole. However, Rick goes too far in his assertions, and even concludes that without meeting together regularly with other believers, not only can you not grow spiritually (as he mentions in the introduction to his book), but he also says you cannot survive spiritually! This is nothing less than scaring people into coming to church, and it also encourages them to depend on people to meet their spiritual needs instead of God.

The last statement in the NLT (italicized in the blockquote above) is not in the original text. The text simply states that we are members who belong to one another. The only one we need is Christ. If all I had was Christ, I would be no less a Christian and could grow spiritually and fulfill the calling He has placed on me. What of those who are destitute and alone? If they are like a finger without the rest of the body, how could they possibly survive? If you were taken from your small group and placed in solitary confinement until the day you died, would your Christian faith perish because you were cut-off from the presence of other believers? All I need is Christ. However, this is not to say that we are to aspire to be alone and to live apart from others--not so! Since we are all one in Him as fellow believers, then we belong to one another and therefore serve one another with the individual callings and giftings that He has bestowed upon each member of the body. But belonging to one another and needing one another are two different things. Each part of the body is necessary and serves an invaluable purpose. However, using the illustration to say that one cannot grow spiritually without other believers as Rick stated in the introduction to this book is to directly contradict 1 John 2:27 which says "...you have no need for anyone to teach you; but His anointing teaches you about all things..."

Loneliness is the most common disease in the world, yet we continue to build walls instead of bridges between each other.

What Rick states above is nothing different than what a good social group in the world would tell you. Yet, the truth is that Jesus is the healer of all our diseases. He told us to come to Him and we will have rest and be satisfied. It is true that people can become reclusive and self-serving. However, is the root of the problem that they are not socializing and opening up in a group, or could it be that they are not depending, leaning and trusting in Jesus every moment of the day so that they can belong to others in service?

But there is absolutely no shame in needing others. God wired us that way! He wants his children to depend on each other.

We can help and serve one another, but God doesn't want us to depend on each other. What if people fail you? No-one is perfect, and people will fail you. If you depend upon people, you may be disillusioned. In fact, this may be the very reason people can get so hurt that some end up crawling into their shell and become reclusive. God wants us to depend on Him! How can I underscore this. It is so important that we see the difference. Its so important, in fact, that God placed this truth in the middle verse of the Bible, Psalm 118:8 (NET) "It is better to take shelter in the LORD than to trust in people."

In The Purpose Driven Life... If you haven't read that book yet, it's important that you do.

I find it interesting how Rick promotes his own book as being important to read, but I don't remember him even once promoting the Bible in such a fashion. If he does, I ask you to please show me.

Even in the perfect, sinless environment of Eden, God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone" (Gen 2:18, NIV).

True, but God created a helpmate, not a dependent. Adam was still to depend solely upon God.

God hates loneliness.

But are we ever alone if He says that He will be with us until the end of the age (Matt 28:20) and will never leave us nor forsake us (Heb 13:5)? While we help and serve one another and share special relationships with one another, we can still feel alone because people fail us. Hear the truth that should warm your heart to the core--you will never be alone with Jesus Christ when you believe and trust fully in Him.

And, like parts of any living body, it's impossible for believers to thrive without each other. (1 Cor 12:21b, MSG). You must be connected to a church fellowship to survive spiritually. (emphasis mine)

Perhaps the scripture that seems to refute what I am trying to communicate in this post is 1 Cor 12:21 (NASB) "And the eye cannot say to the hand, 'I have no need of you'; or again the head to the feet, 'I have no need of you.'" Yet, the kind of need for one another that Rick Warren is communicating seems to put our relationships with one another at a higher importance than our relationship with God and a proper understanding of our relationship to Him. The end goal of our need for one another according to Rick seems to be to "stop traffic" so to speak, where many numbers of purpose-driven people change society. But how is it that Coke, a secular profit-driven coporation could use the Purpose Driven Life as a success manual? Can you be purpose-driven and not a Christian?

Back to 1 Cor 12:21... The idea in scripture is that in the body of Christ, all of the members are valuable; God doesn't neglect a single one and can use each to build up the body. This is how it is meant to be. It is true that we as a part of the body are not to say that we have no need of another part even though it may be different from us. Each believer contributes necessary functions to the body which is in Christ. Yet, while I can take comfort in being with like-minded believers and working together with them in the work of the gospel, and while God promised a spiritual family to each believer as their inheritance while still on this earth, each must come to the proper understanding that they consist and have their full life completely in Christ and in Him alone. I contend that it is only then that one can serve others properly at all times and as God intended us to.

The first step is to admit that we need each other, living like our spiritual lives depend on each other--because they do!

Rather, the first step is to admit that we need God every moment of every day! As Paul said in Acts 17:28 (NIV), "For in him we live and move and have our being..." Jesus never said that the first step is to admit that we need each other. He said that the first and greatest commandment is "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind." Then He said, "The second is like it: 'Love your neighbour as yourself'" (Matt 22:37-39, NET). We need to keep them in their proper order; it is the only way we will keep from being led astray.