A Place to Belong
The children of the '60s were seeking an alternative way
of living from the Judeo-Christian traditions in which they
were raised. That deep desire in everyone's heart to get
back to a life that respects, not just the earth and its
resources, but the people of the earth, is exactly what
the community of believers was supposed to be. The first
century communities were meant to be the light of life,
the light of the world.
Instead, they deteriorated into the dead institution of
Christianity which is not what it boasts to be. This is
why the children of the '60s are still craving a life that
produces love.
Thirty years ago communes sprang up where everyone shared everything,
simply looking for love. We tilled the soil and planted crops,
scraping at the dirt, and scratching out a living. We built simple
houses and started families. A quiet simple life of love and peace
was our goal. But when our best friend or lover died of an overdose,
or we got burned out trying to live together, our little utopias
faded away and we were a little worn and torn by the wear. As
a generation, we remain obsessed with searching for the alternative
that works — be it intentional community, organic diet, or
whatever you are willing to try and trust — one more time.
The institution of Christianity did not provide the life of love
and unity that it promised. It should have. It would have if it
were true. We needed it desperately.
Instead we took hope in drugs, sex, and rock & roll, frying
our brains, wrecking our emotions, and doing irreparable damage
to our consciences in the process.
Where do we find love anyway? And the power to actually do it?
If only the Holy Spirit of God could be made real to us, then
we would have true life, true community, and true love. It would
surely satisfy our craving for a real alternative to the rat race
and a plastic Jesus.
If we could just find that place where the life of unity described
in the ancient manuscripts of Acts 2 and 4 was practiced, what
hope we would have! But what if we never find that life we read
about in the Bible? Will we be sent to the sea of fire as guilty
because we did not accept the unreal Jesus that Christian churches
proclaim? Surely the real Savior who brought the seed of love
demonstrated in the Jerusalem communities in 34 AD will not send
us there.
Just like utopia is found "no place", there is no place
where the boast of Christianity as a life of love exists as an
alternative to the evils of the world. That's why Haight-Ashbury
was a valid alternative to Christianity 25 years ago. But today
both have been destroyed by greed and selfishness and divided
beyond redemption. Instead, its clergy gave us more talk and more
lies than communism or any politician we've ever heard, and left
us without hope. They preached a different gospel, another Jesus,
a different spirit.
That's why we headed for San Francisco, or to the hills, or to
Woodstock, as far from Christianity today as possible. But it
ended like everything else — in disappointment and worst
of all, compromise. If the hope and dream of human beings from
every race, the strong and the weak, the rich and the poor, the
educated and the illiterate, living together in true unity, loving
one another and constantly striving for justice in their midst
is not happening, where can we go? Where can we look?
Can the longing in our hearts to live together in peace ever
be satisfied? Is there such a place? Looking for it has become
a multi-million dollar pastime while we spend the rest of our
lives making other plans.
We were raised in the pews of Christianity, heard the recorded
words of some dead man that we now had to honor once a week,
looked forward to the day when we could sell life insurance
too, just like Dad. We knew well what the word "hypocrite"
meant because we had been steeped in it from birth, a senseless
blend of moral sayings that had little to do with our everyday
life. So our trek began, departing from Christianity to
seek for the very things which she claimed to have for the
whole world. We knew better. We had heard the words "love,
joy & peace" long enough, so when we grew up enough
to do something about it, man we flew out of those stained-glass
tombs called "church" looking for a better way,
an alternative.
We had learned in church that Christianity was the way that God
wanted us to live, but we could not reconcile the beauty of creation
with the dull behavior required by their god. So we did not believe
in him. He was a phony, at least how he was presented to us, and
we just couldn't buy it. The love in Christianity was only shown
around the coffee pot before service, the peace was clouded over
by the talk about one another, and about the greatest expression
of joy we knew was when we filed out the chapel doors, free for
another week.
So we struck out on our own, seekers of truth. If only we could
find truth, some light in our spirits, it would pave the way for
all our other needs as human beings. But our search, in the long
run, only left us disappointed and very hurt. We, the children
of the 60s, have found ourselves without hope, and the religion
that promised, yea, boasted of that hope, did not and could not
deliver the goods.
We have suffered a great evil. Surely we have to account for
whatever choices we made that hurt others, but the religion of
Christianity claims to stand in the place of the God of Love.
And we know that it was not love, or the God of Love, which drove
us away. Christianity had promised to be the alternative to living
a pointless or damaging life, but we were compelled in the name
of love to find an alternative to Christianity!
Now, decades later, many have returned back to the fold, just
about brain-dead from a hopeless search. Perhaps Dad was right
after all. Perhaps there is no real alternative to just making
a living, being comfortable. And this is exactly why the Messiah
told those of a similar dead religion, "If you were blind,
you would not be guilty of sin, but since you claim to see, your
guilt remains." Christianity is
dead, but claims to be alive. That's why the Scriptures call it
a home for demons and a haunt for every evil spirit.
It claims to have the alternative to death, but here the children
remain, still hoping for an alternative.
Actual Community ... is Real
Seekers look for a new social order where people can live together
in peace, just like the song asked us to "Imagine".
But a new social order cannot exist unless all the things that
divided us can somehow be rendered powerless. If it were possible,
then people would be able to live together in community, actual
community. Actual community is real community, one that exists
in reality at the present time, where all the people share a common
life together.
This only happened one time, for a brief moment, in the first
actual community established by the disciples of Yahshua
2,000 years ago. These men and women had life. They were
forgiven people in whom all the barriers of sin that forever
divide people had been knocked down by Yahshua's death on
the cross. They experienced a real common life together.
This was the life of love that shook the foundation of the
old social order. A radically new way of relating to one
another had broken into this age. Love was its essence,
the kind of love that Yahshua demonstrated for us —
one of giving yourself up, laying down your life for each
other every day.
When actual community ceases to exist, the new social order is
held in abeyance. When we see people being real, being able to
share a common life together, then we will know that this new
social order is being restored here on earth. It is the seed of
eternal life, the foothold of the light of the world.
As the prophet Daniel foretold 2,500 years ago, this new
social order would be restored on the earth without human
hands. Its emergence is what will bring the old social order
to its final end.
Then the new social order will become a great mountain that
will fill the whole earth.
This is what we are living for. It is what we were created for.
It is the only hope for the world. We want to be real — actual.
We want the actual Kingdom of God to rule the earth forever and
ever.
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