Community Service: One Anothering


  “For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another.”
Romans 12:4-5



“Every act of self-discipline by a Christian is also a service to the community. Conversely, there is no sin in thought, word, or deed, no matter how personal or secret, that does not harm the whole community. When the cause of an illness gets into one's body, whether or not anyone knows where it comes from, or in what member it has lodged, the body is made ill. This is the appropriate metaphor for the Christian community. Every member serves the whole body, contributing either to its health or to its ruin, for we are members of one body not only when we want to be, but in our whole existence. This is not a theory, but a spiritual reality that is often experienced in the Christian community with shocking clarity, sometimes destructively and sometimes beneficially.”

- The Words and Wisdom of Dietrich Bonhoeffer  -


“Search me, O God, and know my heart; 
test me and know my thoughts.
 See if there is any wicked way in me,
 and lead me in the way everlasting.”
Psalm 139:23-24

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