Elevate Community

Recently I was in a meeting where we were reviewing video scripts for a series of shorts for new believers. One about baptism, the Bible, prayer, and community. I realized that the unique thing about community was that people entered the church with that one thing not being foreign. I mean if this is day one of your new walk with Christ look at the hurdles. Baptism? Weird. Prayer? Awkward. The Bible? Iffy. But community? Oh yeah! I know what that is! We all have a picture of community, even outside the context of Christian faith. We were born into one, even if it was fractured and unfulfilling. So we got talking about what they could expect to be unique about our brand of community. It was a great discussion that I won't rehash here, but you get the picture. We were made for community. You literally cannot practice Christianity and fulfill the commands of Christ without getting into relationships with others.

But I believe community is even more important for kids and students than even adults. Here's the reason: No matter how much I'd like to, I can never play the role in my daughter's life of modeling how a young teenage Christian lady should behave, relate to friends, deal with boys, navigate serious relationships and handle school. I am Mom. I am old. She cannot see the me that I was. My husband cannot model those things for our boys either. As a mom, as an emcee/teacher at our church, or in my staff role, I am still ultimately dependent upon some leader far younger and cooler than me to speak into my kids' lives in this way. There is already stuff we can't get out of my 7th grader. But I know who is hearing it. His SWITCHgroup leader on Wednesday nights. And you know who that is? Someone I picked years ago. Oh yes, it's not beneath me to rig the bunking assignments at LifeKIDS summer camps. :) And now he's actually on our staff but still serving as a small group leader for middle school boys. (And to give credit where credit is due, I'm not near slick enough to pick this good of a guy, God set this whole thing up because He loves me son more than I do.)

I know if you read Think Orange by Reggie Joiner (which you totally should) or attend the Orange conference in Georgia (which you would really love) or even will be at the Dallas Orange Tour event with me on Thursday that Elevate Community means a lot more than just this one point. But if this was all that Elevate Community meant (take something that is hard-wired into us all and use it to grab kids from another angle) then it would still be a tremendous ministry approach to try.

What does it mean to you? Don't forget to track the other bloggers hitting Orange Week because they are doing a much better job of really explaining the concepts as a whole. Just track #orangeweek on Twitter. :)