Community of the Beloved Disciples

What is community in your church? A monthly fellowship night? The conversation that follows a Sunday service? Good friends who know you? Many of us equate community with small groups. Over the last few months, I’ve told friends of mine from Shanghai to Seoul to San Francisco that I’m writing about church community. Their reply: “You mean a book about small groups?” I suppose your definition of community flows largely from the ambition you have for it. And in writing this book, I want to both raise and lower your ambition for church community.

Raising the Bar

On the one hand, I want to raise the bar of what you envision church community to be. I appreciate small groups. But they only scratch the surface of what God intends to create in your church through community. Why? Of all the ways that the gospel changes this world, the community of the local church is the most obviously supernatural. Its witness even goes beyond this world. “The rulers and authorities in the heavenly places” sit up and take notice, says Paul (Eph. 3:9–10). In this book, I’ll define local church community as a togetherness and commitment we experience that transcends all natural bonds—because of our commonality in Jesus Christ. Far from being a “nice to have” element of your church, community is core to who you are.

Mark Dever and Jamie Dunlop, The Compelling Community: Where God’s Power Makes a Church Attractive (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2015).