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I've spoken about William Willimon before. William Willimon is a long-time United Methodist minister, Professor of Liturgy and Preaching at Duke University, and a prolific lecturer and author. He also made it to Time magazine's list of America's ten foremost living preachers.

I think Willimon is one of the most astute observers of the American religious scene alive today. Willimon is concerned about the state of the Church in the United States. One thing he sees happening that concerns him is a tendency toward the privatization of religion. Willimon is worried that more and more Americans are seeing religion as something we do alone, not as a corporate activity. Willimon cites as evidence the drive-in church (where you can worship without ever getting out of your car), Dial-a-Prayer, television preachers you can "worship" with within the privacy of your living room and offerings by mail. He might have added that, at some schools, you can now do your seminary study over the Internet. You no longer have to attend classes!

But, for Willimon, the "last straw" was the individualized, pre-packaged Last Supper. Apparently there is a guy on the West Coast (where else?) who is manufacturing communion for people on the go. What this is is a two-sided, air-tight, sealed container. One side holds a cracker-like pellet (the Body of Christ); the other side holds two ounces of grape juice (the Blood). Now you can enjoy the Sacrament in the privacy of your home or car, without having to encounter anyone! Here we have the ultimate in individualized religion; Communion without communion! "This is my Body, pre-packaged for you alone!" (Sunday Dinner, The Upper Room, p. 104).

Now, in contrast with an individualized "Just me and my Jesus" style of religion, let me tell you a story. It's a story about one of the little girls in my previous church. But it could just as easily have happened here. Little Sandra was five years old at the time; an intelligent little girl who was very involved in the Sunday School and in that church's Cherub choir.

Her father and mother were the folks who made the bread for Communion every month: big, thick, homemade bread. Making the Communion bread was one of their gifts to the church. One Sunday morning before church, little Sandra noticed the extra commotion in the kitchen and all the extra bread piled up on the counter. So she said, "Oh! Is it community today?" She got the words for Communion and community mixed up! But, it's a wonderfully valid question, isn't it? Especially for a Communion Sunday! It's Communion. But is it community today?

Over and over again, God, speaking to us through Scripture, calls us out of our separateness into community: Psalm 133:1, "Behold, how good and pleasant it is for brothers [and sisters] to dwell together in unity" (KJV). Romans 12:5, "We, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another" (RSV). Ephesians 4:5-6, " ... One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us all, who is above all and through all and in all" (RSV).

Then there's that passage from 1 Peter, chapter two, in which there are two calls for unity in Christ. First, there's that odd and wonderful image: that we are to become "living stones" that can be built together into a "spiritual house": much like bricks can be built together into a temple (vv. 4-5). Second, there's the reminder that we have gone from being "not a people" to being "God's people"; that the Church is the "New Israel, the new people of God" (v. 10).

God calls us out of our separateness into community. Why? For one thing, we each need to feel that connection with others. From 1986 to 1990, Frank Reed was one of the hostages held in Lebanon. For months, Reed was blindfolded, beaten, made ill, and tormented by his captors.

But what was most painful for Reed was the lack of anyone caring. He said in an interview with Time magazine after his release, "Nothing I did mattered to anyone. I began to realize how withering it is to exist without a single expression of caring around [me] ... I learned one overriding fact," he continued, "caring is a powerful force. If no one cares, you are truly alone."

Christians are never truly alone. We are fortunate to receive God's gracious care through the church. The sense of that caring can give us the strength we need to endure. It needs to be community today because we need each other, because we all need the support and encouragement we receive in a truly caring church.

Another reason it needs to be community today is because it is through community that we are spiritually nourished. I once read an article in Reader's Digest that taught me something I didn't know about trees. It seems that when the roots of trees touch, there is a substance present that reduces competition between them. In fact this fungus helps link the roots of different trees, even different species of trees. A whole forest can be linked together underground. And if one tree has access to water, another to nutrients and a third to sunlight, all the trees share with each other.

That's another good image of what happens in the life of a church. I believe people are linked together on a spiritual level. When one receives an insight, one a gift of the Holy Spirit, one a word of prophesy or warning, all the others in the fellowship benefit. It needs to be community today because we need the spiritual nourishment we receive from each other.

Another reason it needs to be community today is that we require each other's help to get anything significant accomplished. I like the story that radio personality Charles Osgood told on The Osgood Files. It seems there were two elderly ladies who lived in the same nursing home. Each had suffered a stroke. Margaret's stroke had left her left side paralyzed. Ruth's stroke had damaged her right.

That was sad. What was especially sad was that both women had been accomplished pianists. But both had given up hope of ever playing again -- until the Activities Director of the nursing home encouraged them to play solo pieces together -- one woman playing the left hand, the other woman playing the right.

What a picture of the church's need to work together! What one member can't do alone, perhaps two or three can do together -- in harmony! We need to be in community because we need to know we are cared for, because we need to receive spiritual nourishment from each other, and because we need to work together if we're going to get anything significant accomplished. It's God's blessing that we can be built together into a "spiritual house."

Listen to William Willimon's words:

It is only in communion, in community, in God's community that we get the support, encouragement, discipline, forgiveness, rebirth, conversion, and nurture that we need ... The grace of God is not often known by isolated individuals ... Our Creator has made us to be social creatures ... It is not good for man (or woman) to be alone (Genesis 2:18a).

What a perfect symbol of this ... [community] is Holy Communion. Bread and wine are gifts of God, yes. But they are also products of corporate human labor ... Think of all the hands that put bread on your table this morning. When someone hands you bread at communion, when someone shares it with you, at that moment, at that mysterious, deep moment, you encounter ... the very heart of the Gospel mystery; it is not good to be alone, therefore God brings us together.

Let's get together sometime. The table is spread; all is now ready. The church points you to the table, the Lord's Table, and says, "There is no better time to get together than now; there is no better place than here." (Sunday Dinner, The Upper Room, pp. 109-110)


In spite of all the pull to privatized religion in the United States, in spite of all the stresses and strains that can sometimes develop between people, including, sometimes, in churches, we need each other. God has made us for each other. God has made us for community.