Welcome

What is community? Is it a bunch of folks staring at screens in an internet cafe? A bunch of anonymous people on a listserv chatting about a different topic each day?

All of us, because we are made in God's image, desire to be in relationship with other people. God Himself tells us as much: "It is not good for the man to be alone" (Gen 1:18). Community, then, is something we just do. We can't help it, in some sense.

However, we usually define community by certain characteristics: where we live, our various interests, what we do, what we like, etc. None of this is bad in and of itself. But is it real community?

The Bible gives a different answer. It tells us that, because of what Jesus Christ did on the cross, community takes on a radically different meaning. True community can only happen when we receive the forgiveness that Jesus offers for our many sins.

Our vision of community at Second Church is built on the conviction that God's people should love each other and that will, in turn, spread outwards. The Bible tells us that we love because God first loved us.

At the center of our community here at Second Church is what is called "the means of grace." That suggests that there is a way to get in touch with God's unmerited kindness. We do this by gathering every first day of the week (Sunday), called the Lord's Day, for corporate worship. A true community worships God and not itself. This is what makes the Church different from the world.

Second, we have many opportunities to learn and grow. From Sunday School to Wednesday night prayer meetings and Bible studies, our community here is intentionally Word-centered.

So community is not just something we talk about - you must be a part of it. We 'do' community, in a sense, whenever we live for Jesus and not our selfish desires. That's true community.