Photo by Debby Hudson on Unsplash
There was the diaspora at the tower of Babel where, because of human pride, languages were confused; and the human race, which was one, became many, and the peoples became strangers to one another.
There was the diaspora in Jerusalem when the temple was destroyed and the people were sent from their homeland to the ends of the earth and God's promises must have seemed more remote than ever.
There was the persecution of the early church in Antioch, and the saints fled in different directions, scattering the seed of the Word as they went.
I have had my micro-diasporas. At various times, communities I have belonged to have dispersed and re-assimilated into a hundred elsewheres.
From a natural perspective, community breaks down because of human error and sinfulness. But, looking back from a safe distance, I have come to believe that the hand of Almighty God does this—that in His mercy or judgment, or both—He scatters the people, just as He did at the tower of Babel—so that some wicked scheme or unhealthy dynamic will be defused.
And sometimes He scatters the people so that they will take the meaningfulness of what they have experienced it and share it with others in places that are spiritually arid.
Still, my church life has been a succession of attempts to find that lost sense of community.
I have found glimmers of it here and there, even in the restless assembling, disassembling, and reassembling.
But too often I have been sad about it, haunting the pews like an old ghost.
Last night as the sun was setting and the sky was streaked with cold, pale pink and orange—and the moon was a perfect silver circle in the middle of it--I trudged through the icy snow to a local chapel, which was dark and locked up except for one open door and one dim light, and a handful of flickering candles. I knelt there and, ironically, in the solitude, I felt the sense of community that often eludes me: You already belong to the body of Christ, to the communion of the saints.
I went to a funeral recently of a woman who died at 94. She had been a member of the same church for 84 years. Community grew up all around her and flourished: both in her natural family and in her church family.
But even this woman's community-- in her nearly 100-year span--had its ravages and losses.
At her funeral, a man spoke of that great culmination of history—where every tribe, tongue, and nation will be gathered in one place, at one table, to celebrate the wedding feast of the Lamb of God.
There will be the healing of all our diasporas, of all our language breakdowns; everyone will have a place and no one will be excluded.
The unloved will be loved.
The outsiders will be insiders.
Our rifts will be healed, and all our misunderstandings will be made right.
Though now we see through a glass darkly—though our perception of the blessed Communion of Saints is dim—one day we will see face to face, and we will know, even as we are fully known.
Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. (Ephesians 4:32, KJV)