I’m thrilled to share with you all that my first piece was just published with RELEVANT. Here’s a little sneak peek for you, and I hope you’ll check out the rest of the article!
Recently, it seems as though no one in my group of friends—married almost 30-somethings with houses and babies and dogs and jobs—takes time to cultivate meaningful friendships and intentional community.
We’ve heard over and over that we were made for community and relationship. But if community is something we were created to thrive in, then why is it so hard to find?
We’ve heard over and over that we were made for relationship. But if #community is something we were created to thrive in, then why is it so hard to find? Click To TweetCommunity wasn’t always hard to build. In fact, throughout most of my growing-up years, it seemed as though community weaved into the fabric of my life.
I often find myself longing for college or my single years of living with roommates in Chicago, when friendships came more easily. On any given night, five friends may have knocked on my dorm door and asked if I was ready to head to the cafeteria for dinner, where we’d laugh and talk and eat ice cream for hours. Or my roommates and I would decide on a whim to walk to the new restaurant down the street, and then cap the night off with a few hours of Friends on DVD.
There was no lack of opportunity to do the regular things of life together. My friends were always there, I was less busy and had fewer commitments, and I didn’t worry as much about budgets, so I was always more inclined to say yes to spur-of-the-moment invitations.
Jesus calls us to be just as generous with our time as we are with our money, resources and gifts.
The truth is, community will never look like that again. As we continue growing up, many of us get married and move away from friends. We have kids who need naps and feedings. And we take on more at work. Of course, these things are not bad, but they certainly present obstacles to creating a thriving community. What we need to do is learn to adjust and develop new ideas of what community can and should be in our current stages of life.
To read more about how we can learn to build friendships right where we are, check out the full article at relevantmagazine.com.
