Here's the church, here's the steeple, open the doors and...

One definition of community is a gathering of people who have a common goal and a sense of belonging.

Why is it in a church that sense of belonging doesn't seem to last or to meet the real issues people have? Do we need more programs, more teachers, more counselors, more activism?

Dietrich Bonhoeffer analyzes some of these aspects in Life Together. What was true in the 30s and 40s is no less true today.

Many persons seek community because they are afraid of loneliness...Christians, too, who cannot cope on their own, and who in their own lives have had some bad experiences, hope to experience help with this in the company of other people. More often than not, they are disappointed. They then blame the community for what is really their own fault. The Christian community is not a spiritual sanatorium. Those who take refuge in community while fleeing from themselves are misusing it to indulge in empty talk and distraction, no matter how spiritual this idle talk and distraction may appear. In reality they are not seeking community at all, but only a thrill that will allow them to forget their isolation for a short time. It is precisely such misuse of community that creates the deadly isolation of human beings.

I've heard it said that if a person enters marriage in order to avoid being lonely, they will be a lonely married person. Another person may be the ingredient for fellowship, but not a cure for loneliness. 

Bonhoeffer views this, and I think rightly so, as trying to avoid coming face-to-face with who one is before God. Until we are willing to sit in isolation and have the reality of ourselves fully revealed over time, we will never allow God to cleanse us of our sins. 

Our sins can never be realized to their full extent at conversion. I don't believe we would be able to bear the weight of the knowledge of them in detail. That is something only the sinless Son of God could bear (and it took Him to death). Our sins, such as pride, wear so many disguises and so often appear so pious in their Sunday best.

Daily digging into the Word, daily seeking the heart of God in conversation with Him, daily and consciously humbling ourselves before God and acknowledging His wisdom when our own understanding would rise up against it. . . this is the solitude, the preparation that must be ongoing in order for one to be a healthy part of community.

What does that mean? Do we lock ourselves away from church until we are fit to enter? If we did that, every church door would close till the end of time.

In case this emphasis on solitude confirms any one's desire to pull out of church, Bonhoeffer continues with the other side of the coin:

Whoever cannot stand being in community should beware of being alone. You are called into the community of faith; the call was not meant for you alone. You carry your cross, you struggle, and you pray in the community of faith, the community of those who are called. You are not alone even when you die, and on the day of judgment you will be only one member of the great community of faith in Jesus Christ. If you neglect the community of other Christians, you reject the call of Jesus Christ, and thus your being alone can only become harmful for you.

There is an equal call in Biblical Christianity to individuals and to people. 

Individually, if you have been born again, God called you. No one else could have made that decision for you. It didn't matter whether you were in the "right church," had a good education. . . nothing else mattered. God's grace bent down and breathed life in your heart and you opened your eyes and believed.

Collectively, your new birth is not a matter just between you and God. When God lifted you from the spiritually dead, He placed you as part of His Body comprised of Christians like and unlike you from around the world. When a part of the Body is hurt, the whole Body is impacted. You cannot sin and not affect the Church. You are a part of a whole.

Why is this important to keep this balanced? 

On the one hand, we are responsible for our spiritual walk. Just as a heart is responsible for pumping blood and can't rely on the hand to help it, so we cannot rely on another person to make us strong spiritually. Another can use their gifts to encourage us, but it is up to us to make it real. That is where our solitude before God is crucial. 

On the other hand, if we lock ourselves away, if we begin to notice every weakness in our brothers and sisters at church and pull away, we are being led astray by pride. This pride is able to make our quiet time with God nothing but our own imagined piety patting us on the back. Instead of realizing we are one of many and are responsible in aiding the other parts of the body, we think of ourselves as essential to God and a unit unto ourselves.

Bonhoeffer summarizes:

Those who want community without solitude plunge into the void of words and feelings, and those who seek solitude without community perish in the bottomless pit of vanity, self-infatuation, and despair.

When we are listening regularly to God, we are more sensitive to our own failings and can humbly accept God's tools of change. We also receive of God's fullness and can therefore reach out in love to those in community. 

Thus, God provides our sense of belonging, whether or not others treat us as they should, and towards others we can share love unreservedly, strengthening their sense of belonging too.