We Belong to Each Other

Psalm 133; Romans 12:4-5
Life Together: The Gift of Community
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm%20133%3B%20Romans%2012%3A4-5&version=CEB
 
We kick off this new season of reflections by doing something a little different. We will continue reflecting on the weekly scripture, but the scripture will not follow the lectionary for the next 5 weeks. We will incorporate scripture and topics from a book, Life Together, by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, as we figure out how to do life together in our current contexts (churches) but also in our country and world. Bonhoeffer’s timeless teaching reminds us the importance of community and offers wisdom and practices that help us connect to one another.
 
The words that drew my attention from the scripture reading were from Romans 12:5 in the Common English Bible. The New Living Translation uses the same phrase: “We belong to each other.” What a different world we would live in if we truly believed that we belonged to each other. Psalm 133:1 also drew my attention declaring how good and pleasing it is to God “when families live together as one.” It is much easier for families to live together as one when we understand that we belong to each other.
 
Belonging is a spiritual hunger we all yearn for. We search for a place or a people to feel connected, accepted, and a part of something bigger than ourselves. We don’t want to only be included or tolerated; we want to belong where we are equal, valued, seen and heard. We want to contribute our gifts and have them appreciated. We want to feel as though we have found “our people,” who share common beliefs, understandings, and experiences. C.S. Lewis described it best when he said, “Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another, “What! You too? I thought I was the only one.” We each long to belong.
 
This spiritual hunger of belonging comes from a feeling of loneliness, which is on the rise and becoming a public health concern. Technology is often to blame. It does offer the practical means of connecting, but fails in deeper, spiritual connections of belonging. These connections come from understanding that we, as humans, belong to each other. We are not to have power or influence over another. We are not to possess or dominate each other. We are equal parts that make up one, human family who depend on each other.
 
Paul described it as many parts of one body, the physical body of Christ. Each body part has a different function, but one function is not better or more important than another. The hands and feet work together and go in the same direction or purpose. We may have experienced a time when the hands don’t know what the feet are doing, or the hands do one thing while the feet are doing another. The hands may do specific work of serving, but they can’t serve if the feet don’t carry them there. As the hands and feet of Christ, we work together and function as one body of Christ. We belong to each other as we each belong to Christ.
 
This belonging to the body of Christ is a gift from God. Psalm 133 gives us the image of being ordained by God with the symbol of anointing with oil. Anointing kings with oil was used to symbolize God’s calling of that king and giving one the power and authority to lead on God’s behalf. The psalmist writes that God anoints us to belong to each other and become one united family of God. This belonging, this unity, pleases God!
 
When we understand that we belong to each other, we begin to appreciate the gift of the body. Despite our experiences of loneliness and our disappointment when the body doesn’t always function the way we want it to, we are grateful for the gift because it comes from God. We are grateful that we are not alone and that God has given us each other to belong to one another. May we be grateful for the gift of community.
 
Reflection Questions:

1. What does it mean for you personally to live as though “we belong to each other”?
2. Where have you experienced true belonging, and how did it shape your faith?
3. How can you help the body of Christ function with greater unity and love?

 
​Pray: Loving God, thank you for the gift of belonging—to You and to one another. Amen.
 
Act: This week, reach out to someone who may feel left out or alone and offer them a word or gesture of belonging.
  
*Common English Bible. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America.