Tonight, it’s Wednesday again, and for the past many weeks we are supposed to have a Book Study on the book by Shane Claiborne called the The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical. It’s a great book, and it was instrumental in three of our community (meaning the people I live with: Daniel, Josh and Chris specifically) members decision to radically change their life and join our little community venture in Christ-like living.
Anyways, back to the book study. The book study is part of Josh and Daniel’s church, it was one of many community group options this fall at their rather large church. It started off great, with about 8-10 folks signed up to come (plus those already at our house), and for the first night most showed up. Some even showed up for the second night and a few stayed around to the third or fourth. But then things seemed to drastically drop off.
Maybe it was the decision’s to put down our books for a couple Wednesday evenings and help a women in the church’s neighborhood fix up her house that had been ransacked by area drug dealers. Maybe it was conversation about giving up your stuff, stopping our rampant consumerism, or loving Jesus by loving others to the point of real sacrifice. Maybe it was when Shane’s book started talking about war, or hanging out on the streets with homeless folks, or throwing money out on Wall Street to declare a jubilee.

Whatever it was, it’s caused us in the community to think a little about the decisions we’ve made. We’ve realized the revolution is extremely resistible. Not many people want to talk about a faith that requires more of us then we are willing to give. That includes me. It’s a lot easier for me to resist the revolution when I surround myself with others who will acknowledge with me that there is no revolution, or if there is we are already a part of it, without making much change in our lives.

All that to say, I’m quite thankful for my community, they are leading me into the revolution whether I try to resist or not. Is your community doing that for you?