The American Church Is A Social Community

The church is a social community. There are no social institutions in the world that equal the church. The church is where people find authentic community. God’s plan is to bring diverse people, ethnically and culturally, together into a new kind of community. This new community is a place where people can be reconciled to one another. As the people are reconciled with one another they are sent as a redemptive community into the world (Van Gelder 2007). This new community is intended to be a people if safety. The word used for the place of worship (sanctuary) is a word of safety. This place of safety is one of the things that make this community so beautiful. The breakdown of the family has left people with no safe environment to belong. The community of God is a place where the well being of another is fostered and lived out. Thoennes (1988) after doing a semi-structured study on college students determined the authentic community could not be obtained until people were willing to drop their facade and be real

As a local church grows in size, it must provide opportunities for people to live in small groups (Warren 1995). Atkinson (2014) highlights differences in small groups around the world. He expresses concern that the American church has placed much of her resources providing authentic community for people and there efforts have grown inward. He believes healthy Christian communities do both. The act of evangelism or ministry does not happen apart from the small group environment. Kennedy (1996) argues that small groups cannot be formed or instated in the church just for community sake. He asserts that it is normal for God to bring smaller groups out of larger ones for a purpose. Kennedy places much emphasis on the election of God and raises more questions about methods than he answers, but builds a solid argument that God purposes are fulfilled through small