Thoughts On Community ???

I've been thinking about community a lot more these days. How do you create it? How do we make it authentic? (ooh forgive the 'christianese' buzz word) And better yet, how do you cultivate it and KEEP it authentic, given the crazy pace, distance, and ever-changing nature of modern life?

There are moments when I definitely feel like authentic community is in fact happening ... like today when I logged on to my blog and saw all the New Valley peeps there with their comments and fellow blogs. And yet, the truth is that my heart desires so much more than weblinks, common clicks, and profiles. I want the real people! I want so much more committment to and from other friends. So much more 'face-time'. So much more prayer and sharing one another's burdens and celebrations in day-to-day life. And so much LESS surface relationships, shallow conversations, and fraud.

Jesus, chose 3 of the 12 disciples to engage on a more personal level; to go deeper with and to let inside his closest circle. Maybe the problem is that we honestly think we can foster authentic community with TOO MANY PEOPLE at the same time! I'm guessing that if the Savior of the World felt like he could handle 3 inner peeps, that I might be biting off a bigger flinstones vitamin than I can chew with my personal network of roughly 200 people. What do you think?

Anyway, I'm looking forward to moving south and closer to the church and some friends. I look foward to fostering deeper community with a select few (for starters) and seeing where it leads me. I'm looking forward to becoming a more complete, understood, loving person. I'm looking forward...