Genuine Alternative Community

Now we are all waking up to the fact that there is clearly widespread dis-enfranchisement in our Western democracies, its time for us as 21st Century Christ followers to take seriously our call to be genuine alternative communities.

People have been talking about the issue of the 2% ruling it all for the 98% for a while now (my favourite is Graeber in his book 'The Democracy Project'), but perhaps we hadn't anticipated the unpredictable and erratic outcomes this might eventually generate.

While these unsettling winds swirl around us, remember that our hope is rooted in a more certain reality - as I wrote back in June. With our ultimate citizenship firmly in focus, political events - no matter how significant - can be viewed as second order effects!

That should inform how we are, and how we live. Furthermore, God calls us into communities and not simply to live in hope-filled yet isolated bubbles of individualism. And communities, clusters of ordinary people uniting around a common vision and purpose, can achieve incredible things ... all the more incredible when the grace of God underpins them!

So with people up and down our countries desperately grasping for some kind of alternative, seemingly any alternative, let us quietly model the genuine alternative. Centred on the one who truly comes alongside, who saves, redeems and re-builds. Someone who, as we become united with him, enables us to connect more deeply and properly with our neighbour. One who establishes a Kingdom that is characterised by the 100% desiring peace with the 100%.