Christian Community: Participation

Christian community is like the Christian's sanctification; it is a gift of God which we cannot claim. Only God knows the real state of our fellowship, of our sanctification. What may appear weak and trifiling to us may be great and glorious to God. Just as the Christian should not be constantly feeling his spiritaul pulse, so, too, the Christain community has not been given to us by God for us to be constantly taking its temperature. . . . Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize; it is rather a reality created by God in which we may participate.

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together