What does community mean to you? If you’re like me, you know that community – and belonging to a community or communities – is important to you. In fact, simply by nature of you reading this blog, there’s a good chance that you either feel part of the Pinnacle Presbyterian Church community, or you are connected to someone – through some other community, perhaps – who is. Our communities within the church can be large (the whole community of Christian believers) and small (a local congregation) and smaller still (a small group or fellowship group). The human need for interaction, connection, and belonging is a catalyst for our engagement with communities.

So, then, how does community form and how do we find community? These are large questions that have been studied throughout history and I won’t try and answer them now. Instead, I’d like to offer one practice at Pinnacle, and at many other churches, that we’re already doing every Sunday. Each Sunday, after we have corporately and individually confessed our sins and been assured of God’s forgiving love and grace, we take a moment to “pass the peace of Christ” to our neighbors. 

This practice takes many different forms in as many different gatherings of congregations. In some smaller communities, the passing of the peace involves engaging every other worshipper and can last for several minutes. In other churches, the process is over before you’ve had a chance to greet the person to your left and to your right. I wonder if you’ve ever thought much about this practice and, specifically, the connection to peace, and not only as a time of greeting.

We don’t have to look very far to see the need for peace in our individual lives, in our community, and, of course in the world. Humanity has always needed this peace that comes from God. I have been spending time preparing for an Advent class on Mary and I’ve been thinking a lot about her circumstances. Several years ago I was teaching a confirmation class, and after recounting to the students about Mary’s finding out from the angel Gabriel that she was pregnant, and telling them that Mary was about their age, I asked them whether they would expect that Mary would be at peace. One student captured the advent paradox by saying that Mary would likely be experiencing the opposite of peace. And, yet, the beauty of the incarnation and of Mary’s willingness to be the God-bearer, is that God is able to bring Mary to a place of peace and adoration of the God who will show love to the world in the form of the baby Jesus. The transforming power of God is vividly present in the story of Mary’s life.

And the transforming power of God is also present in our worship together. When we connect with one another in our pews, we are coming together as a community, bound in the Holy Spirit and called to be the family of God, united in worship. This is our calling as Christ’s disciples, and it all begins with showing up to worship and being ready to connect with others and with God. The passing of the peace is not merely a Sunday greeting, but rather it is an opportunity to be a part of building community that is centered on the transforming power of God’s love. We practice peace so that we can go into the world and be bearers of God’s peace in a world so very much in need of it.