Finding Happiness in Community, just as God Intended
It is so easy to lose our sense of what’s really important.
The Declaration of Independence claims that among our rights is “the pursuit of happiness.” Experience teaches us that it is easier to pursue happiness than to actually find it. As it turns out, we usually seek happiness in all the wrong places. Thinking about the average American, most of us seek happiness in “fulfilling” and especially lucrative careers. We pound this into kids at an early age – “What do you want to be when you grow up?” The critical word there being the use of what rather than who. We fondly smile at the child who says they want to be a “mommy” or a “daddy” - we think their quaint reply has missed the point.
The reality is quite the opposite: it is we who have missed the point. To be sure, a good job and enough material resources is an important component to happiness (poverty is no happy condition), but happiness is not reducible to these things. A stage is an important component for a play, but it is not the play. Many erect the staging for a happy life, only to find it empty. The true joy of the theater is only found when there is a cast.
Stepping beyond analogy, what the child knows and what Scripture tells us is that relationships are critical for human happiness. In the record of God’s creation of Adam, God states in Genesis 2:18, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” God then of course creates Eve as Adam’s partner. The woman is a notable addition. Adam (and any individual) can only find full happiness if he is in good relationship with God, but God was not content to create a solitary human being. The very human nature that God designed requires “a helper” - human relationships are required for the design to be complete. Human happiness per God’s design requires relationship with Him and other human beings.
Of course, human relationships have been fractured along with our relationship with God. In our presentation of the Gospel, we often emphasize the possibility of a restored relationship between God and the individual human being who trusts in Jesus Christ as Savior. This is true and it is a decisive stride toward our final happiness, but if that is all we say then we are seriously short-changing the Good News. Again and again, Jesus ties our forgiveness and reconciliation with God to our forgiveness and reconciliation with other human beings (Mat. 6:12, Mat. 18:21-35, Lk 6:37, Lk 17:3-4 ). The full measure of the Gospel is captured by Paul’s words in Galatians 3:27-28,
For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
Jesus tears down every divider so that believers now live in restored human community – what good news! This holds greater promise than merely being on good terms with each other; this peace is not merely the absence of war. The peace of Christian community brings us into living, breathing communion with each other. We can’t say there is never any conflict, but we can say that because of Jesus there is endless grace. This grace liberates us to embrace, no longer holding each other at arm’s length.
On Sunday, I referred to Acts 2:42-47 as the model of Christian community. Verses 6 and 7 especially captures the transformed condition of the believers: “And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people.” Notice how their relationship with God and their relationships with each other are woven together and the outcome is their happiness.
There is much to say for how the Church is instrumental in Christian growth; this alone would commend church participation and would increase happiness as you become more like Jesus. However, there is something more that MUST be understood: your relationships with other believers are not merely instrumental means for your Christian growth or their Christian growth. These relationships are ends in themselves – they exist for mutual enjoyment, for human happiness. Your Christian brothers and sisters are God’s gift to you in Jesus Christ. God created Eve because it was not good for Adam to be alone, and God has given us the Church community because it is still not good for us to be alone. It is good for us to be together; it makes us happy.
As a pastor, I know some won’t take me seriously because they assume this is just what I’m supposed to say, I’m biased, etc. However, you should know that everything I’m saying enjoys the broad support of sociological study. Any religious community (Christian or otherwise) will tend to increase human happiness because humans are wired for relationships. The Church stands in a league of her own because she can offer grace to all the prodigals. Other religions (apart from simply being false) face the real challenge of restoring others without the grace of the Gospel. Setting that aside, we can recognize that any community with substantive relationships will tend to promote happiness. If you are interested in these studies, you should check out The Human Flourishing Program at Harvard and explore the studies linked below.
My basic charge to every Christian (and invitation to those just starting to seek) is that you share life together with those in your local church. Have meals in your home, do fun things with each other, and of course study and worship together. This will make you happy, just as God intended.
Association Between Religious Service Attendance and Lower Suicide Rates Among US Women
Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright © 2001, 2007, 2011, 2016 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Rev. Tom Loghry
Tom Loghry is the senior pastor of Rockland Community Church in North, Scituate, RI. He is a graduate of the Berkshire Institute for Christian Studies, Toccoa Falls College (B.S. Pastoral Ministry), and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (M.A. Theology). He is continuing his graduate studies in the area of “Ethics & Society” at GCTS.