Little girls make friends so easily.
On the playground it consists of nothing more than shared interest, inhabiting the same place in the space/time continuum and a tag-you’re-IT mentality.
Naomi walks right up to two little boys near the slide, Can we be friends? Let’s play on the swings. I’ll show you how to swing on your belly...
And off the three of them run. Together. No gender issues. No worrying about status or name or race or worldview. They don’t even try to beat each other to the swing set: they know there is more than enough playground equipment to go around.
It’s just three preschoolers happy to be at the park, happy to find someone else to share the morning with and happy to look eye-level at another kid.
Three-year-old community.
And an example for us.
So often I feel like I’m in the search for community. There isn’t much community in suburbia unless I look for it. And somehow, in my search, I seem to want to look across the table from people exactly like me. I’m going to be honest, I never actually think this. But on this lofty search without thinking about it I set out for people who believe like me and in some ways look like me.
I know I’m not alone in this, so I’m going to be vulnerable. Sometimes, before becoming friends I conduct an “interview”: I weigh comments and ideas and beliefs of the other person and in the depths of my brain, I make some kind of judgment about how close we can become based on these ideas. Less like me, less close. More like me, we can be bosom buddies.
But this isn’t right. It’s horrible, I know. And I realized this when I watched the three-year-olds swing on their bellies at the playground. They were different. They didn’t come from the same place. But they all just wanted to play.
Friendships are richer when we are different. They can actually be better when we find those people who are our opposites. They rub off our rough edges.
Churches are stronger when we come from different backgrounds. We all add our wisdom to the work, wisdom that has come from vastly different experiences and lives.
And because of this, I think community is better when we aren’t alike. Our lives would be so much sweeter if we were less consumed about the what’s and why’s and more concerned about being friends and letting others into our lives and hearts without worrying about the outcome.
I need friends who aren’t like me. It’s important.
I need people around me who don’t think like me. I need blog commenters who disagree. It’s good for the community.
So, even if we don’t all think the same or look the same, let’s jump on the slide and play tag for the morning. Let’s be friends, no matter what. We’ll be better for it.
How do you find community? Am I alone in this?
