Learning about Community from an Unlikely Source
Doug
Yesterday my car started over-heating on the highway. I was with a good friend of mine and we quickly pulled over at the nearest exit and prayed for a place to stop. God led us to a Valvoline where I found out that my car had to be towed. Little did I know God was ready to teach me about community from a most unlikely source.
He was a scruffy, cigarette-smoking, 48 year-old country boy with a deep Kentucky drawal. As we got into his tow truck, we started asking him questions. It wasn’t long before he told us about how he was a member of the “Vannin Club.” Yep, you heard it right. The Vannin Club. We told him we had never heard of such a thing. And he was more than excited to tell us all about it. In fact, he gave me the offical Vannin’ website and here’s what it says:
For those of you new to vanning, or who have somehow stumbled across us, vanning is a culture unlike anything else you may have ever dealt with. Vanners are like a big family, they will travel for hours, even days to see each other on a regular basis. They watch out for each other, they celebrate together, and sometimes… they mourn together. Vanners are a diverse bunch brought together by their common love for the sport of vanning. Some people like to just camp out of their vans, while other prefer to make their van into something more them. Sometimes that is just curtains and a bed, for others its something they put their all into, chopping, gull wings, tubbing,..It’s amazing what you can do with a van. Whatever level of vanning you may enjoy, you do it because you want to. Vanning is also a very social event, we do some wild and crazy things, and consume more than our fair share of alcohol.
There you have it. Vanners are “like a big family … they watch out for each other, celebrate together, and sometimes even mourn together… a diverse group brought together by their common love for the sport of vanning.” Wow. Makes you want to be a vanner! So as we thumped along in the front of his tow truck, this guy kept jabbering about his Vannin’ Club and the community he experienced there. He rambled on and on about how much he loved it. We just sat and listened.
Finally it was time to get out. We shook his greasy hand, told him thanks, and said good-bye. But he wasn’t done. He actually turned to us, looked at us in the eye, and asked us to come to his next “Vanning Club” get-together. We laughed out loud … but he was totally serious. And as he rode off, I turned to my friend and said, “Weird. He just invited us to his church, didn’t he?!”
You see, for this 48 year-old, buck-toothed, cigarette-smoking Kentucky hick, vannin club is where he’s found community. He couldn’t help but talk about it, and in the end, invite us to be a part of it.
Everyone is looking for community. Some find it in the strangest of places. But I learned something from this simple tow truck driver. He found community and was eager to talk about it and invite others into it. Am I? After all, I’m part of a community too. A community centered on something that will last forever. A community centered on a Savior who bled and died on my behalf. All other kinds of community are only faint pictures of the real thing our hearts were made for.
And to think God used a tow truck driver to teach me all of that.
Written by Doug Wolter - Visit Website
July 23rd, 2010 at 3:57 pm
Great post Doug!
July 23rd, 2010 at 7:26 pm
You should show up there!
Good stuff, Doug.
July 27th, 2010 at 9:14 pm
[...] Doug Wolter on learning about community from an unlikely source. [...]
July 29th, 2010 at 2:26 am
Doug,
We have had some good conversation on this topic so far at our church. I am wrestling with the idea of community. I go back and forth about what biblical community should look like and be.
I am convicted and inspired and frustrated and confused and hopeful all at the same time when I read the blog post. I want Christos to be like that…I want church in general to be like that for everyone.
However, I thought, is this a realistic expectation–no, a biblical expectation? Although the immediate comparison of the church community to the vanning club seems legitimate because it is an authentic community, there is a glaring difference I think. What would Paul say if you asked him about his vanning club (aka church experience)–especially with the church at Corinth? I think Paul would say, my vanning club at Corinth is filled with adulterers of the worst kind–the kind that sleep with their step moms, selfish consumers who fight over which apostle is more amazing, hysterical worshippers who try to gain all the attention with their abuse of spiritual gifts, immature people who are filled with jealousy and strife, brothers who are going to court against each other, hypocrites who are participating in idol worship right before taking the Lord’s Supper, and undiscerning people who are believing all kinds of crazy things about the Resurrection. BUT–Paul would say, that the people of his Corinthian vanning club are blessed saints in the Lord who have been forgiven, redeemed, washed clean of their sins by the blood of Christ! And it is because of this Gospel reality that he is willing to stick it out with these people.
i think we have to be careful about how we idealize community. I don’t think the vanning club in the blog would stick together very long if the members were sleeping around on their parents, fighting over who should lead the group, provoking the other members to jealousy over how awesome their van was, taking each other to court over silly matters, or any of the other things the Corinthian church was doing. The vanning club in the blog sticks together because although the people are diverse they probably like each other relatively well. The Church is entirely different. Church community consists of people that are very different, who sin against each other, who don’t like each other from time to time, who do all kinds of bad, hypocritical things–yet they stick together because the call to Christian community is to learn how to die to ourselves for the sake of the Gospel, for the sake of the church, for the sake of community, and for the sake of the glory of God. Our enjoyment of community does not primarily come from how much we like each other, but from how much we are being rescued from destroying each other by the Gospel! The overflow of joy in the Gospel is joy in each other because we can look at each other and announce the Gospel to each other–the very Gospel that forgives us of sin and helps very different people with very different backgrounds with very different sinful tendencies with very different agendas, frustrations, and preferences come together around a common Savior.
We must be careful that we don’t get fired up and invite people to our community because of how awesome our community is–that is idolatry. We invite people to our community because of how awesome the Savior of the community is and what he is doing to enable our diverse community to gradually die to ourselves and become more and more authentic. A very subtle difference, but a vital difference that signifies whether the church community is a temple of the living God or a synagogue of Satan (Rev 3:9).
July 29th, 2010 at 6:42 am
Couldn’t agree more Chad. Thanks for bringing this out. Community can become an idol and will fail us and disappoint us because it’s made up of broken sinners like you and me. But Jesus will not fail us or disappoint us. He died for us and accepts us and is for us and not against us. Robert Putnam once said that community must have a goal beyond community in order to thrive. I agree. Our focus and our center is Jesus just as the body is dependent on it’s head for everything. Good stuff, man. Do you mind if I quote some of your comment as a separate blog post?
July 29th, 2010 at 10:05 am
Doug,
We are really wrestling with this issue right now at our church. We are having great discussion as we seek to think through what community looks like. We have all landed on the reality that people will go to community events and be involved in community when they see the value of community. For example, how many of us have not wanted to go to a church event because we are tired, busy, frustrated, etc?! So, what is it that makes you go? The temptation is that we want to make church into the Vanning Club, so that it is fun and exciting. However, the biblical reality is that sometimes you have to die to yourself and go for the sake of the greater community even though you don’t really want to go. If you end up not going because you don’t think it will be fun, or you won’t get anything out of it, or it will be more work than it is worth–you have to ask yourself the question, do you really value biblical community. But this points to a deeper reality–what is the point of biblical community? To celebrate the Gospel! It is so easy for us to ignore this reality and make community an end in itself when biblical community must be about making the Gospel the end.
I thinking through more stuff on community, but that is all for now!
Yes you can quote any of this in a blog.
Chad
July 29th, 2010 at 10:33 am
Yes, I think we value community when we value Christ as the center of that community. And the body can point us to the fullness of Christ’s love … I think of Pauls prayer in Eph 3 about comprehending with ALL THE SAINTS what is the length and height and breadth of the love of God. One other thing…I don’t think it was so much the fun and excitement that attracted this guy to the Vannin club as much as it was the mutual love and friendship he felt there. People aren’t looking for a friendly fun community as much as they are looking for real friends! But of course even Christian friends will fail us but Christ will not. And I agree that as we get to know him more deeply we become like him in his death and will embrace discomfort and incovenience like he did for the joy set before him.
This is good discussion brother. We should do this community discussion LIVE and in person sometime!!
July 30th, 2010 at 1:24 am
Great point! I agree that this guy continues going to the Vanning Club because of the mutual love and friendship. We are definitely on the same page. I, too, long for this kind of reality in the community of the Body of Christ!
Yes, we should do this discussion live! We should record it on video and post it like those other fancy blogs (aka Between Two Worlds, the Resurgence, etc)!!!
Talk to you soon!
Chad
July 30th, 2010 at 11:53 am
[...] few days ago I wrote this post and it triggered some good dialogue with a friend of mine about the gospel and community. This [...]
September 11th, 2010 at 1:05 pm
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