The age of community has been foreclosed by the age of individuality. Social media made a blanket promise to “connect” people, yet Western civilization has never been more disconnected. Laws are now customarily reshaped for the demands of the individual without concern for the negative effects such legal rearrangements might have on the broader community. Our focus on the people has been undone by our focus on the person.
While remaining a dignified human being, the individual bears a deceitful autonomous capacity apart from the presence of the Holy Spirit. The deception of individualism might be summarized as follows: that the individual is the only moral arbiter that matters; that the individual is the only moral shelter that comforts; and that the individual is the only moral redeemer that saves.
If it was not good in a pre-fallen world for man to be alone, it is no surprise that in a fallen world, we often find ourselves alone. Few would say outright that they want to be alone, but almost all of us live as if that’s what we want: we seek to be “me” rather than “us”; we honor individual “truths” rather than communal beliefs; and we prioritize individual desires rather than familial ones. It is all apparent, then: we are helplessly individuals.
Individualism is a perversion of the created order. The one thing not good about God’s creation was the isolation of Adam, the first human being: “It is not good for man to be alone.” (Genesis 2:18). God Himself is triune: three distinct persons in one. As God is in community with Himself, so we are to be in community with others. Relevantly, God created a distinct institution for two human beings to become one (i.e., marriage), reflecting a similar kind of bond that God Himself has enjoyed for all of eternity. Therefore, to live individualistically is to live in opposition to both the created order and the Creator Himself.
Left to ourselves, there is no reason to be honest unless it advantages one in some way. In a godless worldview, the only semi-legitimate basis for anything comes from the individual’s cognitive output, which is influenced heavily by his or her social environment. For example, if honesty helps the individual increase in socio-economic status, then the individual will likely be honest. But it is usually the opposite, especially in a fallen world: dishonesty seems to get individuals more money and “success” than honesty (though this is not always the case). There is nothing that could possibly unify autonomous individuals aside from fictitious unity rooted in arbitrary externalities (e.g., sports, sexual orientation, etc.). Most importantly, there is nothing to morally unify individuals if all they have is their individual moral selves in common, which is nothing but moral friction.
There is no such thing as real community without God. Before sin entered the world, humankind’s first form of community was in the presence of God. Today, however, our individualism separates us from true fellowship not just with God, but also with one another.
Getting the individual out of the individual is impossible for the individual. But if an ontological authority––that is, someone who is above humans in “being” ––like God makes a claim (or claims) on all of us, which the God of the Bible did at Creation (i.e., imago dei) and at Redemption (i.e., the cross and Holy Spirt), then He, and only He, can unify us.
This is why Jesus Christ, the Son of God, demands that His disciples disavow themselves from all of that individualism: “If anyone wants to come after me, he must deny himself and pick up his cross and follow Me. . . ” (Luke 9:23). Not only does Jesus provide the opportunity for real fellowship, Jesus is the only one who could possibly provide the capacity for it. Before the ascension to heaven, Jesus told His disciples: “it is better for you that I leave so that the Helper will come” (John 16:7). The One who brings unity to us is also the One who lives in us.
Therefore, the social bond for Christians is unlike any other social bond because it does not rest in individual preferences that can change at a moment’s notice (i.e., the team loses, the injury occurs, etc.), but rests in the unjudged judge, the unruled ruler, the uncreated creator of values, God Himself, giving us a community literally meant to last an eternity. Our fellowship is God all the way through: He made us; He called us to Himself; He sent His Spirit to us; and, in calling us to fellowship with one another, we are experiencing greater fellowship with Him. Human beings cannot create this kind of unity. Only God can.
With the knowledge of God uniting us, and the Spirit of God inside of us, there remains little to no room for the individual, giving way to genuine community and fellowship. Since God has called us to honesty and to confess our sins to one another, we have a basis outside of our individual interests for being honest with one another. We are called to honesty not just because it is in our individual interest, but because the infinitely good God of the universe, who is graciously and actively saving us from sin and death, said so. This a community unlike any other because it is from the God “who is like no other.” (Psalm 86:8, 89:6).
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