Thread by @gwhitehurst

Community group, life group, small group - whatever your church might call it. I believe in them because I’ve seen and experienced the fruit they bear.

But if I’m honest, more often than not I don’t want to attend. I really don’t want to attend.

We gather on a weeknight at 7 PM. Most of the time I look around our little circle and see people like me who are clearly exhausted from a long day at work. Tired eyes, stifled yawns, foggy brains.

There must be a better time to meet than this, but it seems to be the only thing that works for most.

New parents with babies usually can’t make it. No cars to transport the family here. Or parking spaces. There’s no spare room for generous volunteers to take care of the kids who are there.

Thank God for our hosts, who generously open their home to us every week, but ( and by no fault of theirs) it’s hot and cramped for 8+ people. No complaint here, it’s just the nature of doing this in New York City.

Sometimes the discussion is interesting. Most of the time it isn’t. Most of the time people sit there and don’t respond.

Questions like “what stands out to you in this passage?” don’t always produce staggering answers at 7 PM from tired people who would rather be at home winding down (we need better questions).

We meet until 9. We might end early, or late. Then we all walk home or walk to the subway or bus that takes us home (no comfy, easy cars here, remember?). Some nights you aren’t home until 10.

Recap: We all head straight from work to CG where we sit in a hot, small apartment, trying to pay attention while hungry children - who should be in bed - run wild. We might debate something if we have the energy. Most likely people will stare at the floor.

We go home tired. I often go home stressed. It’s hard, it’s really, really hard.

I once asked an elder at our church why we do this...why we put ourselves through this every week.

He didn’t respond right away. He thought about it for a few moments, then teared up and said, “Because Jesus is there.”

I hated him for that answer because I wanted something easier. But he’s right.

This doesn’t always look beautiful, and we don’t always have great discussions, but we pray for each other, we babysit for each other, we help each other move, we have each other. Christ makes us grow while we don’t see it.

I only wrote all of this out to convince myself to go to CG tonight. Again, I find myself dreading it. I have so many other things to get done at home. But Jesus is there, so I go. I pray he continues to work in us through the mundane, small, repetitive things.