To hunger for a sense of belonging is human. It’s not the result of evolutionary development. It’s part of our essential nature as creatures made in the image of God. The Triune God has eternally existed as one God in three persons – Father, Son, and Spirit, in perfect relationship with one another. To bear his image is to be hardwired with a capacity and a desire for life in relationship. As God himself says, “It is not good that the man should be alone” (Genesis 3:18). 

The foundation of our practice of community isn’t a felt need for help that ebbs and flows on the tide of our conscious sins and sorrows. The foundation of our practice of community as a church is the identity God gave us at creation and invites us to experience anew through faith in the person and work of his Son, Jesus Christ.

Jesus came to earth to restore our relationship with God, and in so doing, to restore our relationship with one another. It’s because of his life, death, and resurrection that we can say with the Apostle Paul, “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God” (Ephesians 2:19). Practicing community as a church isn’t about creating something for ourselves. It’s about living in the good of the reconciliation with God and man that Jesus accomplished on our behalf. 

Real community is created by Jesus and points back to Jesus. It’s never an end in and of itself. It’s a gift in service of the mission of the gospel. God has a greater goal in our pursuit of community than simply giving us a sense of belonging. He’s using the testimony of our relationships to reveal his goodness to a broken world. “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9). 

And that’s why community and mission at KingsWay are not separate things. Living in community, helping one another follow Jesus in every area of life, is how we fulfill our mission. It’s the context through which we enable the world to see Jesus. Our primary work of ministry as Christians is loving our neighbors together, showing and telling them about the goodness of Jesus together. 

The members of our church do that in hundreds of ways as friends, neighbors, spouses, parents, and employees throughout RVA. Some of it is more formal and organized. A few of those environments are featured on our Groups page, but you won’t find a long list of programs. Most of the work of discipleship at KingsWay (think: helping one another follow Jesus) is done through informal relationships where ordinary people are doing extraordinary things with the help of an extraordinary God.