Importance of Community

I have been back home almost a month now and it has been quite an eventful return. I have been getting my business going, seeking community connections, working on our home, and re-establishing routines that work for me. In all this, I found myself engaging more with others and praying for God to bring me to people that I can build relationships with. This is not just professionally but personally and spiritually.

I have been a social person most of my life and despite moving around in my twenties and having different jobs and going to new schools, I never had a hard time making friends, connecting with co-workers, or just feeling surrounded by like minded people. This changed when I graduated from PT school and being in my thirties, my cohort was starting families, had been established at their job, and in my mind, getting settled into their lives. I found myself on the outside looking in, feeling disconnected and somewhat alone. To a degree, I made my own bed by the career path I chose of traveling for work, which obviously didn’t help the social isolation. I did start to build relationships where I went, but given the nature of traveling, I had to move on after three to six months. This began to play a role on a growing sense of need for community.

In 2023, I landed in Montana and began to seek out groups, but for several reasons, things didn’t really foster into relationships I was seeking. It certainly was harder than when I was in my twenties! Between our busy lives, personal and family agendas and priorities, a growing superficiality in culture, distractions from stress and social media, and a society that values individualism, it is challenging to find and build a friendship these days. Fortunately, I have relied on God to help quiet the voices of loneliness and self pity. It has not been easy and I still hear those voices daily, but the prayer helps dampen their volume and effect.

“Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.” (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10) This verse highlights the importance of community, in that we are to support one another. Further, the classic verse “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” from Proverbs 27:17, shows that we get stronger when we are together. I am a firm believer that when we are alone, much like a solitary gazelle in the desert, we are in peril of failing pray to the devil. When we have people around us to hold us up, keep us accountable as Christians, and remind us of God’s love and fidelity, we become closer to what God intends us to be. Friends and disciples in Christ.