A Tidal Wave of Community
Meet Josh Riebock and Andy Baxter.
Josh is an unbelievably talented author and perhaps the most influential speaker I’ve ever heard. It’s like King Midas himself touched Josh’s tongue and hand. Josh, defying all good Christian logic, is heavily tatted up, LOVES 80’s music (enough so that he fist pumps anytime Journey starts playing), has a strange affinity for the TV show Dawson’s Creek, and can plant an Inception in your mind better than Leonardo DiCaprio.
Andy is Josh’s protégé. But for a protégé he is the total opposite of Josh,….with the exception of a large number of tattoos also. Andy, like Josh, is silver-tongued and despite his crazy beard is actually a youth pastor. Andy has the most angelic voice I’ve ever heard croon over a guitar and can often be found calling his wife “M’Lady” like he’s some 15th century knight. He’s also the most kind and sensitive man I’ve ever met. I’ve seen him cry during random commercials and when someone talks about Jesus.
And me?
Well, I was the drunk jackass they met over 4 years ago at church at a bar that hit on Josh’s wife.
(I’m quite serious)
About 4 years ago I had just moved to Austin, TX after returning home from Iraq. My life was in shambles and falling apart at the seams. My wife had left me while I was in Iraq, I had no money, no car, and I had one friend in Austin who offered his place to crash and help me pick up the pieces.
Seemed logical.
The problem was I got more depressed, ended up drinking more, and my friend got tired of my depression. That’s when the intervention happened. CHURCH! He suggested taking me to “church to maybe find a nice Christian girl!” I mean, that’s the next logical step after a divorce, right?
Enter Josh.
I heard him speak at a bar downtown. Ironically, the church we were checking out had organized this event to attract 20-somethings. He seemed like a cool guy, but I was a little confused. He was covered in tattoos and athletic, so my immediate thought being raised in a strict Christian environment was “There’s no WAY this guy is a pastor!” But that night as he spoke every heartstring in my body got plucked like Van Halen on a harpsichord and I was deeply moved.
I had never had that happen before……
After the service, I bee-lined straight for him and stuck out my hand. He had look of panic at first and I later found out why. During my time in Iraq I spent every waking moment, when I wasn’t on a mission, eating gyms and mainlining protein like a human petri dish for GNC. I had packed on 20 pounds of muscle in about a year and basically looked like the Hulk. So when you have a dude the size of a small mac truck heading for you, you naturally assume he’s angry. And then when you stick out your hand and give the crazy, half-cocked Hulk smile from the Avengers movie, there’s only one logical conclusion to be drawn – This dude is going to crush my hand.
But I didn’t crush his hand (as Josh later told me he thought I would), and I’ll never forget the introduction or what he said.
“Hey……My name’s Ben….but my friend’s call me…….………………………Sledge”
Josh: “Of course they do”
Josh and I ended up hitting it off really well, despite my “Hulk Smash” introduction, and started hanging out. In fact, we hit it off SO well, I hit on his wife by accident….I DIDN’T KNOW SHE WAS TAKEN….DONT JUDGE ME……It was this really awkward moment at the bar/church thing when I caught a pretty-young-blond thing out of the corner of my eye and decided to throw game at her.
“So this church/bar thing is pretty cool, huh?”
“Yeah, sure is!”
“So what’d you think about Josh’s message? Really deep huh? Oh hey Josh, have you met…..…uggghhh, I’m sorry I haven’t caught your name?”
“Ha, this is Kristen….she’s my wife!”
You know that scene in Top Gun where Maverick is yelling at Goose to pull the eject button, but you know Goose is a goner? Yeah…that was playing through my mind.
Despite this monumental fail, Josh and I began to hang out, but I was afraid once he really knew who I was…..a guy who struggled with depression, anger, was violent, had a drinking problem, a sex addiction, a pornography problem, you name it…that he’d run away. Christians don’t identify themselves with those kind of people, right? Right?
Slowly, I began to trust Josh and reveal small parts of my brokenness, each time expecting him to run away, express his disgust, or look at me like I was an alien life form. But he would just listen and say things like “I can’t imagine how tough that must be….how are you holding up? How can I pray for you and encourage you?” Then something I had never expected happened.
“Ben….I’m in counseling.”
“What…… type of counseling?”
“Deep depression. Like, real bad depression. The type where I can’t get out of bed depression. My parents died unexpectedly last year, my upbringing was a mess….Dad had a drinking problem. Mom slept in a separate room. I dunno man…..I just thought you should know…..you need to know it’s okay to not be okay”
It was in this moment I began to trust Josh, to see that he was just as broke as I was, but subconsciously I still believed it was still only a matter of time before he bailed once he saw what a wicked person I was.
But he never did……
During lunch one day, Josh brought one of his friends along. A guy that looked like he had either recently eaten out of a dumpster or planned on lumberjacking the rest of his life (I later discovered the correct term is “hipster”).
As Josh and I’s friendship was just blossoming, and I was still insecure, my initial thought was “we may need to fight.” The problem was this man had one of the most disarming smiles and bear hugged me leaving me in utter shock. He could have walked up and said:
“Hey I’m Andy Baxter and I’m going to stab you now” and I probably would have let him. That’s how kind and gentle he was.
During lunch that day, Andy asked me to “share my story”. I found it strange that he wept when I told him what was going on in my life. I was confused, but there’s was something there I hadn’t felt in a very long time. Love.
Each week with them was a new journey. Every hangout was filled laughter, high fives, movies, pubs, late night talks, prayer, Greek food, Dave and Busters, pranks, meals with their family. They walked beside me and challenged me on the things in my life and of how I viewed God. I fell down often, most times never telling them that I had got drunk again just like last weekend, or fooled around with a woman I barely knew.
Eventually when I did they just loved me.
It reminds me of this really beautiful story in the Bible about a guy named David, who eventually becomes King of Israel. And in this story, David meets the current King of Israel’s son, named Jonathan. David and Jonathan end up swearing blood oath’s to one another and end up best friends. And in what I feel is one of the most poetic lines in all the Bible, it says that “the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul”.
That’s a deep love right there! We’re not talking, “Oh I love tacos” or even “I love my parents/girlfriend/boyfriend”, this is talking about the eternal. The soul being eternal, and that the way they loved one another conquered even the great beyond.
Do you walk that deep with anyone? And if not, why?
Because you see, Andy and Josh are part of my community. We walk deep with one another. I can tell you stories when Andy would hold me and cry, when I felt less than the least. There were times Josh would drop whatever he was doing to love on me. Andy and Josh should never have had to put up with the majority of self centered crap I put them through, but they didn’t care. They loved me as they’re own flesh. As their own soul. And I love them as my own soul.
This story I’m telling you is just a snapshot of community. That there are people that care about you enough to love you, call you on your junk, fight for you, and carry you when you’re to weak to stand.
I would encourage you to surround yourself with a community that will go to war for you, and if you’re sitting here saying “well Sledge I don’t have any friends”, then hear this:
Neither did I when I moved to Austin. I knew one guy. That’s it.
But. I found people who were willing to fight for me.
Find those people. Saturate yourself with them and fight for that type of community. Jake (Luhrs) and I are currently in the process of fighting for community with one another and growing deep in our relationship. We didn’t know one another prior to HeartSupport, but we want to be a representation of what we believe this community is going to be. And you know what I’ve found in Jake? Another David whose soul is slowly being knit to mine.....but is taking time.
And what do we believe this community at HeartSupport can become?
That in cities worldwide people on the prayer wall connect, wrestle, and encourage one another. That you share, weep, laugh, celebrate victories, and talk of the sting of defeat only to get back up. You guys have the power of social media in your hands. You can be a community that is HEARD. When a wave is started in the ocean, tiny molecules bounce around until they ultimately gain enough energy and momentum to create an unstoppable force of nature. This community can be a picture of that wave when enough of us collide into one another, for good….or for destruction.
We leave that decision in your hands.
Community: What Does It LOOK like?
There have been a number of times where I've been told and taught that community by definition is a social construct and perspective of people interacting with one another for a larger purpose. That's a great definition from a textbook or for the sake of a classroom environment, but it just never felt like enough. When I saw the objectives and details for the month of May with Heart Support I experienced the exact same thought as in a classroom: "alright. I know what it is to define." The question I couldn't seem to answer with enough credit centered on uncovering what community looked like, and its significance in the larger picture that we create as people striving toward a goal. I kept thinking about the idea of community and the different things that I could manage to present for my blog this month only to realize that maybe, even in my own communities here at school, I still have a ton to learn about how they facilitate and what it is that I can do to better the machine. Community, in its own standalone definition, relates to the idea of people coming together and attempting to forge new connections- to promote a stable ground through the busy nature of everyday life- struggles and achievements combined. Yet, there's still a piece that I'm desperate to uncover and that I hope will truly get the heart at what we're trying to create as the people of this organization: what does community look like?
"There's no I in team." That's the phrase so many of us hear in the early years of childhood. Some of us might even still reiterate the same theme today, to ourselves or the other people that we encounter on a daily basis. This concept, whether repeatedly said throughout childhood in a game or group setting or, mumbled under your breath in the middle of a difficult situation still applies. Community means that there is a group of people who share the same heart and vision toward a common goal. The size and number of those in the group proves insignificant. Instead, the importance is each individual brings heart and dedication to the project that lies ahead. Community calls to the individuals to put aside personal goals and come together toward the aspirations of the overall group.
Will it be easy to put aside personal values for the "bigger picture?" It's never easy. Group perspective and human vulnerability is never a gift handed easily, but it's possible and achievable.
What must persist though, throughout the challenges of each, is the heart of each person and their ability to sit and hear the need. A community comes together to tell a much larger story than the ones we've personally created. A community comes together for the sake of telling an intricate detail of this honestly broken world and when those words have been uttered, the community stands tall and connected to keep the hope and the faith. Will standing tall in the face of hardship, in the lack of energy and tired seasons be easy? Of course not, but it's a possibility. The building and the effort is always a possibility. Again, it comes back to where the heart lies and the true dedication of those around us.
Think for a second of the communities you're a part of. There's communities at the school the attend, the church you go to, the job you have, the clubs you're in, the music you like, the family each of us come from, the goals you aspire to achieve. Think about it: communities are a part of how we function as a mobile society. They exist; they sprout up in more places we tend to acknowledge. In those moments then, the question comes not from what community is but what it looks like.
I've had the opportunity to go to a great school just outside of Philadelphia, Arcadia University. I remember when I was first deciding on schools 3 years ago how much I wanted to feel a part of a community. I remember how much I wanted to just make some moves and make the experience one bigger than myself. I remember wanting to feel connected to the people of the school and to a city I love so much. Now, three years later, I can definitely say that God has opened the doors for community to be fostered here. Not only that but, for it to become an overwhelming component of my life.
Arcadia's a school that prides itself on extending a hand to the community of the students and of reaching further out to the Philadelphia area. What does it look like? Community looks like students taking their time on a few Sundays of the week to go and complete service projects. Whether it's packing things to be recycled, holding a family weekend for prospective students, or packing backpacks for inner- city kids. That's one facet of the community. Community paints the picture of people working together to spark a conversation or make a statement, no matter how large or small.
Arcadia dedicates itself to making a community for the first- year students who come here and through their orientation program upperclassmen attempt to facilitate the commonalities between students as they attempt to connect to one another. Therefore, the conversation sparks around the beginnings of college life and the blend of people who come together in this new environment. The statement, in its own way, comes in the ability to mesh the newest class of students together before the start of classes. Thereafter, the fostering of relationships then continues as the semester moves forward and the changes of students is just something phenomenal. It still makes me wonder sometimes.
Is it challenging; of course. Is it awkward at times; of course! It's the ability to persevere that makes the experience that much more worthwhile. Community then, takes the shape and the perspective of those who first breathe life into its creation.
Recently I've applied to a local graduate school in Philadelphia masters degree in counseling psychology. When asked about which concentration I'd like to pursue in the program I chose the community track almost instantly. When asked why I chose that track specifically I explained that I want to be at the heart of the situation. I believe that to be in community and to understand it is to be willing to dive in, trust God, and just take what He has to offer us. Allow ourselves to hear the stories of those around us because those interactions are the most significant, whether or not we're consciously aware of it. The truth is, I love the way that a community can take shape, the way that it can transform, and the way that it can spark discussions and needs bigger than ever before imagined.
Community has become a word and a definition you can find in any sociology textbook. The movement and steps it provides for are even more beautiful. Think about the communities your part of: make a list if you have to. Look at that list. Digest it, pray over it, and dare to be the one that takes the first step to make it noticeable. When that happens just remember: don't do it for personal gain. Instead, pursue it for the movement of the world. Do it to meet the need and start the conversation.
Call it a little ridiculous, but this is just one instance of our community: five students of Arcadia Christian Fellowship, myself included, spending our spring break in Quebec to spread the knowledge of His Kingdom. As you can see, we were stoked.
How do YOU influence your community?
You can’t change people. You don’t have the ability to control their thoughts or behavior. But you can change the course of someone’s life. You can make an impact to divert them from the path they’re walking, or influence them to make a pivotal decision. The choice we have is an opportunity given to us by God; a free choice.
You can lead the people around you in a direction that could take them in a totally different direction. Now whether that is for better or worse is up to you. What is the impact you make on people? Do you drag them down or lift them up? Are you guiding people in love, encouragement, inspiration, and positive influence, or are you drowning people in negative comments, lashing out, anger, disrespect, dishonor, and bullying? Are you just a cynic? Instead of complaining how others affect you, ask how you affect others.
We sometimes associate ourselves with people who aren’t healthy for us. Sometimes we place ourselves in groups of people that negatively influence us and point us in the wrong direction, and it’s really easy for us to point the finger at those people when we figure out who they really are…but that's not what I’m talking about.
Are you the person who is poorly influencing others? Are you the one who needs to be shut out or pushed away? Community is important…believe in it or not, you are a part of one. How are you impacting the people around you? Do you help them stay afloat do you drown them? Do strength, encouragement and inspiration flow from you, or do you wallow in negativity, bashing, gossip, and perverse speech?
Community is important because it shapes who we are as people. So be the good in whatever community you find yourself in.
