The Fruit of Salvation is Grown in a Community Garden (Colossians 3:12–17)

“ ¹² Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, ¹³ bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.” —Colossians 3:12–13 (ESV)

Growth in Christ, or sanctification, has two parts, mortification and vivification. If mortification is an odd cat, vivification is an extraterrestrial green alien. The word is rare, the reality likewise. To mortify is to kill, to vivify, to enliven.

One reason that vivification is rare is that it requires community. Solo spirituality cannot sanctify. The virtues of Paul’s vivify list all deal with people and they assume people are something to deal with. Just as you must kill the old, know that your brother is doing likewise. He has to deal with you and you with him. If you want to kill the old man, you must do so in community. False spirituality is an individual sport where you get to show your best. The Christian faith is a team sport. We see one another at our best and at our worst, and we admonish and teach one another for the good of the whole.

Too many pick a community where there is no need for this. They don’t really know anyone and they come together on the basis of secondary issues. Hobby churches, instead of carrying a byline like, “est. 2010,” need to be honest and say “dividing the church since 2010.” The unifying factor of the church becomes Jesus plus. Jesus plus bikes. Jesus plus cowboy culture. Jesus plus hipster culture. Jesus plus music preference. Michael Horton warns:

“It is not my church to shape into my image, according to my own cultural preferences, ethnic background, politics, or socioeconomic location. It is Christ’s community—and he is the location that we all share together. He is the demographic niche and the political rallying point of this kingdom. I still belong to other groups based on my cultural affinities, but my family is not something I choose; it is something I am chosen for.”

Get in a church that is centered on Jesus so that it crucifies your flesh, so that you center on Jesus. Get in a place where you have to put on love; a love that has its roots in Christ.

Sanctification is communal. We are not simply to put on the new man, we are to put on the new humanity, a new humanity comprised of Jew and Gentile, black and white, cowboy and biker, hipster and boomer, all because Christ is all and in all (Colossians 3:11).