We need each other.

I read a fair amount of books. Typically, I read theology or analyses of Western culture or missiology, but when my brain wants a break, I read about ecology, ornithology, or some other biological science.

Fun, right?

Currently, I’m reading a book called Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake, and it’s about fungi. I live for this stuff. Keep your hobbits and your sci-fi and your romances. I have fungi.

Fungi are amazing, and are essential to so many processes necessary for life on our planet. For example, trees in forests are connected by mycorrhizal (myco = fungi, rhizal = rhizome, roots) networks that entangle the roots of trees thoughout the forest. Amazingly, trees are able to communicate with one another along these fungal networks, and can send chemical messages and signals to other trees, share nutrients, and even warn other trees of disease or pests. It’s incredible! Trees need each other!

Bear with me, because I promise I’m going somewhere with this.

We talk a lot about being a Psalm 1 church. In this Psalm, we’re compared to trees who are planted by water and bear fruit in their season. Our church is like a collection of trees, or a forest. If we were to do a little bit of theology, we would say that the church is instituted, or put in place, by Christ, and constituted, or made up by, the Holy Spirit.

As I was reading about mycorrhizal networks (Truly, I am happy and living a good life), I was struck by how our church is connected by the unseen work of the Holy Spirit, which mystically and miraculously binds us together in our fellowship. Together, we’re like a forest, made up of trees who are dependent on one another to live into who we are fully called to be, and we’re connected and bound together by the mysterious work of God through the Holy Spirit.

Put simply, we need each other, but we’re more than a simple collection of people. We’re people living a life together by the work of God.

As we talk about re-dedicating ourselves through this season, we’ve talked about being rededicated to fellowship. It’s simply not optional for us. We need to be together to live into the full vision of who God is calling us to be, both as individuals and as the collective people of God. As you continue to work on following the Jesus way, and as you strive to be a tree planted deeply, remember that you need your fellow people on the way, and that the Holy Spirit is keeping us together in the mystical bonds of love. We need each other!