God wants to create a people, and Jesus pursued that theme, that message, as a matter of course. All his teachings can be seen in that light. He gathered people together in community–first the disciples and spreading out from there. We can’t understand Jesus’ message properly without acknowledging his drive to form a community of faith. For example, he says in Luke’s gospel, “Whoever does not gather with me scatters.” (11:23)
To form that community of God’s Kingdom, we join our life with the lives of others in a new way–not simply by helping others, as admirable as that is, but by sustaining each other and reorienting each other toward a common goal.
To orient our lives properly, we need to be open to correction–easy to say, but not so easy to do. Who wants to admit they’re wrong? Not many of us. It’s mutual correction that Jesus calls us to practice, which means removing the log from our eye before complaining about the splinter in our neighbor’s eye, as he tells us in one of his teachings.
The idea of mutual correction is seen throughout the New Testament letters. For us to grow as a community of faith, we need the humility to let that log in our eye be removed. We need the community to help, because sometimes we’re not even aware of our failings and shortcomings. If we’re lucky, we’ll have people in our life who can help keep us on the right track.
“How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove that splinter in your eye,’ when you do not even notice the wooden beam in your own eye? You hypocrite! Remove the wooden beam from your eye first; then you will see clearly to remove the splinter in your brother’s eye.” (Luke 6:42)
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