The Twelve Tribes Communities

We are a tribal people. The folks that you will meet in the communities listed below are part of a tribespeople. Our life is expressed through living together in community - a new social order. We love working with each other on our farms and in our cottage industries; doing folk dances and playing music; building; teaching our children at home; and caring for one another. Our desire is to live as naturally as possible by being close to Creation and to people. Our vision: not a lifestyle, but the forming of a new nation - the twelve-tribed nation of Israel. We want to be restored back to what we were created to be.

"Tribe" actually means groups of families who live together in clans, united through a common ancestor. We believe in the God of Israel and follow in the steps of a man who had faith, who burned with a passion for something more than what he saw existing in the world around him. He walked away from the confined, leveled mentality of the society in which he lived, in the hope of finding a new beginning. He looked forward to the start of a new nation of people who were connected to their Creator and to one another. His name was Abraham. Most people know him as the founder of the nation of Israel. If you were to read the Bible you would discover that the entire book speaks continually about "tribes."

The God of Abraham has always had a desire to be accurately represented by a united, tribal people who express His very character and nature to the world. Through their oneness of heart and purpose, this tribal nation would prove His existence, manifesting the love and unity of a people connected to Him.

"As the stars of the sky, and as the sand which is on the seashore," God promised to multiply his seed and make a great nation out of him (Genesis 22:16-18). Our Creator was faithful. Abraham fathered Isaac, and from Isaac came a son named Jacob (whose name was later changed to "Israel"). From Jacob came 12 sons who became the tribes that housed the descendants of Abraham. Thus Abraham found the "new beginning" he longed for – the twelve-tribed nation of Israel.

Each tribe was made up of clans and each clan was made up of families. Those families were made up of husbands and wives who desired to rule over their households and raise their children in the way of their God. The tribal life that grew out of these families was the "corporate life" that our Creator desired for man to have from the very beginning. He wanted a people who would be joined together for a common purpose, who would live at peace with one another, and in absolute unity.

However, this unity and peace didn't last long. Like every other nation that has been on this Earth, it ended up broken and divided. Thousands of years after God had spoken to Abraham, another man walked the earth with the same heart and desire as Abraham. He, too, longed for that twelve-tribed nation to fulfill all that it was meant to. His name was Yahshua, the Messiah. You might have heard of Him as "Jesus," but we call Him by His Hebrew name. His name means "Yahweh's Salvation." He had the power to save men from their sins and to remedy the very things that caused them to be separated and divided from one another. He spoke a clear message as He walked the Earth. This message called people out of the fallen society they were a part of, compelling them to leave their old life and sins behind them, and to become part of a whole new social order within community. Yahshua saw that "natural" Israel was not fit to represent God to the world, nor could they maintain unity among themselves. He recognized the need for a "spiritual" twelve-tribed Israel to emerge.

He spoke the same message to all men because He knew in the heart of every person there was common ground. No matter what religion you are a part of, what country or social class or period of history you live in, or whether you are a man, a woman, or a child, the common ground among us all is "the conscience."

Our Creator gave everyone a conscience - the instinctive knowledge of right and wrong. In that knowledge we know that a loving Creator does exist and that we owe our very life to Him. We understand that there is an inward law that governs our behavior. This inner law is meant to be an expression of everything that is good - the very nature of our Creator. It is meant to be immovable and unchanging like the stars of the heavens in order to keep us on course. The more a person silences that voice within him, the more evil he becomes and the more guilt he accumulates. No matter how you try to cover it all up - therapy courses, philosophies, and positive affirmations - nothing erases the guilt. You end up deceiving yourself into thinking you're a good person, especially when you compare your life to others' lives which seem more evil than yours. Yet, deep down inside, your conscience knows everything you've ever done (no matter what you do to try to hide it).

The faith we live by has caused us to leave everything behind - our possessions, our ambitions, our relationships, all that comprised our empty, purposeless lives - in order to follow Yahshua and receive the abundant, eternal life He purchased for us with His own blood. This covenant we have entered into with Him and His people is what is forming this new nation. Those who are a part of this new society have given up their self-satisfied, self-seeking pursuits and have entered into a tribal life of caring for others, sharing what they have, and loving one another more than they love themselves, just like Yahshua. This is true freedom!

Can you picture how life would be if we all had this kind of love? We would all care for each other and truly appreciate one another deeply. There would be no wars or violence to plague mankind ever again. We would all live in peace and harmony and this would only be the beginning. Your imagination can fill in the rest. For those of us already gathered, we no longer need to just imagine. We listened to the voice of hope and saw the condition of our dirty conscience. We saw our need for forgiveness. Now we stand together with others who saw their same need and as a people we are experiencing the reality of what we once only dreamed of. It's the new land where people from every nation - the rich and poor, male and female, can live together in complete peace and trust for one another. Yahshua called this life we have in common "the light of the world." It is the witness of His kingdom. It stands in bold contrast to the darkness of the world's societies.

We are so thankful that we can share with you the longing of our Creator's heart: a nation of twelve tribes living together in unity. He is the Creator of the universe, the same One who created the radiance of the sun and the wing of a butterfly, who washed the sky blue and put music in the heart of a bird, the One who gave us the freedom to be in love with one another and live in unity... Who would have thought that this God was the God of Tribes?