Writing this in phases.
Prior to the arrival of fellow participants:
We are doing the main course, this week, which is a chicken based casserole, which is cooking. The coffee is perking. The house is as clean as ours gets. It is comfortable.
We bought the ingredients for the meal. Matt--his last full day with us is today-- loves to cook. He was up before 6:00, cooking it.
We are all sitting and waiting for the mob, which will begin to trickle in in about twenty minutes.
The preparation for this gathering of disciples is, for us, genuine worship, as Romans 12 talks about it. It is sacrifice and service offered to the Lord and His people.
Today is a beautiful, sunny spring day. The golf course is greening and birds are chirping. An easy day to praise God.
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The stragglers are actually still here in the afterglow of a wonderful 3 plus hours.
Lots of praying today. Lots of singing, much of which contained lyrics that are, themselves, prayers.
Today the word was spoken and applied at the same time. One of our women, who is divorced, came asking for prayer because her ex is trying to reconnect with her and their son.
What developed was a conversation about the nature of forgiveness and of the place the fellowship of other disciples in allowing the Lord to speak His wisdom into our lives. Much Scripture was spoken.
The thing that impresses me most in our gatherings is the unqualified transparency that our people practice among each other. Such was the case again today as we confessed our sins and fears and sorrows and victories among ourselves.
We concluded our time in the Word by forming a circle around our friend and praying for her.
Evelyn led a powerful time in the Word in preparation for the taking of the bread and the cup.
The meal was awesome, as we have come to expect.
One further note about the transparency. It happened again today, even in the presence of Matt, who is new to the group and who will only be among us in a transitory way and whose commitment to the Lord is shallow at best.
ReplyDeleteThis strikes as extraordinary to the extreme.
Regarding the extraordinary transparency among our people two more thoughts occur to me:
ReplyDeleteFirst it is all the more extraordinary because in this gathering we are of German heritage in which people are very private and reserved about personal matters.
Second, it is fruit of our, well, theology of gathering, which is distinctly at odds with what is the norm for Christendom groups. Because we embrace the so called Priesthood of all Believers, we have no consumers of religious products and services. We all participate in ministry together. Therefore we have the openness colleagues have with each other. We are, to use the language of the New Testament in a legitimate way, brothers and sisters. The fruit of that way of being together is the transparency, which, it seems to me, happens organically from the values we share. I doubt this is possible in Christendom. Yet, it seems inevitable for us.
My former coworker Matt moved out of our house today. His homeless time is over. He moves into his new house in another state after settlement tomorrow. He will stay in a motel in his new city tonight.
ReplyDeleteSo, I will journal, briefly, thoughts about his time in our gathering.
We don't believe in church growth. We believe in making disciples so we don't invite seekers or any other brand of unbeliever into our gathering. Matt invited himself and, after he was living here, it would have been difficult to keep him away. He came to love our gatherings with a passion I don't think even I feel.
On his first visit, when we did the bread and cup I spoke briefly about taking the bread and cup unworthily. He declined to take it that day and he never did, even yesterday.
Near the end of his time in our home, he spoke of himself to me being as the kind of Christian I am, in his mind a "true" Christian. But, I never saw fruit of repentance in him. I saw a creedish sort of faith in basic Christian doctrines but not Hebrews 11 faith and, certainly, not repentance.
I never warned him a second time about declining the Lord's Supper yet, somehow he still knew not to take it.
In Winebrenner's day, he might still be someone sitting on the mourners' bench.
His reticence about taking the Lord's Supper, I think, says something affirming about us. Even though he thought he believed and even that he was a Christian like I am, he, in the very best way, still did not consider himself to be one of us.
There is a holiness about our people when they are gathered, that is truly extraordinary and Matt appreciated that reality.
He is not gone for good. We will stay in touch. Perhaps, one day, he will take the bread and cup with us.
An interesting note to myself about this particular gathering:
ReplyDeleteAs we sang, I attempted to introduce truth questions about words we had just sung in the previous hymn/gospel song/Scripture song, as I and others have done in the past. In this gathering, those comments normally produce fruit in vivid interactive conversation of core components of the gospel.
However, though I attempted to do that at least two times, there was no response.
Nothing meaningful happened until our divorced friend began to update us on the state of her relationship with her ex. Then it was as if floodgates were opened.
Looking back, I have concluded that what didn't happen and what, ultimately, did happen was a function of the reality that our people really do live in the Spirit when they gather. It was the Spirit Who blocked a discussion of song lyrics and it was the Spirit Who empowered our conversation on forgiveness and the role of the community in speaking God's wisdom to us in times of distress.
I think back to the days when we had a bulletin and an "Order of 'Worship'" and my heart is filled with regret so profound that I can't even begin to describe it.
What time we lost!
What blessing we have missed!