Provoking Unity

...let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching. - Hebrews 10:24-25


We are profoundly affected by the communities we are a part of. If we spend most of our time with groups that are satisfied with the ways of the world, we too are likely to become inured to the deadening comforts of darkness. This numbing may even progress to the point that we resist the light when it shines on us. We can become so accustomed to sickness that the approach of the Physician threatens our whole worldview.

Things look dramatically different, however, for those who spend most of their time in community with other children of light. When we are gathered together in communities that have a clarity and unity of purpose, we are prepared to receive the Word of God(1) with joy. A community that is conscious of itself as being a living member of Christ's body, and which waits on the Lord for guidance, is well-prepared to receive the light. Unfortunately, most communities - religious or secular - are a muddle of competing visions, human interests and willful individuals. Most groups spend the lion's share of their time negotiating vision, rather than carrying it out.

Discerning vision is an important step in the process towards unity. Without a careful, prayerful process of discernment of the will of God for the community, the group easily falls prey to human manipulation. Our communities often end up serving the interests of an elite, or of the "common good," rather than clinging to God's guidance. It is crucial that our Christian communities maintain an ongoing cycle of attention, discernment and action: observing the world around us; waiting on the Holy Spirit for fresh guidance for our circumstances; clarifying our sense of calling and mission; and acting according to that united sense of purpose.

It is easy to get caught in the first and second steps - perpetually observing and waiting, never reaching any firm conclusions. Conclusions can be threatening, because they often upset our comfortable lives. They demand an answer of us: Will I submit myself to the Truth, or do I insist on having my own way? Real spiritual unity in the group will often mean that I as an individual have to change my way of life in order to take part in the mission that God has given us. This can be painful.

But what a joy it is when the Holy Spirit gathers us into unity! How unimportant our petty desires and prerogatives seem when bathed in the light of Jesus' risen presence! When together we awaken to the deep peace and singleness of vision that the Lord offers us, there is a new creation and the old order of darkness is swept away. Reviewed in the light of Christ, so many of the demands that we previously laid on our community are revealed to be petty and selfish. Yet, other concerns are revealed to be more important than we ever suspected.

As we are gathered into unity of purpose in the purifying light of the Savior, we find the answer to our longing for a true home and our thirst for righteous living. We see that our deepest hopes, the ones which we scarcely dared to utter before, are in fact the foundation of this new community in Christ. We discover that God offers us that which we most deeply need: A true home. Overflowing, abundant life. Deep peace and contentedness. The knowledge that we are loved unconditionally. We see that all of our selfish demands and posturing, all of our shows of strength and self-sufficiency were merely attempts to paper over our fundamental need for the living water that Jesus gives us, the unbounded love and mercy of God.

This is not something we can produce ourselves. We cannot control or predict God, and the Spirit blows where it will. We can, however, make the choice to prepare ourselves to be receptive when God sends us the Holy Spirit. Sadly, we are often resistant to the indwelling Word. We get so caught up in our own opinions and visions that we push the Spirit aside on our way to a decision. When Jesus appears in our midst, many communities are not ready to receive him. We often prefer to throw our own party rather than accepting Christ's invitation to his wedding banquet.(2)

How do we as Christian communities prepare ourselves to be brought into unity by the Spirit? How do we provoke one another to love and good deeds, and to a receptiveness to Christ's guidance in every moment? How do we tell the difference between the false unity of human conformity and the spiritual unity that Christ gives us as we receive him together? How do we prepare ourselves to respond in faith when the Holy Spirit draws us together with others who are seeking to do his will?

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1. Jesus, the Risen Lord.
2. See Matthew 22

The Hedge and the City

[The angel] called out with a mighty voice, 'Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!' ... Then I heard another voice from heaven saying, 'Come out of her, my people, so that you do not take part in her sins, and so that you do not share in her plagues...'"
                                                              - Revelation 18:2, 4


As residents of the capital of the greatest imperial power the world has ever known, we at Capitol Hill Friends are greatly challenged to live as a faithful expression of Christ's reign. We recognize that we are deeply affected by the surrounding culture, that the attitudes and assumptions of our neighbors, families and friends are often diametrically opposed to the demands of the gospel. Yet, we feel that Christ has called us to remain in this environment, as much of a challenge as it often presents to our faith. We feel assured by the Holy Spirit that God has work for us to do here, and we have been directed to remain and encourage the formation of a witnessing community that shares the good news and new life that we are finding in Jesus.

Though we sense the Lord's command to remain and set down roots in Washington, we recognize that life in the city is and will continue to be a serious challenge to our faith and our cohesion as a group. The entire environment is laced with anti-Kingdom assumptions. Ideas about who the important people are; what worthy goals are; what power is; and where meaning comes from. Our faith as present-day disciples of Jesus of Nazareth is under steady pressure to conform to the image of the world around us.

Finding ourselves in such a challenging situation, we seek together for ways to ground ourselves in the living reality of Christ's presence. We support one another in our personal disciplines - prayer, study, service and gospel witness. Yet we also recognize that personal discipline is not enough. We can develop deep personal disciplines to keep us in touch with God, yet we remain spiritual weaklings if we are not incorporated into the Body of Christ. We must be bonded into a coherent church community, not just a collection of spiritually athletic individuals.

This is harder for us. Because we do live in such an atomized, individualistic environment, developing the life of the local church as our primary commitment is deeply counter-cultural. Sometimes, it seems that the simple act of gathering together weekly for fellowship, study and worship is about as much as we can handle. Our lives are so full of work, family and social commitments. There is so much to do and so little time to do it in.

Our priorities are distorted. We have put the focus on our individual preferences, careers and social networks, yet we are called to place Jesus and his Body - the community of those who are drawn together to be his disciples - at the center of our lives. The Christian community should not be simply one more obligation to meet among many others. On the contrary, it should be the social foundation from which the rest of our lives grow. The church must be our primary identity.

In his book, Living in Christian Community, Art Gish asserts that, "we are defined by the people we are a part of. ... Those who have no identity apart from the world have nothing solid in their lives."(1) If this is true, then we will never be empowered to emerge from the oppressive culture of busyness, loneliness, self-promotion and greed that hangs over our city like a fog. That is, not until we come to see our shared life as Christ's disciples as our primary identity, a base from which we interact with the rest of society.

For centuries, a concept that was central to the self-understanding of Friends was that of the hedge. The hedge referred to a protective barrier that maintained a distinction between Quakers and the wider society. The hedge was a spiritual reality, but it was represented in a variety of very practical ways - distinctive dress and speech that instantly set Friends apart; refusal to participate in military preparation and war; refusal to swear oaths, use titles, gamble, drink to excess, or own slaves. At its best, the hedge did not remove Friends from the world, but instead served as a reminder to Friends that they were set apart for God's service, and that they were not to participate in the degenerate behaviors of the world.

I agree wholeheartedly with Art Gish that, "It is essential that the Christian community always be in close contact with the world so that we can understand the world and be in dialogue with it."(2) Indeed, I believe that our call at Capitol Hill Friends is to be a missional presence in the DC metro area, actively and intimately engaged with the life and struggles of our city. We exist as a church to embody the love and justice of Christ's Kingdom, and to invite others to join us as disciples of Jesus.

However, Art Gish is also right in insisting that we must maintain a certain separation from the world. "Our separation from the world is spiritual and cultural rather than geographic, a result of distinctive loyalties rather than spatial isolation."(2) Through our obedience to the demands of the gospel, we must necessarily be distinctly different from the surrounding culture. If we are living into the life that Jesus desires for us, we will think differently, relate to others differently, regard pleasure and suffering differently. We may even appear visibly different to those who meet us.

Christ calls us both to be deeply engaged and active in society, and yet distinct and separate from the lifestyle and worldview of the fallen world. How are we to balance these two gospel imperatives? Some groups, such as the Amish, Conservative Mennonites, and some Friends have taken the route of rural isolation, placing the emphasis on separation rather than engagement. Other groups, such as the Church of the Saviour in Washington, DC have taken a much more active stance, placing their emphasis on engagement, perhaps at the expense of separation. We are still discerning what our response is to be as a community of Friends living as witnesses in the heart of the imperial city.

What has been your experience of engagement and separation? How can they be balanced, and how have you found them fitting together in your context, be it urban, suburban or rural?

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1. Gish, Living in Christian Community, 277
2. Gish, Living in Christian Community, 287

A New Harvest of Faithfulness

What would it look like for a Spirit-led, Christ-centered movement to emerge out of the North American Quaker community? Certainly, such a movement would shake up our comfortable habits of religion. Regardless of our theological or cultural background, we would all be deeply challenged by an authentic movement of renewal within the North American Quaker Church. Such a movement would call into question our conformity to the American way of life, to which almost all of us are deeply wedded. It would demand that we dedicate everything - time, money and attention - to Jesus, receiving his Light and following the guidance of his Spirit.

But do we truly want to be part of such a movement of the Holy Spirit? Most of us would like to see an uptick in energy, financial giving and attendance at our established Meetings. Many of us would even like to see some new Meetings be founded, to have the sense that we are a part of a growing community, rather than one which peaked long ago and is in the slow process of going extinct. It is natural for us to want to feel confirmed in what we are doing, to see positive indications of the health and vitality of our community. But is what we most want a self-affirming human community - or are we prepared to risk everything to follow Jesus?

There are some existing institutions that are already quietly at work preparing the way for a fresh, radical obedience to the Holy Spirit in our North American context. I think of Earlham School of Religion, where Friends and other Christians from across the country and the world are given vital training in Christian scholarship and discipleship. There is the School of the Spirit, which for almost two decades has nurtured Christ-centered eldership and ministry, primarily within the Liberal-Unprogrammed branch of the Religious Society of Friends. The Friends Center of Ohio Yearly Meeting is an example of an attempt by Conservative Friends to provide more opportunities for structured learning and development of gifts. And Northwest Yearly Meeting has its own Friends Center, which is dedicated to developing Quaker Christian leadership in the Pacific Northwest.

It is my hope that each of these institutions - and, surely, many others that I have failed to mention - will provide a base for developing well-informed, self-aware and spiritually grounded leaders for this new century. Yet, I am also aware that this kind of leadership development is by itself insufficient. Leadership training may be little more than hospice care for a dying institution unless we as Friends make the choice to humble ourselves and commit our whole lives to Jesus' mission in the world. Until we are willing to set aside our own prerogatives and desires, seeking first to follow Jesus together, the Religious Society of Friends in North America will continue to wither and die.

And maybe that is OK. If many of our Meetings, institutions and programs are no longer receptive to the leadings of the Holy Spirit in our midst, we are not of much use anymore. What is to be done with salt that has lost its saltiness (Matthew 5:13)?

But there are those of us who sense the call to be a flavorful expression of Christ's presence on earth. For those of us who hear this call, how can we join with others in laying down our own priorities and seeking to be completely obedient to the Spirit? How can we support one another in being obedient unto death - the death of the self-will, of our clinging to money and status as a form of security, and even of our physical bodies if need be? How do we make the transition from a faith that is a "good idea" to one that is worth dying for?

And what role do our existing institutions have to play? How can our Meetings and Yearly Meetings become places of shared wrestling with the challenge of discipleship to Jesus? How can our schools and leadership development programs become engines for the radical change from self-serving to self-sacrificing? How can our community and tradition become as a seed that dies in order to bring forth a new harvest of faithfulness (John 12:24)?