I was struck this morning, listening to a conversation between two leaders of churches and businesses, living on different continents, as they observed what was happening in the world and the challenges posed to all of us right now.
Most of all, what struck me was the discussion around the ‘campaign’ for this time (like a battle cry).
As communities are dispersed back into the home, the opportunities to gather and share, on mass, a vision or purpose is diminished (but not lost). The ‘campaign’, they said, was to ‘come out of this stronger’ – a campaign to protect our community spirit some might say, a campaign to maintain a sense of togetherness and not overly individualise our lives, and as followers of Jesus, they discussed the campaign to come out of this more in love with Jesus, more in love with his mission and his church than ever before.
For many of you reading this, the purpose you were once physically participating in or the community you gathered together will be different to mine – it could be attending football matches, taking part in a weekly exercise class, it could be the atmosphere and community in your office, it could be your church community where you share together in figuring out a life dedicated to the ways and teachings of Jesus.
What would it look like for you to come of out this time of isolation stronger?
The leadership many in my church community might have witnessed from a Sunday gathering has now been commissioned into their homes across the city (and further afield as student return to their parents’ homes). The vision for our community is now conveyed through videos and social media content which we can very easily choose to ignore, multi-task through or scroll past.
As the church moves into households I can’t help but sense this opposite but similar transition to that which I see in the book of Acts ( a book in the New Testament of the Bible which describes the formation of the early church).
In Acts we see how early christian would gather together to encourage one another in the home, share stories of God at work, build each other up, pray together and then be ‘sent out’ onto the road the share the gospel in other places and put their faith to work. Their sent journeys often presented persecution, challenge and required perseverance – this is why they needed to be encouraged before they were commissioned on their journey.
Something similar but opposite has happened now – we have been sent out from the churches where we gather, but back into our homes.
The road was outside of the comfort zones of these early Christians and I feel for us that exploring faith, discipleship and following Jesus in the confinement of our own homes is in someways outside our comfort zones.
We have been sent home, to dig into our own discipleship in following Jesus, to read our bibles, pray our prayers and experience the presence of God without the comfort of familiar voices, songs or structure.
Continuing in our faith at home we no longer have the temptation to participate to look good in front of others, or to participate to blend in with those around us.
In some ways it’s just us and Jesus and that can make us uneasy.
For may people home isn’t where they usually experience God. For some being home is hard, relationships with housemates or family are patchy and distractions are everywhere.
For some home is a lonely place and, when we can’t leave it, we are confronted with feelings we usually like to ignore or run away from.
Followers of Jesus in this time have been sent to their homes to discover Jesus here – and this is where the invitation to ‘come out of this stronger’ gets interesting.
You see, when we meet in churches which have community, structure and ways to participate, we can find ourselves in a rhythm of behaviour. We are given prompts, social encouragement and familiar comforts like music which can help us in our discovery of Jesus.
At home, the initiative is on us.
If we choose, we can go weeks without worship, without prayer, without coming before God and repenting, without inviting the Holy Spirit to renew our minds and correct our paths.
Anyone who goes to the gym will know that you only build muscle when you push past what feels comfortable and what you usually do. Trying something faster, heavier or doing more reps is what builds the muscle – doing the same over and over again gets familiar – muscles don’t grow with familiar movements.
So how will we ‘come out of this stronger’?
I believe the challenge of faith at home is greater than we might have thought at first.
I believe that we grow stronger when we preserver through discomfort.
I believe that when our faith cannot rely on rhythms and behaviours initiated by other, we can grow leaps and bounds in our relationship with Jesus through the obedient act of our own initiative.
The challenge here is not to create your own little church at home, ignoring the community you’re a part of. But to build a resilient faith, one which doesn’t depend on the initiatives set by others. A faith with can benefit your community because of its depth, durability and the fruit of your investment into knowing, being with and becoming like Jesus.
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If you’re a follower of Jesus I’d encourage you first and foremost to be honest with yourself and with God:
How much have you been flexing the muscle of initiative in your relationship with Him?
How much has your mood, circumstance, distractions and environment dictated how you spend your time, rather than your own self-discipline to lean into growing you faith?
How are you building your spiritual muscles?
Are you coming before God with those difficult questions, or escaping into TV and games hoping they’ll disappear?
Do you trust God with the challenges you face (be them loneliness, relational difficulties, financial uncertainty or health) or are you striving to find solutions on your own?
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Secondly, I’d encourage you to begin to take steps to support your best intentions:
We can all go to bed with the intention of getting up early and starting the day reading the bible – in and of itself that’s a good intention. However, if we set no alarm, scroll through our phone first thing after waking up or go to bed too late to get up early then we’ve got in the way of that good intention which would have served us well.
What is stopping your best intentions from producing good fruit?
If that seems tricky to answer I’d encourage you to ask God to highlight some hurdles in your way.
Let’s push past comfort and convenience, be willing to have hard conversation with ourselves, with others and with Jesus.
Let’s prepare to come out of this stronger.
For the inspo behind today’s blog watch this podcast I refer to here
Clarity Pending 