Thinking About Formation . . .

I have been thinking a lot about formation lately.  In some ways, Jesus’s message of forgiveness, love, mercy, and peacemaking is as foreign a language now as it was in his day.  Jesus ran across people all the time in the Gospels who didn’t (perhaps simply couldn’t) understand what he was getting at.  I imagine Jesus was faced with confused looks every day of his public ministry.  There were those who heard it and didn’t understand but were attracted to it.  And there were those who heard it and didn’t understand and were repulsed or angered by it.  Even the apostles, those who walked every day with him, often didn’t get it.  Those who were more likely to get it were people like Zacchaeus or the Samaritan woman, those who felt it in their own lives, reaching into a deep need, and then lived it out and passed it on like bread among those who were starving.

In our world, so many things form us into consumers, competitors, national citizens, even fighters and fear-ers.  So much of the information we consume forms us into people who are suspicious and self-protecting or tribe-protecting.  We are well-versed in the language of  winner-take-all.  How much of what we consume on a daily basis is forming us into radically trusting, loving, peace-making people who lead with mercy and forgiveness, who put faith in the abundance of God?  How often are we learning and speaking the language of “there’s more than enough love to go around”?  How are we allowing God to form us into citizens of the realm of reconciliation?

If we are to live out and pass on the Gospel like bread among those who are starving, we need to be consistently molded by God, by Jesus, by the Spirit.  We need to practice speaking this language that sometimes sounds foreign in our day to day lives, foreign in comparison to  primary languages of fear and competition that the world seems filled with these days.  And we need to practice it with each other, helping each other find spaces of non-coercion and dignity affirmation, and having patience with ourselves and others when we stumble over these words of Jesus because they feel too foreign or too strange.

We are called to something different that sometimes feels radically foolish in the power struggles of daily life – we are called to openness, vulnerability, trust, and love.  Remember my mantra for the hard days?  Yeast, salt, light, mustard seeds…  How are we being formed in that kind of kingdom logic?  How are we creating spaces for God to form our churches in that kind of kingdom logic?  I’m not being rhetorical here!  Go ahead – take a moment to   answer for yourself and your church.

These are the kinds of questions the Brethren Leadership Institute task team is asking as we consider robust apprenticeship models for training ministers and lay leaders.  These are the kinds of questions your district board will be asking in our upcoming retreat, as we look for ways to connect congregations and honor our distinctive role as Church of the Brethren in central and southern Indiana.  These are the kinds of questions I know many of you are asking within your congregations as you address poverty, addiction, and brokenness in your own towns and communities.

Keep molding us, God.  We want to be like Jesus.

Laura