The discipline of moving against the flow… This is a practice of discipleship that seeks to redress a very natural tendency that we have as individuals and as communities.
That tendency is to become settled, comfortable and even self-satisfied. The is problem is that over time we accumulate, we build things – buildings, traditions, even stories we like to tell ourselves of who we are and where we have been. It’s as though we get into the habit of going a particular way and given enough time, it becomes our way of seeing the world. I wonder if that is the meaning behind the words in Scripture that say, “They shall eat the fruit of their way…” (Prov 1:31).
It’s interesting… when I read the Gospels, Jesus is always moving about from place to place – encountering people where they are. His home is on the road – betwixt and between. The lifestyle Jesus chooses for himself means that he needs to travels light.
Apart from disciples and a reputation for being a trouble-maker, Jesus didn’t accumulate very much.
If all Jesus left behind for us were his yolk, his disciples and his instruction to go and make more disciples, then the challenge for us as disciples is to work out what that means for us in the church today. That’s a work in progress – a intentional act of translation… discipleship always is !
The discipline of moving against the flow starts with us. It begins when we deny ourselves, when we turn our back on ourselves and leave ourselves behind. Karl Barth says that this is conscious the decision of each new day…..
