I have, over the past 15 years, come to finally rest upon covenant as central to everything—fully realizing that this is neither well understood in most circles nor easy to disentangle from changing nuances of vocabulary over the past 1700 years. What I am not talking about is making a covenant together to join an order—I am talking about us actually understanding the very nature and reality of the covenant to which we have already been joined—ratified by the very blood of Jesus.

We need to acknowledge appropriate societal expectations, yes, but we are already bound to one another, whether we want to be or not! What hurts you hurts me, whether I feel it or not. What benefits you benefits me…and if I see something that is potentially hurtful to you and I do not move to protect you from it, to defend you in it, I am guilty…you get the picture.

I resist using covenant in the current common manner because it confuses and dilutes the understanding of the binding covenant we already have…as if we are not really already bound to treat each other as beloved brothers and sisters in Christ…as if the way we treat each other is not received by Christ as personal to himself.

I am required to look out for the best interest of my covenant partners (God and members of Christ’s body), and discerning what that means is the challenge people do not want to embrace—as in Chesterton’s famous quote about Christianity being found difficult and left largely untried. There are, however, new covenant terms and conditions: Love God/neighbor & disciple the nations. And those Ts & Cs find their full articulation in the Great Commandment/Great Commission and are summed up by the simple command to be like Christ.

Faithful covenant-keeping (chesed) in the old covenant is to be found in the new covenant through the command to have love (agape), grace (charis) and mercy (eleos) for “one another” (allelon), made manifest in acts of mutual submission, sacrificial service and servant leadership. These are, for me, foundational attitudes and actions that safeguard mDNA for whatever we do in God’s name and for his Kingdom.

That is not to say that we can always be totally successful in our efforts—especially complete inclusion of the “other.” But we—every one of us—must never cease to give due diligence to that effort…looking to at least have representation in line with our constituencies. Without intentionally remembering our binding responsibility to both recognize and include the totality of the covenant community/Body of Christ in whatever we plan, we break covenant—with God and with those we neglect. And covenant breaking requires the humility to embrace confession, repentance, forgiveness, restitution and reconciliation.

If, then, we are centered on God (Father-Son-Holy Spirit) as solemn covenant-making and faithful covenant-keeping “communitas,” realizing the amazing “simplexity” of the new covenant in Jesus Christ, then what we do and how we do it already has an established framework…I would venture that it is a forgotten framework, as it were… ;^)

And if we, in the birthing of this new order, move too quickly to set form and action without proper replication of the mDNA found in covenant…we doom it to become the latest “new thing” rather than the fresh work of the Holy Spirit in and through us. And so we embrace the tension of the “don’t wait” and “be patient.”

I will be carefully working through these issues as they relate to CovenantClusters in the coming days…but I did want to mention them here at this point in time.

Thanks for listening…

This is not to suggest that covenant isn’t a good starting point for more thorough considerations on constructing an Order. We need to be quickened by communal help to proper memory I agree, and the MO certainly could be structured to get at that. If our covenanting with one another in the sight of God (gulp, sounds like marriage) enables greater faithfulness to God individually and communally, then I’m all for a meaningful covenantal framework.

My wife is calling for dinner, so I’ll get busted if I delay any longer…

Good thoughts. Thank you.

Dan

meanwhile, perhaps we could reflect on the turn-of-the-20th-century salons as a case study in shared practices among people who were likely more on the fringe of things and created a way of coming together to share discussions among people who appreciated circling in and through lively and “subversive” issues. the forum itself provided the continuity, though the topics varied.

and that “lost generation” was actually a type of “virtual tribe,” drawn together by a similar non-standard ethos (which at the same time meant being marginalized by people of the standard ethos). that’s something important to look at, as the Church [capital "C" for universal Church] is the world’s longest-running virtual tribe, cutting across all dividing lines of time and space, and despite local cultures we as disciples following Jesus Christ hold to a counter-cultural ethos …

some other very intriguing forms of covenant and listening/leadership can be found among councils of various Native American tribes. for instance, the Iruquois elders would consider the implications of potential decisions to the seventh generation. i believe it was the Cherokee whose practice was for whichever group arrived first at a council, the men or women elders, to wait for the other to arrive; with only one group present, they could only hold half a dialog. (i’m still trying to get my research together and verify which tribe did that, as well as the following.) another tribe, when making decisions, allowed anyone present to share questions and comments, starting with the youngest and going to the eldest.

i have been a long-time student of this cluster of cultures, and was even a member of Indian Club in high school. i’m intrigued by all of these modes of leadership and listening, as they run so very counter to what is typical for most contemporary European cultures. they are also far more “future-oriented,” both in interacting deeply for the sake of the community’s future and in finding ways to raise up its next generation leaders.

okay, gotta zip for now. still working on my own processing of Seabeck and the issues from that i’m wrestling with …