06.19.09
solitude, community, ministry
Nouwen speaks of three disciplines from Luke 6:12-19. He writes,
“Jesus spent the night in solitude with God. In the morning, he gathered his apostles around him and formed community. In the afternoon, with his apostles, he went out and preached the Word and healed the sick. Notice the order-from solitude to community to ministry. The night is for solitude; the morning for community; the afternoon for ministry.
“So often in ministry, I have wanted to do it by myself. If it didn’t work, I went to others and said, ‘Please!,’ searching for a community to help me. If that didn’t work, maybe I’d start praying.
“But the order that Jesus teaches us is the reverse. It begins by being with God in solitude; then it creates a fellowship, a community of people with whom the mission is being lived; and finally this community goes out together to heal and to proclaim good news.
“I believe you can look at solitude, community, and ministry as three disciplines by which we create space for God. If we create space in which God can act and speak, something surprising will happen. You and I are called to these disciplines if we want to be disciples.”
nathan colquhoun said,
June 19, 2009 at 6:36 am
Usually when I get in conversations with people they end up calling me a hippie of some sort and say something like “why don’t you just go and live in a mountain somewhere by yourself and live out all your crazy ideals” What I guess they never got is that I don’t want to be alone. I feel like my calling in a way directly involves the people around me and I am unable to go forward with it by myself, because the very core of that calling is to be with and do it alongside of others.