Dear Ray,
What would happen if we came together and no one took charge?
I do not mean that everyone sat waiting for the usual brother to overcome his hesitation. I mean that we had actually relinquished the expectation that someone must become the source of the gathering.
Would we know how to remain together?
I suspect the first thing we would encounter is our own discomfort. We have been trained to recognize a meeting by its movement. Someone begins. Someone establishes the direction. Someone supplies enough words to assure us that something worthwhile is happening.
Remove that person, and we may feel that the meeting has failed before it has begun.
But perhaps what has failed is our arrangement.
Christ already dwells in His members. Zoe is already our shared life. We are not waiting for someone to bring Him into the room. We are learning to cease occupying the place that belongs to Him.
Paul describes a gathering in which different members contribute to the building up of all (1 Corinthians 14:26). He also calls for order and discernment. But the source is not one person’s ability to maintain everyone’s attention.
There is room for the members.
I wonder how many things have never been spoken among us because the room was already occupied. A sister carried a burden but could not find an opening. A brother had a small experience of Christ but decided it was too ordinary to mention. Someone needed prayer, but the meeting had already moved beyond the place where a need could interrupt it.
We completed the meeting.
Did we receive one another?
If no one took charge, perhaps those hidden things would begin to emerge. Perhaps we would discover that the quiet person was not empty. Perhaps the gifted brother would receive something he could never have supplied to himself.
There would also be awkwardness. We might speak over one another. Someone might talk too long. We would need to learn patience, restraint, and the freedom to acknowledge that we had missed one another.
Those things cannot become another training program. They must arise as the cross touches our independence and Christ’s life finds expression among us.
We would not need to escape the difficulty by handing the gathering back to the most capable person.
Silence can become another performance. We can be proud of our refusal to organize while remaining just as occupied with ourselves.
The question is whether we are available to Christ and to one another.
Can I speak without needing to establish myself?
Can I remain silent without resenting the person who speaks?
Can I receive something unfinished, hesitant, and ordinary without wishing someone more impressive would rescue the room?
Ray, I want to discover what becomes possible when nobody needs to own the gathering.
Christ has not left His body without a Head.
Perhaps we have been so busy supplying one that we have scarcely learned to live under His.
Your brother,
Brent
