Nurturing the Moment

During this season of Advent, here are some profound nuggets of truth I'm learning on a deeper level.

Advent is the time when we practice the discipline of waiting. We focus our attention on the hope to come. We set our hearts on God’s not-yet-seen promises rather than our unfulfilling circumstances in the present. We join the saints who even now are crying “How long?” before God’s ultimate Kingdom shows itself (Rev 6:10), longing for the world to be put to rights. We take the long view, keep our eyes on the big picture, and walk on.

Henri Nouwen in his writings points out that waiting is not doing nothing and twiddling our thumbs. Waiting is a vital, engaged, active stance we take in the life of faith. It’s a matter of responding to God in the present—right here and now, in the wilderness—hearing and nourishing ourselves on the presence of Jesus. (Ps 27:14)

Henri Nouwen’s words drive this home. He describes waiting as “nurturing the moment.”

“A waiting person is a patient person. The word “patience” means the willingness to stay where we are and live the situation out to the full in the belief that something hidden there will manifest itself to us. Impatient people are always expecting the real thing to happen somewhere else and therefore want to go elsewhere. The moment is empty. But patient people dare to stay where they are. Patient living means to live actively in the present and wait there. Waiting, then, is not passive. It involves nurturing the moment, as a mother nurtures the child that is growing in her womb.”- Henri Nouwen, Eternal Seasons

God is teaching me tons about waiting as we plant Axiom Church in Syracuse. I must remember that waiting is active. Sitting under the weight of this tension forms my heart and character. I’m tempted to find a way to slink out from under this weight. But the vision is being nurtured in my own soul as I sit still. Being with Jesus changes me more than doing for Jesus.

inspired by Henri Nouwen and Chaplain Mike

Leading From a Still Soul

Leadership is often viewed by the masses as an opportunity to move people in a certain direction or to accomplish a certain task with a group. The end goal is often about being productive. Within the church that productivity translates into equipping people to do the work of the ministry. As a leader inside the organized church for the last decade there is a sly temptation upon my soul. You see, being a visionary and a strategist I want to see us climb mountains, grow stuff, step over blockades and mission new frontiers but the temptation to lead and respond from a dark place in my soul is always there.

With people comes opposition, negative feedback, vision confusion, obstinate attitudes, slowness in retention and straight up personal critique. These often feel like arrows at our identity, our mission, our calling and our leadership proficiency. So the natural tendency is to steamroll over people who voice concern or to demonize them in our mind as “against us”. It’s easy to see people who slow us down or call our methods into question as obstacles in the way of the mission.

That’s why I’m slightly (emphasis on slightly) uncomfortable with using the war motif in association with doing ministry. There is a lot of pontificating going on in literature that frames ministry in battle terms. If we are honest this approach appeals to baseline impulses in us to defend ourselves and respond out of anxiety and anger.

Leadership challenges offer souls sessions or clear opportunities to face our real selves and to navigate why we are triggered by opposition, feedback, confusion, questions, and critique. It is convenient to blame, shame, get defensive, become argumentative and squash the reasoning and case presented to us by a brother or sister in Christ. The dark place in our soul screams “they are rejecting you,” “your incompetent,” “your useless,” “your better than them,” “no one understands you,” and “they’re not with you”. These emotions, thoughts and knee jerk reactions then become part of the self-concept and the “lens” through which we lead others. It leads to all kinds of gross misinterpretations and assumptions. Inconsequentially it becomes very hard to hold onto high caliber leaders and to woo people to follow you into unknown kingdom territories.

Leading out of stillness is a spiritual discipline and a probably the most important homework for a pastor/leader to press into.