Discipleship Letters 81-82

Discipleship Letter 81                                    April 04^th, 2010

Friendship plays a key role in Christian spirituality. In the story of David, Jonathan nurtured the soul of David when he was chased after by Saul, the Father of Jonathan.

“In the middle of the craziness and madness, the meanness and hate, David experienced a most unusual love in Jonathan’s friendship. In conversation and prayer, together they tried to understand Saul…Jonathan’s friendship was essential to David’s life. It’s highly unlikely that David could have persisted in serving Saul without the friendship of Jonathan. Jonathan, in striking contrast to his father, discerned God in David, comprehended the danger and difficulty of his anointing, and made a covenant of friendship with him. Jonathan’s friendship entered David’s soul in a way that Saul’s hatred never did” [Eugene Peterson, Leap Over A Wall: Earthy Spirituality for Everyday Christians (New York: HarperSanFranciso, 1997), pp. 51-53.].

Saul minimized the soul of David; Jonathan enlarged it. Saul’s hatred and jealousy almost destroyed the life of David; Jonathan’s friendship turned David’s potential ungodliness into holiness. Without Jonathan’s covenantal friendship, David would become another Saul: filled with hatred and jealousy. Jonathan saw God in David. David started to see God in himself. Jonathan continued to see God in David in spite of hard circumstances, which “didn’t cancel out the covenant; rather, the covenant was used in the purposes of God to overcome the circumstances” (p. 53).

--

Discipleship Letter 82                                    April 11^th, 2010

“We understand gift language well enough. We begin as gift. We don’t make ourselves. We don’t birth ourselves. We find our fundamental identity as a gift. And then, immediately, we are given gifts: gifts of love and food and clothing and shelter, gifts of healing and nurture and education and training…Gradually these gifts develop into the strengths and responsibilities of maturity” [Eugene Peterson, Practice Resurrection: A Conversation on Growing Up in Christ (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010), p. 46.].

We have been blessed with much. We have been given much. We don’t grow up with what we have been given. We grow up by exercising these gifts that are in us. Not only do we exercise our gifs, but also exercising them in community. We begin as gift. We serve with gifts. We exercise them in a community: not a general community, but a particular community. God put us here and now—this body of Christ.

We usually talk about the gifts of serving, singing, preaching, cooking, etc…We usually neglect the gift of nurturing. Nurture requires attention, patience, and time. Nurture is against instant gratification. Jesus said, “Baptizing them in the name of the Father…and teaching them to obey…” To baptize them is to place them in a local community; to teach them is to nurture them.

“Maturity cannot be hurried, programmed, or tinkered with. There are no steroids available for growing up in Christ more quickly. Impatient shortcuts land us in the dead ends of immaturity” (p. 133).