I wasn't sure why I asked my wife to bring my copy of Abba's Heart for me to take with us to our Marriage Encounter area board meeting last night. The business of the meeting - discerning new area coordinators for the NKY-Cincinnati-Dayton region - was going to take a lot of the time of the meeting, and the discernment process doesn't provide much opportunity for input outside of its own flow. This is partly out of a desire to avoid the influences of ambition and popularity. I suppose I just wanted to let people know about this wonderful book, if the chance came up.
This was our fourth ME discernment meeting: two for circle leadership (the first of which my wife missed), and two for area coordinators (one for Dayton, one for Cincinnati). Three of these four have resulted in only one couple being willing to serve in the role being discerned. Ideally, at least two couples will be willing to serve.
We began with a period of affirmation, in which we took turns affirming each couple there for some gift we saw in them. Interestingly, at least twice when I was getting ready to affirm one of the couples, another couple affirmed them for the same thing. I noticed the couple who led the discernment taking notes to ensure that each couple present was affirmed for some gift they bring to the community. The introductory remarks gave us the opportunity to write down the challenges or reluctances that would tend to cause each of us to withhold our willingness to be discerned as coordinators. We then prayerfully turned these over to God to overcome our reservations. The current ecclesial team leaders and outgoing area coordinators discussed their own concerns with accepting their roles, and the biggest surprise blessings they encountered when they stepped out in faith. I realized that there were some words I'd recently read in Abba's Heart that seemed particularly relevant, but there was not a good opportunity to offer it in the context of the presentation. We then had a brief dialogue question, after which each couple indicated on paper whether they were willing to be discerned as area coordinators.
We were there primarily to prayerfully support the process; geographical concerns alone would have precluded us from serving in this role for this community. If we have a separate discernment later for Dayton area coordinators, we may respond differently. We were surprised when the couple leading the discernment announced that no couples had agreed to serve in this role for the Cincinnati area. They shared another passage of Scripture, and were preparing to ask us to please go off as couples and reconsider, in light of the fact that no one had stepped forward, whether we might be being called to serve after all. But before they sent us off, I now asked permission to share something briefly. It turns out that I still had the page marked, intending to share about it here when I got the chance:
God will not give us more responsibility without the grace we need, and He will be with us to accomplish the task. That is why it is exciting to work with what the Father gives us. We are never alone. We have the joy of fellowship with the Lord. As we take responsibility for our lives, we will get to know the Father and grow in our identities as His children.
An increase in responsibility is an opportunity to depend on God. When you exercise your authority, it brings you closer to the One who gave it to you. You were created to represent God in service to others: "For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." (Eph 2:10)
Faithfulness releases God's power and authority through us to extend His Kingdom, and it comes through service. To be a son or daughter does not mean hiding from an increase in responsibility. It means taking one's place at the Father's right hand, serving with His authority. It means going lower in humility with Jesus to wash the feet of others. When we do the Father's will, we become more intimate with His heart for others. Whatever God has given you to do, He has also given you the authority and power to carry it out.
When we next returned, a couple had stepped forward to serve. I'd like to be able to say that we were willing, too, if we had been discerned, that we had sufficient trust in God and the community to not put us in a position we clearly understood that we shouldn't have been in, and to equip us to overcome the obstacles if we were chosen. I'd even like to think that we would trust each other enough that, in the potential upcoming discernment for our own area coordinators, we would be willing to serve. I'm not at all certain that we do. I find this disappointing, and I'm glad that someone doesn't read my blog. I don't love her any less for it, and I also don't want her to think that she's the only one with reservations.
Interestingly, in our dialogue we each invoked a familiar image. I talked about the feeling of jumping out of an airplane, and she talked about being on a high dive. And it fits us, somehow, that I did, and she doesn't. I want her to know that she won't have to jump alone.
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