life questions...

Who do I celebrate with? 

This question was posed on a Fall evening. I had the privilege of hosting dinner for an eclectic group of people to discuss pastoring around the topic of lifetime singleness. Now having an eclectic group in itself is not that rare for us, in fact it’s a hallmark of our house.

But this evening, we had come together for the purpose of discussing what life looked like for the single, celibate person as they grew older. The group ranged in age from nineteen to mid sixties- their needs were as varied as their life experience. Most of them did not know each other prior to dinner. Eight of us at the table and one on the zoom screen joined for this pastoral discussion. So when I say it was a privilege, I’m serious. Listening to people whose daily sacrifice for Jesus and His call on their lives seemed larger than my sacrifice. More daunting than my sacrifice. Yet we could learn from  each other and encourage each other.

Questions that filtered around the table were serious and sobering. The older single folks, even not knowing each other well, shared a common experience. Words filled with both joy and sorrow as they quickly dispensed with small talk and dove deep into purposeful questions.

How had they developed and sustained  community in their lives?

What were the gritty hard spaces they all faced?

Where were the successes and the failures they had all seen?

How did the church figure into this picture?

Practical questions like the one I posed at the beginning: who are the people that I celebrate with? Christmas, Thanksgiving, Birthdays?

With the holiday season upon us, I thought it worth delving into some of these practical questions with some of their thoughts and some of my musings. Probably most of us just ate turkey (or ham), or perhaps some other family favorite. For many of us, who we would spend the day with was a settled question months in advance- the same people we had celebrated with years prior: family.

The adults around my table that evening had relationships in their lives that would meet that need this year. But what about next year, or in five years, or twenty years? What did it look like for them to build traditions that would outlive them? 

And in the midst of the celebration, there is an acknowledged sadness in being solitary, single. This sadness and grief came regardless of close friendships. One man in the discussion lived with a couple and their two children. They had purposed to do life together indefinitely. These family like relationships are necessary and huge in this discussion, but they do not eliminate the honest sadness.

The oldest man in the discussion spoke at great length about early church traditions of friendship and commitment. Wes Hill, the man on the zoom screen, wrote about these traditions in his book, Spiritual Friendship.

This, unfortunately,  is not the church tradition we live in today. 

We are often  transient in relationships. Job changes, marriage changes, and weather desires often determine where we plant ourselves, and we celebrate our freedom in this.

I think we’ve lost perspective on the power in the body of Christ. Those spiritual, familial relationships should mark us as different from the world. A commitment based on being declared family regardless of blood lines. A commitment reminiscent of the early church as recorded in the book of Acts, where all property was held in common and no one had an unmet need.

Can we recapture this spirit? What does it look like in today’s culture to form friendships of this quality?

I think it starts with me looking around and forming myself in those ways and doing it intentionally with the friends in my life. I make commitments, even to my own hurt. I honor those commitments, even though at times it will be costly. It may bring pain. Relationships usually do.

It will also be beautiful and unexplainable to those around you.

It will cause people to ask you questions about why you live the way that you do, and you have the opportunity to explain.

For me, I speak about it to those around me. Perhaps I write about it in a blog.  I change me- and the culture immediately surrounding me. And I pray for the broader church to see these changes as valuable.

Join me?