Why do I need community? Because I have clutter in my conduit and that clutter keeps me from clearly hearing the full revelation of God. Let me explain. Imagine a conduit, a tube between you and God, a channel through which God could speak. I believe all day, every day, God is speaking to you and me through this conduit and yet if I am honest I am hearing only a handful of the hundreds of things he has to say. I believe this is due to the clutter in my conduit, presuppositions, particular paradigms and painful experiences that are all crammed into my conduit and keeping me from hearing clearly much of what God would like to say. Which is why I need you, because you have different clutter in your conduit which means I might hear things you miss and you might hear things from God that I have dismissed.
This past summer a young woman asked me if I believed that God still speaks to people. It was not difficult for me to say, “Absolutely!” There have been moments in my life when I have understood more than I can understand, been wiser than I am on my own, been lead in a direction I had not planned on going, and have had visions and dreams that I simply am not profound enough to dream and vision. But I am also aware that there is so much that I am missing and that my revelations are partial at best.
I do not believe that there is a person on this planet with no clutter in their conduit, no person who holds the full revelation of God. All of us have limitations in our revelations, which is why I need you to be listening as well. Today God might say 1000 things to me and if I’m in a good place I might hear a dozen things that are absolutely right. Today God might say 1000 things to you and if you’re in a good place you might receive twenty valuable insights. Ten of the things we have each heard might be quite similar but I have two new things to give to you have you have ten to offer in return. Together we have a shot at twenty two.
This is one of the reasons I like to gather people around me that are quite different from me, not just so I can be purposefully multicultural, but because when I am purposefully multicultural I hear more from God than I would if my community consisted of people who had all collected similar clutter in their conduit. So would you consider with me that when we’re all hearing the exact same thing around the table that it could be the full revelation of God or it could be that the community consists of too many people with similar clutter in their conduit? I know it is easier to be with people with whom you agree but what if it is in the places we disagree that a more full revelation from God exists? What if God speaks more fully through the words I wouldn’t have heard without you and you wouldn’t have considered without me? What if you hold some of the direction for my journey and I hold some the insight for yours?
I relied heavily on this kind of discernment the year I spent walking across the United States. A seminary professor and I had prayed together over a map and tried to discern my route. Remembering someone we knew in a particular state or feeling nudges toward particular towns my route was planned using a large dose of the pragmatic and what I believe was a sprinkling of the prophetic. My professor felt nudges I missed and I had connections with people whom he didn’t know and the original route was finalized based on our partial revelations, beginning at the Pacific Ocean in Grayland Beach, Washington and ending at the Atlantic Ocean in Cape Hatteras, North Carolina.
In May of that year I began putting one foot in front of the other. One of the goals of my trip was to learn to be with God and so many of my days were spent alone listening for his voice or just learning to live with his silence. During those quiet stretches of road I often prayed for people who came to mind and circumstances that rose to the surface. On one particular day I simply couldn’t get Miami out of my head. After a full day of praying for every possible thing I could think of for the city of Miami I phoned my professor and asked him if he thought God was telling me to go to Miami. He said, “I have no idea. But you’re in Washington State and you’re on foot so don’t’ worry because we have a long time to discern.”
“Let’s ask God to tell someone else to tell you.” He said. I responded, “God would do that?” “Yes,” he said without a doubt in his voice, “God speaks and confirms through others who are listening on our behalf.” A few hundred miles later as I was walking through the Crow Nation in Montana, a young woman approached me after a church service and said, “You’re not ending in North Carolina are you? Because God told me to tell you to go to Miami.” And so I rerouted because a fuller revelation was offered when I listened to a young Native American woman who had different clutter in her conduit and words to offer that I could not have heard clearly without her.
This year, as we talk about community, I want to challenge you that one of its blessings is that there are more eyes and ears, more hearts and minds to discern what roads should be traveled. I challenge you to invite people with different clutter in their conduit to listen with you. And I challenge you to seek God not only in the places where you find similarities in your revelation but to seek him also in the places where there is no consensus. Let’s see if there isn’t a fuller revelation waiting for us.
