poor

If you received the December issue of Sojourners Magazine, you couldn't have missed the article on sociologist Nelson Good. According to Sojo's editors, Good, who recently passed away, was "an apt example of incarnate grace in the world. The physical structures Nelson helped build will stand for some time, but it's what he built with his life that's instructive and inspiring. Nelson wasn't perfect by any means, but he was a tireless advocate for others, an accepting, generous person who was interested in what others had to say. He made people feel good about their contributions and about themselves, and he was deliberate about being in relationship with others."

Since reading the article many weeks ago now, one particular section has remained burned on my brain, and I find myself contemplating it many times a day:

Nelson and Betty bought their first house with another young couple and arranged the space to accommodate both families, with a shared living room. It was practical, but it also expressed their values—the arrangement "allowed community to happen," as Betty put it, but didn't force people into community. It saved money, but Nelson always had a larger vision for frugality. People who managed to live happily on less had more freedom. They could work at jobs that allowed room for family life, or for causes they believed in. It was all part of a strategy for building community, the web of relationships that starts with the family and extends outward.

In recent discussion with friends, we've talked about how our society has been set up to separate us. You have your single-family unit and I have mine. Here's where my yard ends and yours begins. See this fence? My property. Yours, mine, and very little ours.

Honestly, I've dreamnt of owning a huge house all my life. A house where every room is ready for guests at any moment, and where I can hold a ball for all my friends and neighbors in a room with floor-t0-ceiling windows and a spiraling staircase I can swoosh down in my beautiful gala gown, all the while balancing my glass of champagne in one hand while placing my hand on the back of a good friend to let her know I am fully immersed in her story. My backyard would provide acres of running room for my kids and the vineyard would provide my income.

And then a few months ago, I read a book that radically pushed me in another direction. Henri Nouwen writes in his book, In The Name Of Jesus:

The way of the Christian leader is not the way of upward mobility in which our world has invested so much, but the way of downward mobility ending on the cross. This might sound morbid and masochistic, but for those who have heard the voice of the first love and said yes to it, the downward-moving way of Jesus is the way to the joy and the peace of God, a joy and peace that is not of this world.

Here we touch the most important quality of Christian leadership in the future. It is not a leadership of power and control, but a leadership of powerlessness and humility in which the suffering servant of God, Jesus Christ, is made manifest ... Powerlessness and humility in the spiritual life do not refer to peole who have no spine and who let everyone else make decisions for them. They refer to people who are so deeply in love with Jesus that they are ready to follow him wherever he guides them, always trusting that, with him, they will find life and find it abundantly.

The Christian leader of the future needs to be radically poor, journeying with nothing except a staff. What is good about being poor? Nothing, except that it offers us the possibility of giving leadership by allowing ourselves to be led ....

I read that line over and over again: The Christian leader of the future needs to be radically poor. And I think about Nelson Good and communities like The Simple Way. Then I think about the things I buy, or the ideas I buy into. I think about the way I view other peoples' successes and how I measure in comparison. I've grown into an idea that says to be independent is the best way to be. It can't be! I'm not happy being this independent. I'm not happy getting everything I want. Not that it's even all about being "happy."

Sorry. I'll avoid tangents. Just been thinking a bit on dependency and money and spending and following Jesus. Okay, I'm thinking on it a lot.