Thursday evenings are usually one of the high points of my week. Last night was no exception.
Almost always, 3 or 4 of us fellows gather for a couple of hours. Martín, Gerardo and Jose Luis came to my house last night. It is always good just to hang out together as friends—to eat supper or drink coffee together—to catch up on each other’s lives. Of course, these guys are not newbies when it comes to following Jesus; between the three of them, they have almost 28 years of experience as Christ followers. Each of them is fleshing out Christ in obvious ways where they live and work. The conversation is almost always rich!
One of our main reasons for gathering is to pay attention to God’s work and word in each of our lives; to do this together—to be there for one another during good times and bad—to listen for God together and to support one another as we each try to be obedient to that word. Besides our weekly gathering, we also try to connect by phone several times during the week—to ask how its going and to pray together. We usually agree to read some section of scripture during the week in our personal time with God—lately we have been making our way through Ephesians. Out of all of that, God almost always speaks.
I think that we are learning how critically important it is to spiritual formation and maturity for us to have these close, and ongoing listening relationships with another person or two. I’m impressed at the constancy of this element in the lasting spiritual formation I’ve seen over the years.
I hope that these friends of mine and I don’t forget this important lesson. I think it could make all the difference in the world.
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