Fragile is the common life

A glass cello and glass violin. I'm not sure about the decision to build musical instruments from such a fragile material. They are not just vulnerable to being knocked or dropped but they are vulnerable to the vibrations produced by the music for which they were made.

People operate out of their strengths and conceal their weaknesses. Yet the Christian life calls us to work out of our weaknesses that the strength and power of God be made visible. This is faith, not foolishness. Yet there is foolish faith when common sense wisdom, phronesis is denied, for example operating dangerous machinery and not using safety equipment when it is available, or deciding to walk across a highway. There is also foolish faith when not seeking expertise or advice when it is available, also seeking a breadth of opinion rather than finding something that merely agrees with what you want or think is right.

My Auntie Mary is being discharged at long last from hospital after 3 months. However when I went to visit on Saturday she had a list of phone numbers to call to setup her home support services. At first I was indignant and frustrated, how could they do this to her! Anyhow after some good counsel Sunday night, Monday morning I went and asked what was happening? I found out she'd been asked if she wanted to make the calls or whether they should do them for her. I had to tell them that an Asian, especially female senior, expects to be asked 3 times even when they desperately want help.

We hide our weaknesses and needs from each other and yet weakness is what real community should be about: the asking and giving and receiving in the context of strengths and weaknesses, in the context of having and not-having, in the context of needing and giving. This is the common life but the common life is fragile because people don't know how to hear others asking for help, they don't know how to see and respond because weakness should not be shown. BUT after a while if you do need help and nothing happens, you stop speaking if you realize no-one is listening! When your's and my lives are too busy, and self-obsessed then the life together disappears.

All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. Acts 4:32