Mutuality in Ministry

It is an oft told story that ministry is a lonely profession. There is much truth to that adage. The requirements of keeping a professional distance from members, so as to effectively minister is drummed into us -- both during our seminary training and in practice. My wife continually reminds me to be careful with what I share with members -- for sometimes that information can come back to haunt you. We have to be careful that we don't show favoritism to one member or another, lest jealousies develop. So, you keep your distance, and as you keep your distance, you find yourself alone.
And yet . . .
The elders of our church are reading Henri Nouwen's In the Name of Jesus: Reflections on Christian Leadership (Crossroad, 1989). It is a brief reflection on what it means to be a leader in a Christian context. He writes this book out of his own experience of living in community -- with the L'Arche Community, a community composed largely of handicapped people. He finds this both restricting and freeing. But in living in this community, he learns much about ministry.
He speaks here of ministry being communal and mutual. We serve together and are called by the community to give account. What is interesting is his reflections on mutuality because they go against the grain of what we're taught.

Somehow we have come to believe that good leadership requires a safe distance from those we are called to lead. Medicine, psychiatry, and social work all offer us models in which "service" takes place in a one-way direction. Someone serves, someone else is being served, and be sure not to mix up the roles! But how can anyone lay down his life for those with whom he is not allowed to enter into a deep personal relationship? Laying down your life means making your own faith and doubt, hope and despair, joy and sadness, courage and fear available to others as ways of getting in touch with the Lord of life. (p. 43).

Our calling, Nouwen suggests isn't that of the professional who services clients, but we are "vulnerable brothers and sisters who know and are known, who care and are cared for, who forgive and are forgiven, who love and are being loved" (pp. 42-43).
This call to mutuality is a risky one, for we can end up being hurt (as I've been), but can we effectively lead without taking this risk?

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