The other day Team Quake received their allotted laundry
time at the Manila KIM ministry center.
I took my red bag down to the laundry room and the six of us divvied up
our lights and darks into four different washing machines. Ian and I put our darks together in one, the
girls used two, and all of us were able to fit our lights into one washer.
Later as I walked upstairs to my room Jill stopped me and
said, “Jacob I have a potentially awkward question.” I was pretty confused until she said “I ended
up with two pairs of guys boxers in with my clean laundry, could you tell me if
they are yours or Ian’s?” Community has
begun.
Later that day we took about 2 hours as a team discussing
and establishing our “Team Norms”. It
was a great process. Issues arose that I
would never have anticipated. The most
discussion arose when we began talking about internet and media time. We ended up making three categories here:
internet time, media (mindless entertainment) time, and computer/reading/etc.
time. We decided we would set aside two
days per week as internet days, mindless entertainment is to be for Sabbath or
Rest/Recharge days, and we are relying on group feedback to monitor our time in
our various engaging activities like writing, reading, and making videos. Kelly pointed out toward the end of the
discussion that issues such as internet and entertainment were the areas that
brought about the most discussion because those are the areas we most often
view as our rights. I think that fact is
a mark of our generation.
I want to be clear that we aren’t establishing these Norms
to create a bunch of rules. We know that
living together closely for a year can be hard.
We want to make sure that we all stay committed to the process of
refining each other in intentional community.
These norms are the guidelines for the life we see ourselves living as a
family this year, what we believe we should be tending toward.
In the process of deciding how to live for each other, we
were awakened to how much we were living for ourselves. We prayed over our Team Norms at the close of
our discussion and Kelly prayed, “God I don’t even want to mix my
laundry…” In the same way that many of
us believe we have the right to be on the internet any time for as long as we
like, we don’t think we should have to find someone else’s underwear mixed with
our favorite T-shirt.
We heard a lot of teaching this past week on the way God
created us differently to come together as a body that glorifies Him. It is precisely those modalities that often
make it a struggle to live together as that body. If we’re ever going to bring His Kingdom to
earth, we have to find a way to lay down ourselves, our rights, for the sake of
the Body. We have to find out how to mix
our laundry.
