Rhythm 6: Discernment

How do you make decisions?

What will you make for dinner tonight?

Where do you want to go to college?

What will you do with your life?

Should you marry this person that you’re seeing?

Is it time to move or change jobs?

Do you want to use the blue table cloth or the red table cloth?

Sometimes our decisions seem so weighty that we get stuck in them, frozen into decision paralysis, unable to move forward. Chicken sandwich or Burger? Cereal or oatmeal?

Many of us work with this struggle by establishing patterns, habits, predictable choices that we go back to every time. I brew my coffee one way and one way only each morning. I could potentially brew it about 5 different ways with the random assortment of coffee junk I’ve accumulated over the course of my life, but because it is coffee and it needs to get done while I’m still a little groggy in the morning, whilst also trying to get a 3rd grader to stop reading and actually get dressed…then a simple brewing method, repeatable and easy, is required.

You might always have your granola or always eat a banana. You’ve decided on a rhythm that makes other decisions easier, because you’re worried about one less thing.

Discernment is the sacred practice of decision-making. We practice discernment by paying attention. We open our eyes to all that is going on and seek to faithfully choose a way forward.

In a moment, I’m going to give us a long reading from the book of Acts, where the early church Christians faced a difficult impasse and needed to decide a way forward. Discernment is the practice to enter into when we are at a juncture, a turning point, or face a bind. Discernment is how people of God slow down to listen, consider, and then act.

Our text this morning talks about something that was quite divisive in the early church, especially for Jewish Christians. In the earliest days of the people of God, as Abraham covenanted with God in the land of Caanan. The marker of that covenant was that the men of Israel were to be circumcised. This “marking” of the covenant set them apart as faithful to the Creator God who had called Abraham.

But as the centuries passed and, eventually the message of Jesus and the practices of Christianity began to spread beyond the region of Jerusalem, Judea, Palestine, then this covenantal practice came up against the lived reality of those who were outside the covenantal family of the Jews, namely, the Gentiles, or non-Jewish Christians. Was faithfulness only possible by honoring the Old Covenant, with this physical act? What were they to do?

This is a moment for discernment. Let’s see how this takes place.

Acts 15:1–21 NRSV

Then certain individuals came down from Judea and were teaching the brothers, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.” And after Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and debate with them, Paul and Barnabas and some of the others were appointed to go up to Jerusalem to discuss this question with the apostles and the elders. So they were sent on their way by the church, and as they passed through both Phoenicia and Samaria, they reported the conversion of the Gentiles, and brought great joy to all the believers. When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and the elders, and they reported all that God had done with them. But some believers who belonged to the sect of the Pharisees stood up and said, “It is necessary for them to be circumcised and ordered to keep the law of Moses.” The apostles and the elders met together to consider this matter. After there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, “My brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that I should be the one through whom the Gentiles would hear the message of the good news and become believers. And God, who knows the human heart, testified to them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as he did to us; and in cleansing their hearts by faith he has made no distinction between them and us. Now therefore why are you putting God to the test by placing on the neck of the disciples a yoke that neither our ancestors nor we have been able to bear? On the contrary, we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.” The whole assembly kept silence, and listened to Barnabas and Paul as they told of all the signs and wonders that God had done through them among the Gentiles. After they finished speaking, James replied, “My brothers, listen to me. Simeon has related how God first looked favorably on the Gentiles, to take from among them a people for his name. This agrees with the words of the prophets, as it is written, ‘After this I will return, and I will rebuild the dwelling of David, which has fallen; from its ruins I will rebuild it, and I will set it up, so that all other peoples may seek the Lord— even all the Gentiles over whom my name has been called. Thus says the Lord, who has been making these things known from long ago.’ Therefore I have reached the decision that we should not trouble those Gentiles who are turning to God, but we should write to them to abstain only from things polluted by idols and from fornication and from whatever has been strangled and from blood. For in every city, for generations past, Moses has had those who proclaim him, for he has been read aloud every sabbath in the synagogues.”

Discernment takes into account the wide field of possibility in the process of decision making. If we are going to be faithful with our whole lives, we have to learn how to make decisions “Christianly.” What I mean is, if we are going to make this claim that Jesus’ way is what we follow, we are going to have to encounter the decision moments of our lives with a sense for what the faithful, covenantal, consistent way of God would be and, ideally follow after this. This is not easy work. The way is not always clear. But Christians, through the centuries, have practiced a simple method of discernment that can guide even some of the most divisive, difficult decisions.

There are a variety of ways Christians have talked about discernment through our tradition, but at its core, we can see that discernment has three important movements. Our reading from Acts follows this arc, where the apostles make their decision through a process of Listening, Discerning, and then Deciding.

Listen

The first step in faithful Christian discernment is to listen. In a time when we are profoundly inundated with opinions and noise about who to follow or what to do, we see that the faithful response is to to slow down and listen.

You’ve been in this situation. Let’s take the simplest example, choosing a meal option. Perhaps your partner wants one thing and you want another. In faithful discernment, we listen to one another. We hear each others’ argument or rationale. We share our own ideas and opinions. We listen to the problem that the other might perceive or we listen by exploring our pantry to see what we could make. We listen to our world, our bodies, our rhythms of life. We listen to our bodies, in particular — are we really hungry or is it just time for a snack? We listen to the needs of others — is our child going to eat that…is it worth trying to convince them…how does that impact our decision?

We listen.

Now, listening is relatively easy when it comes to deciding about a meal, but how about the practice of listening in much more difficult decisions?

From our text, we see that the apostles listened to each others’ opinions and experiences. They gathered data, as it were, of the accounts of the Gospel going out to meet these new communities of Gentiles. They listened to the voices of the Scriptures, the tradition of the prophets, the promises of God. They listened.

Let’s amp this up a bit and put listening into a different context. This is an election year…if you didn’t know. How do we discern who to vote for? I know many of us have probably already made up our minds. Perhaps we vote on party lines or we vote against someone rather than for another. Both of those options are outcomes, but short-change faithful, Christian discernment. They’re business as usual, and that logic, party or protest, may be an outcome of our discernment, but they are not the listening step.

Listening, in the context of politics, means attending to the voices of those running, certainly, but it also involves listening to our own hearts and spirits. What do the words and actions of a candidate tell us about how they will lead? Will that way be in step with how we understand God’s leading and God’s justice and God’s purposes for humanity? We have to listen to them and listen to ourselves to note what is stirred up in us. We listen as Christians, seeking to hear God’s voice through all the noise, God’s voice which must guide our hearts.

Ok, so we listen, whether it be to our stomachs or to the words and actions of a politician.

Then what?

Deliberate

The second step is to sit with all the data we have gathered. To deliberate on it. To mull it over.

Ok, you’ve got spaghetti sauce and no noodles — can’t make that for dinner. But you have some dough and fixings for a pizza…maybe it’s pizza night!

Discerning, the second step of this process, is about stepping back from what you’ve heard or seen or gathered in terms of information…and then sitting with it and weighing the options, counting the cost.

Discernment is baked into the way we govern ourselves as a church. We do not make quick decisions. Rather, we deliberate. We consider. We pray and discuss and seek silence and tune in. We sit with one another, having listened to each others’ voices, and deliberate about what might be the best course.

You see this, again, in the apostles’ story. Having heard from multiple voices, they then have time to consider. They look to the Scriptures. They seek wisdom about what has been the direction of God in the past. They keep listening while they deliberate, trusting that God will move them in one way or another.

Again, I have to talk about our political landscape as we think of discernment. Perhaps you find yourself frustrated by your options for potential leaders, or perhaps you’ve felt a clear sense of direction one way or another. The faithful step here, then, is to consider — how does my vote or my political or social action, how does my faith in the goodness of God and the seeking of the restoration of all Creation, direct me? If we gather all the data, listen to all the speeches or read all the candidate bios, then how do we sit with those and consider them in light of our trust in Christ?

This is where prayer is crucial. Prayer, in discernment, guides us into a place of quiet, where we can bring before God these concerns and offer them up.

Decide/Act

The final movement of discernment is to decide and act.

The apostles, having heard the stories and prayerfully listened for God’s leading, make the decision not to burden the Gentiles with this requirement of circumcision. Instead, they find a way through. They make clear stipulations about how they are to abstain from blood sacrifices, from idols, and from promiscuous or ritualistic sexual activity. These are clear lines they must draw. But in terms of the covenant of circumcision, this is left up to them to decide.

So, you’ve decided you’re going to make pizza tonight. Great. Here’s where the beauty of discernment kicks in — with pizza, you can make it so many different ways, depending on what you have and what you like. Is one of you vegetarian? Great, make your side of the pizza vegetarian. Throw some pepperoni on the other side for someone else, a compromise and connection that is aided and supported by good discernment.

Politics might seem more complicated than this, obviously. But by listening and deliberating, hopefully we come to place of peace where we can make our decision in trust of God’s plan over and above our own. We act or decide and we do so as Christians, as faithfully as we can. Perhaps we’ve identified fruits of the spirit (patience, kindness, compassion, and the like) in a candidate or platform. Or perhaps we’ve seen no clear way forward, and instead find ways to advocate for another way, resisting the binary options and finding ways to lead in resistance to such divisions.

Discernment is about making decisions out of faithfulness to God’s voice.

So…

What decisions face you today?

How might you slow down to listen and deliberate about them? This doesn’t have to be a long process, but rather needs to become a rhythm we practice again and again as we face decisions, big and small.

Thankfully, in the Christian way, we do not do this discerning work alone. First, we have the Holy Spirit to guide our steps, to open our ears and eyes and hearts. And second, we have each other, the community of believers, to listen to, contemplate and deliberate with, to discuss and sometimes even argue with, and then, to collectively act. We do not walk alone, but instead walk together through even the most difficult of decisions.

Faithful discernment is one of the most important parts of our Christian journey. We have to learn to make good decisions together and this is a lifelong process. We will face mundane choices, like what color of carpet or blinds to purchase. And we will face monumental decisions, like how to be faithful witnesses to a hurting world, how to use our facilities to bless and support the community, how to serve and worship together amidst times of great upheaval.

May we learn to practice listening, deliberation, and action, as God’s people, together. Amen.