Leadership: A word from Mennonite Church USA leaders

Let’s try an experiment. Take a deep breath. Hold it until you have to exhale. When you exhale, do it until you can’t exhale anymore and have to take a breath.

Now, having tested both inhaling and exhaling, which is more important? Which could you not live without?

It’s not even open to debate; you have to both inhale and exhale to sustain life. One apart from the other is insufficient.

A similar idea is at work in our spiritual lives. Two components work together to sustain us and give us life. One is filling ourselves with the love, peace and joy found only in Jesus. The other is sharing that love, peace and joy with the world around us.

Our body lets us know when it’s time to inhale and exhale, keeping us in tune with our natural rhythms. So does our spirit. We may consistently spend time with God in prayer, Scripture and other spiritual disciplines. That’s wonderful. Think of that time as inhaling. It feels great to take full, deep breaths. But if we aren’t allowing God to work through us in the world as bearers of peace and reconciliation, we’re not exhaling. Before long, that breath becomes stale and unsatisfying.

And what if you spend all your time exhaling? Eventually, you run out of breath. What was once a full, satisfying release turns into a sputtering wheeze. So it is when our spirituality is only directed at mission. While mission is central to following Jesus, if it isn’t animated by Jesus—when we’re out of breath and fighting on our own to keep it going—it’s just activity, and unpleasant activity at that.

We compensate by taking big, panting breaths if we’ve exhaled too long or by exhaling in a short explosion if we’ve held our breath too long. Maybe you feel out of breath spiritually, so you find a short, intense service project to participate in. Or you withdraw totally from the world to focus on God. There may be some relief in these, but it won’t last if you return to only inhaling or only exhaling.

Jesus is our model for keeping inhaling and exhaling in harmony. Scripture tells of Jesus constantly being engaged in teaching and healing and being involved intimately with his community, never turning away from his mission of bringing the kingdom of God to the earth. But he frequently went off by himself to pray, spending nights in communion with God. When he was in prayer, he didn’t forget about mission. When he was engaged in mission, he didn’t hesitate to stop and pray, calling on God for power to bring healing and peace to whatever situation he faced.

That perfect balance of inhaling and exhaling is what we strive for not only as individuals but also as a church. The tendencies inside each of us are magnified in our collective body. Historically, the body of Christ has at times withdrawn to inward-focused piety while injustice and violence ran roughshod over the powerless. Just as troubling have been periods in which the church has become so engaged in the world that we’ve seemingly forgotten whom we belong to and with whom our allegiance lies.

God continues to shape the church in the image of Jesus. Taken as a whole, Mennonite Church USA is a fine example of inhaling and exhaling, receiving the love of God into our hearts and spreading that love to others. A concern is that some of us are in a mode of permanent inhale, while others are in permanent exhale. Our task going forward is to find the balance together—for all of us to wear the yoke of Jesus, which is light and easy, and to give ourselves the pleasure of a nice, deep breath, followed by a satisfying exhale.

Let’s try another experiment. This time, don’t do anything to your breath. Just find it and get a feel for it. Recognize your inhalation and exhalation. Now, when you inhale, pray, “I’m breathing in the love of Jesus.” When you exhale, pray, “I’m breathing out the love of Jesus to the world.” May we all live in the love of Jesus, in our every breath.

Jason Boone is coordinating minister for the Peace and Justice Support Network, a joint ministry of Mennonite Church USA and Mennonite Mission Network. He attends Raleigh (N.C.) Mennonite Church.