I was down in southern Indiana a while back, riding motorcycles with my friend Dave, the newest member of the Quaker Oatlaws Motorcycle Club. We stopped for lunch in New Boston, then decided to head further south to ride on the Ohio River Scenic Byway, a curvy, beautiful stretch of road that runs along the river starting at our border with Ohio all the way to Illinois. I was the ride leader, but Dave said to me, “When we get to the scenic byway, let’s turn east and we can stop for pie in Leavenworth.” I knew right then Dave was being led by the Holy Spirit. I didn’t study theology for eight years for nothing, after all.
We rode south and came to the Ohio River Scenic Byway, and I said to myself, “Turn east for pie.” But I have never been good at the east, west, north, south stuff. Especially in June when the sun is straight overhead not casting shadows, so instead of turning east, I got turned around and headed west, eventually arriving on the outskirts of Evansville. I pulled over, Dave pulled alongside me. I said, “I think I turned the wrong way back there.”
Dave said, “Yes, I noticed that.”
When you’re a ride leader, it’s important to make it seem like your mistakes are someone else’s fault, so I said, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
He said, “You didn’t ask my opinion,” which is how you end up in the industrial zone on the east side of Evansville instead of eating coconut cream pie in Leavenworth.
Sometimes it’s hard to know which route to take, isn’t it? Of course, not every decision is as insignificant as pie in Leavenworth. Some decisions shape, or misshape, our lives, and the lives of others, for years to come. Poor decisions can have significant and harmful consequences.
We’ve been talking about the things Quakers got just right. Last week, we were reminded that the ultimate authority for the Quaker is not the Bible, but the Inward Light, the Spirit that gave forth the Scriptures. This Light is still active, still guiding our lives, if we let it. But this process is not without its perils. People have done horrible things under the pretense of being led by the Spirit. On January 6>th, Christian Nationalists believed they were being led by the Spirit to storm our Capital. In 1993, David Koresh, the leader of the Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas, announced to his followers that God told him he was the reincarnation of Cyrus the Great, and many of them believed him, right up until they burned to death. In 1975, I wore a leisure suit to my 8thgrade dance, which ruined my chances for romance for the next four years.
Early Friends knew we were susceptible to error, so developed the custom of what we’ll call community confirmation, a process of discernment that encouraged them to test their leadings with their fellow Friends. Does this feel right? Does this seem reasonable? Is this decision consistent with the God we’ve experienced? If I do this, will people be helped or hurt? Will the world be made better or worse by what I am about to do?
Socrates taught that a person must ask themselves the following questions before they say or do anything: Is what I am going to say or do true? Is what I’m going to say or do a good thing? And finally, is what I’m going to say or do useful, does it need to be said or done? That was Socrates. In our Christian tradition, the Apostle Paul said we can judge the merit of an action by testing it against what he called the “fruits of the Spirit.” Those are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. The Southern Baptist preacher and civil rights pioneer Clarence Jordan once said we should never judge another person but thought it advisable to be a fruit inspector. We evaluate our leadings and the leadings of others in light of the fruits of the spirit. Is what I am about to do loving, is it kind, is it good?
I was thinking this week about community confirmation and why it’s so difficult. I think it’s because opening ourselves up to the community is counter to our preference for privacy. We are often reluctant to reveal anything of a personal nature to even our closest friends. I know a woman whose husband was arrested for drunken driving and sentenced to jail every weekend for three months. Every Saturday night, she would go to a restaurant, tag the location on her Facebook page, and post that she and her husband were enjoying a date night. She didn’t want anyone to know her husband had a drinking problem and spent Saturday nights in jail. How can people who aren’t honest about their troubles, who can’t admit the difficult choices they face, ever turn to someone else and ask for guidance.
Our preference for privacy makes deep knowing and frank honesty profoundly difficult. This is why the first step in any twelve-step program is saying aloud, “I admit I have a problem.”
Early Friends believed healthy community was the natural and logical corrective to error. If you had a leading, or were struggling with a significant challenge, you went to those who knew you deeply, and spoke about your situation honestly and candidly. If you believed God was leading you to do something, you tested your leading with your fellow Friends. You didn’t thumb through the Bible in search of an obscure verse to support your inclination.
Privacy is a jealous god, leading us to believe we can keep our true selves hidden, that our masks will never slip, our secrets never told. Honest, transparent community saves us from our worst demons, it stands beside us not just in moments of joy, but in moments of shame and confusion. It stands beside us and says, “Let’s try this path, not that one. I’ll go with you.” If I were to awaken tomorrow no longer believing in God, I would still believe in all of you and what we have here. I would still believe honesty and transparency were essential to our well-being. I would still believe that if I ever lost my way, I could trust you to direct my steps and correct my missteps. This was the sure conviction of early Friends, that God spoke to us not in some mystical heavenly voice, but in the familiar, comforting voices of those we love.