Pilgrim HeartBefriending: The Mutual Regard & Care of Souls

Darryl Tippens is fascinated by the study of cultures, both past and present. As an author, speaker, professor of English literature and the Provost of Pepperdine University, Tippens sees that American culture permeates our spirituality and how we practice Christianity today. His newest book, Pilgrim Heart: The Way of Jesus in Everyday Life (Leafwood Publishers), invites Christians to consider afresh the way of Jesus in light of numerous practices that have proven to transform lives for two thousands years. Many practices such as Sabbath rest, hospitality, confession, forgiveness, listening, singing, and telling stories are largely lost on us today.

In Pilgrim Heart, one of the practices that Tippens gives special attention to is friendship, and our lack of meaningful relationships with our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. He explains, “Following Jesus is not a solo enterprise. In the Middle Ages, the great era of pilgrimages to holy sites, pilgrims traveled in large groups for safety. Geoffrey Chaucer’s pilgrims, for example, consisted of a group of thirty-one because the route from London to Canterbury passed through treacherous forests where robbers lay in wait.”

Tippens continues, “The Christian life is such a journey: a long, sometimes bumpy, circuitous, and risky adventure. Thus when the Lord commissioned his twelve apostles, he sent them out two by two (Mark 6:7), as he sent out the seventy emissaries of the good news in pairs (Luke 10:1).” In the same way that the disciples of Christ’s time did not journey through life alone, we should closer connect with our own Christian communities.

The Lost Art?

Excerpt taken from Pilgrim Heart by Darryl Tippens

Friendship as a serious subject (and some would say as a serious practice) fell into neglect in modern times. C. S. Lewis lamented the decline in his classic The Four Loves: “To the Ancients, Friendship seemed the happiest and most fully human of all loves; the crown of life and the school of virtue. The modern world, in comparison, ignores it.”7 Many would argue that mature friendship is rare, especially among contemporary American men. A professor of sociology once told me as much, when she concluded, after studying friendships at length, that American men are generally good at “side-by-side” relationships: they can bowl side by side, watch sporting events side by side, hunt or fish side-by-side; but what they cannot do is face one another and engage in a deep, heart-felt conversation. Thomas S. Fortson, Jr., president and chief executive of the evangelical ministry Promise Keepers, asserts that the first characteristic of American men is that they are friendless.8

The contrast with previous generations is more than considerable, and one must ask if there are consequences to the decline of interest in spiritual friendship. The short answer is yes, because authentic spirituality is corporate by nature. God always intended the pilgrim heart to travel in company. Without partners for the journey, we are ever in peril. Many believers are chronically lonely in their spiritual search. Emotionally detached, without faithful companions to hold them accountable, they are particularly vulnerable to temptation.

Some years ago I became interested in men in crisis. Some were depressed. Others were tempted by affairs or close to abandoning their religious or family commitments. As I befriended these men, I noticed something striking. While their surface stories were considerably different, I noticed that the “deep structures” of their circumstances were often similar. In particular I noticed that they were alienated, disengaged, or emotionally isolated. Why was this? No doubt the forces creating their various situations were complex, but it was pretty clear that the culture’s emphasis upon radical individualism was part of the problem.

America’s seminal heroes, from Ben Franklin to Ralph Waldo Emerson, preached a persuasive gospel of autonomy and self-reliance. Popular culture tells us in countless ways to stand alone, to be independent, and not to tell the truths of our inner beings to anyone. The messages has sunk deep into the hearts and minds of millions; and many––men and women alike—feel compelled to go it alone, to invent their own “spirituality,” in effect, to save themselves.

The trouble is, we were never created to live isolated lives, and to try to do so is to invite crushing loneliness and personal disaster. A rich spiritual life presupposes a rich communal life, and a communal life presupposes rich friendships. “I have called you friends,” the Master Teacher said. For Jesus discipleship is friendship: No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my father. (John 15:13-15)

Just as Abraham was the friend of God, all who follow in Abraham’s footsteps have also been called to be friends of God and friends to one another. In fact, a happy outcome to being a friend of God is the invitation to join a vast community of friends.

Pilgrim Heart by Darryl Tippens
Leafwood Publishers/January 2007/ISBN 0-9767790-7-2/224 pages/softcover/$14.00
www.leafwoodpublishers.com