Let’s start with an uncontroversial statement, theologically speaking:

The God of the Bible wants to be with us. 

Got it? Great!

But when it comes to the role of the church’s mission in the world, the idea that we are to “be with” others does tend to get church folks all that excited.

Myself included!

Words like rescue and liberation and transformation and restoration, justice-seeking and conversion and peace-making…those tend to get the church’s collective hearts racing. 

But a word like “with”? Not all that exciting.

And I’m pointing the finger at myself.

When I was in seminary in Vancouver, I was quite involved with a community called Jacob’s Well, who worked on the Downtown Eastside. 

Taking their name from the place where Jesus’ encounters a Samaritan woman, the Jacob’s Well community exists to build life-giving community and create unlikely encounters with folks living with addiction and homelessness in a very poor neighbourhood. 

We ate meals together. We gardened together. We worshipped together. We visited folks in hospital and detox. We made art together.

And after a while, I found myself thinking, “We should do more!” 

“We should be advocating for better addiction supports! We should be protesting the city’s poor housing policy! We could create a small business or job training, to help people generate income!”

Now–these are all good things. Important things! And, in fact, most of the folks at Jacob’s Well were involved in that work, too.

But it should never come at the expense of being with others, through simple acts of solidarity and relationship–visiting sick friends in detox, eating meals with people. Taking joy and delight in each other.  

My mentors and friends at Jacob’s Well pushed me to remember that anything we do for others, or alongside others, should be the fruit of the time and relationships we have from being with others.

This is one reason that theologian Sam Wells calls “with” the most important word in mission. In the Bible, the God who sends the church into mission is always the God of with-ness–Emmanuel, God-With-Us.

The story of the civil rights movement in the United States, led by Martin Luther King, Jr., is a case study in why with-ness matters in mission.

The movement for a more just and fair society for Black citizens in the United States in the mid-20th century was very much a faith movement. 

Black Christians drew on the stories of their faith as they built a movement to stand up for the rights of Black Americans–stories like God’s exodus liberation of Israel from Pharaoh’s oppressive economy, stories of prophets calling for justice for the poor, stories of Jesus living and moving and teaching among day labourers and beggars and everyday townspeople in Galilee. 

When that movement needed a leader, many turned to Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. 

But did you know that, early on, Dr. King had little interest in being that leader? He was leading a comfortable middle-class church in a comfortable neighbourhood, and he didn’t want to disrupt all of that and take on such a dangerous role. 

It was God’s call and his relationships with friends and pastors and communities that drew him into the fight. It was his relationships with those who were suffering that moved him to action. Not abstract ideas or ideals per se, but being with people, especially suffering people. 

With-ness led to the church on mission.

And when Martin Luther King reached out to allies from other communities–pastors and leaders from white churches, more privileged churches–many of them didn’t want to get involved either. It was risky!

But they had a relationship with Dr. King, and with the Black Christians in their own communities. And it was those connections that brought them into the struggle.

Not so much abstraction like “justice” or “peace”–as important as those are! But being with suffering people, being with those who needed friends to stand with them.

Check out Charles Marsh’s The Beloved Community: How Faith Shapes Social Justice, from the Civil Rights Movement to Today for a fuller telling of this aspect of the civil rights movement.

And so that’s a question for all of us.

Who are we with? Who are our friends, our neighbours? With whom are we friends? What suffering communities and peoples are we standing with? 

And what does “being with” those folks mean for us? What will it mean to stand with them? What will it ask of us? What doors might Jesus open and what doors might Jesus close, as a result of being with the people –the poor, the meek, the weeping, the hungry–that Jesus loves and calls blessed (Matt 5/Luke 6)? 

How can with-ness shape our witness?