A Different Way of Learning

We read an article in our text books about a phenomenon that is apparently somewhat common in several cities across France. Le Troc des Savoirs, roughly translated as The Exchange of Skills. We all have something we're good at, why not learn from one another? It just so happens that you know how to fix a toilet and I know how to play the ukulele. And it just so happens that I need to learn how to fix a toilet and you want to learn how to play the ukulele. So let's spend some time together, teach one another, free of charge.

I love this idea, a means to meet people and learn from one another on a personal level. No need to read a textbook or register at the university when you've got someone in the building next to you who has all the know-how you need. It seems like a much more rich, valuable experience.

And this is the way it used to be, isn't it? Before universities and academia became the norm, we were apprentices, learning a job by experience one day at a time. Not only that, we usually didn't choose the job, but it chose us, perhaps because it was the family business or someone within our circle of friends. But the fact of the matter is, if the blacksmith didn't find his apprentice, then eventually the town would no longer have a blacksmith. In a certain sense, this personal one-on-one teaching, free of charge, was the back-bone of society.

Today it's sort of the contrary. Relatively speaking, one must take an incredible amount of initiative to get much of anywhere. We choose the field of study to pursue, decide how to pursue it, apply, pay, and typically go on to listen in a lecture hall among dozens of others like us. This is how we learn. And no matter what the field, you must cram all the theory into your head before the practical. The rare opportunity to work alongside a professional is by begging your way into an internship of sorts, after proving you've already come to understand enough of the theory. I could go on, but you get the idea.

The reason all of this captures my attention is because of its impact on the church. We've followed the trends of our culture, and our pattern of making disciples doesn't look much different. Someone hears some sort of message that may spark their interest, and they must take the initiative to choose a church, find the church, attend, and break through social circles to meet someone. They sit among crowds, listening in services or Bible studies or Sunday school classes, getting all the theory they can handle. If someone says they want to learn more, we recommend a book or a podcast. If someone really wants to learn, we recommend the nearest Bible school. And the rare opportunity to learn directly from someone typically only comes after they ask specifically and intentionally, and even then it's such an unusual suggestion that the person being asked isn't really sure what to do with them.

I'm not saying that teaching in services and Bible studies and Sunday schools and Bible colleges and whathaveyou is bad, wrong, or worthless. If you know me, you know that's the furthest thing from I mean. What I'm saying is that this way of making disciples seems to be quite foreign from the picture I see in the New Testament. In my mind it resembles much more of a Western-20th-century-upper-middle-class-strong-work-ethic-pick-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps-and-prove-your-worth-because-that's-what-I-did type of mentality.

In my mind, discipleship resembles something much closer to this Troc des Savoirs. It's the pursuit of people and the exchange of ideas in a one-on-one setting. It's the space to ask questions, sometimes quite personal. It's the ability to try out some things with direct feedback. It's real-life, day-to-day learning. It's observing the example of someone who has a bit more experience. It's watching, listening, sharing, discussing. It's living life together.

I was talking to someone about mentorship recently, and to be honest I still am not quite sure what the difference is between mentorship inside the church and discipleship. There's a lot of people who like to split hairs over semantics like this, but usually those are the people who aren't doing either because they're too worried about defining them first. But I said to this person that in my mind, mentorship often doesn't happen because the Mentors are waiting for Mentees to take initiative and ask, while the Mentees are waiting for the Mentors to take initiative and ask, and so we sit in our corners waiting and never exchange with one another.

I've spent a lot of my life being one of those Mentees waiting to be asked. I've been told I'm in the wrong--that if I want a mentor I need to take initiative and speak up. OK, sure, I get it, and I can agree that the road goes both ways. But I maintain that there are a lot of people sitting in our churches who are insecure or who lack self-confidence or who don't seem any amount of potential in themselves, and they need to be pursued. Mentors can't just sit around and not engage anyone just because it appears like no one's showing initiative. And sure, Mentees need to be willing and interested and desirous in such a relationship, but sometimes simply being asked ("Who me? Wow, thanks for asking...") is all they need to spark that desire.

As I've been mulling all of this over in recent weeks, Christ's example struck me in a fresh way. He walks up to twelve men, he goes directly to them. They aren't the most obvious choices, not the men who have taken initiative or who are the most qualified. He doesn't mince words, he has one simple command: "Follow me." It's not an offer, not a question, it's a direct command. Generally, these men show no prior interest, they don't ask, don't sign up, don't inquire, don't apply. Just the opposite, Jesus sees them, knows them, chooses them, recruits them, and commences with the one-on-one side-by-side day-to-day on-the-job training.

This is our first and prime example of discipleship, and I think we could learn a few things.