Strengthening the walls of our whare
Discipleship…. It’s a word associated with differing meanings and interpretation. Of course, we know lots about Jesus’ disciples — even what most of them did for a profession. Yet how would our discipleship today stack up against the discipleship that Jesus modelled? Jesus had a wonderful grasp on what the needs and motivations were of those around him, he was an expert at seeing needs and responding to them. While his answers and responses often were cryptic and/or blunt, yet in many situations they were right on point. Now we, like many others all over the world who follow Jesus, have a wonderful opportunity to practice this holistic approach in the days, weeks and potentially years of uncertainty around responding to Covid-19.
John 10:10 tells us that through Jesus we can have ‘… an abundant life’, or as one translation puts it ’…a more and better life than they ever dreamed of.’ Some might measure that abundant life in tangible terms and physical assets — a big TV, or brand new car, or kids in the ‘right school’, a retirement nest egg growing nicely, thank you very much. But perhaps Jesus’ idea on an abundant life was centered on a more holistic definition.
Our Tangata Whenua have a model of health as a four-sided whare (house), Te Whare Tapa Whā. The four walls represent the dimensions required to make your holistic whare strong: mental/emotional health; spiritual health; relationships/family health; physical health. For me this is a wonderful definition of an abundant life. A holistic, complete and full life. And, as you might have noticed, one wall in there is mental health.
For me this is the missing piece of discipleship. Sometimes discipleship has only considered a few of the ‘walls’. Discipling is more than just being authentic with each other and asking questions about one’s soul or (cue the cheesy music) ’how’s your relationship with Jesus?’ Discipleship has to be holistic in its response. It can no longer be just a three-walled whare or a partially built mental/spiritual wall of that same whare.
From what we know, Jesus’ disciples dropped what they were doing (literally for some… their fishing nets), followed him and became his disciples. That’s not possible for all of us today. However, my point is the disciples were involved in all aspects of Jesus’ life. They had all four walls of Te Whare Tapa Whā intertwined as they were exposed to Jesus and his ministry every day. What if we were able to intertwine, in a 21st century way, our lives and the lives of those we disciple to embrace all walls of the whare?
What if our mental health was talked about more frequently amongst friends, family or those we disciple or are discipled by? What if we were willing to disclose our own, and ask about others’, mental health? What if it was normal to ask for help, tell people if you need help, or ask if someone is doing ok and needs help?
An article on Stuff[1] reinforced that in the context of mental health it is important that people shouldn’t be told to ask for help when they need it— instead help should be offered early and without it being asked for. Then, ‘when someone starts struggling we already see an open relationship and open dialogue and they don’t have to wait until they are trying to kill themselves or until they are in crisis’. I would argue that this is an approach that should be part of discipleship and living an abundant life together.
Embracing mental health into our view of discipleship does not make us (or require us to be) a qualified mental health practitioner. We cannot diagnose. Our role is not to cure people from their illness. We still need the qualified and trained practitioners — maybe even more so now. What I am arguing is that if the disciples were all in on Jesus’ life and he in theirs, why can't we be like that with our discipleship?
We already have some great discipleship going on. Let’s just enlarge our definition of discipleship to include mental health conversations. Ones that occur early and often. Perhaps that will help us to truly fulfil John 10:10.