The Case for Long Conversations
We converse because God conversed with us first. We enter into long conversations because history is long and glorious. Eternity will be the eschaton of our earthly talks beside the fire.
I am a proponent of fire-side conversations; the long-form variety that provides laughter and endless enthusiasm for life. On one evening, we can delve into each other’s lives and history; on another evening, we spend time dissecting the glories and agonies of life; and the other night, we sit around good food and explore again deeply into our histories and the shaping figures of our lives. The good life is conversed through rather than simply traversed through. Even though parents speak in fragments, I trust those incomplete sentences–-interrupted seven or eight times by the needs of four-year-olds–-bear good fruit.
This is all a tribute to good conversation. When our Lord was raised from the dead, he met Peter next to a fire. That fire-side conversation changed history, not because of apostolic succession but because the apostolic mandate to feed the sheep kept the conversations going. We feed by talking, not by imposing.
Good conversations leave an imprint on the next day and the next day. It may even change generations to come. I am the idealist who believes discipleship happens like that: through long conversations in the right direction. Some intimate, some intriguing, but always stimulating. There are regular people, and then there are curious people. The latter make good friends. These friendships are enriched by resurrection meals around a fire in good and bad times. They ask you questions, and you return the favor.
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