Maturity and Risk
By Ben Wormleighton
“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable — if anything is excellent or praiseworthy — think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me — put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.” Philippians 4:8-9 (NIV)
What do you see in me?
There are many “you”s in our context — colleagues, students, collaborators, administrators — who see us. What do they see in us? Uncertainty? Comfort? Drive? Compassion? An inner Christ-man bubbling to the surface?
The reality of being deeply and instinctively seen by those around us can cause a great deal of anxiety. It seems like an unfortunate pedagogical reality that the things we actively want to impart to those around us are often those things that require the most energy and careful intentionality to do so. I can spend an hour crafting the ‘perfect’ treatment of Lagrange’s theorem, but perhaps what some of my students actually take away is that I was three minutes late to class. They might conclude that teaching, or at least what they’re currently learning, must not be a priority of mine. How we move through the world is being picked up and relayed back, often in ways we might not know or appreciate.
I think it is very deliberate that Paul connects the example of his own risk-taking and Christ-dependence with the provision of peace because that is exactly what I need when attempting risks of far smaller magnitude. Paul was likely imprisoned at the time of writing, and he was corresponding with a community of believers who were living in the midst of a hostile, intensely nationalistic context. That to say, Paul and the believers in Philippi understood risk to a very real, very present extent. Their way of life could at any moment—at every moment—clash with the concerns of those around them. They had to live into a spiritual maturity that Paul calls them to embrace throughout his letter, offering reassurance as he resets their thoughts in Philippians 4:8-9.
In my own classes, I usually give a short spiel at the start of a course on the concept of “mathematical maturity.” I’m sure there is a version of this in every field: mathematical maturity is the combination of sufficient base knowledge with the skillset to grow more. For instance, you may not be able to immediately reel off the proof to Lagrange’s theorem, but you mostly remember the statement and have an intuitive sense of how it fits into the wider landscape of group theory. I have found it to be a helpful point of view — at least for upper-division math classes — that the objective in those spaces is to hone the mathematical maturity of a student in the general direction of the class topic, above even adding to their pool of base knowledge.
What does it look like to inhabit and impart “spiritual maturity” into the academic spaces we move in, and to see it emerge as practice in our lives amid the lives of all the “you’s” who just keep seeing us?
I want the colleagues, students, collaborators, and administrators around me to see that the risks I take are risks taken for Christ’s sake—in what I choose to research, how I choose to distribute my time and my resources, and how I choose to conduct my professional relationships, especially with those of less “power.” I want to be a part of a spiritual community at WashU that is continually teaching one another how to risk.
This Lenten season God has been challenging me to access greater levels of compassion for my colleagues and collaborators, and to do that by encouraging or offering to pray with six people a week throughout Lent. In the moment this feels costly but reading Paul’s words reminds me that these are little acts of obedience and opportunity, and that the feeling of risk is intrinsic to such things.
I pray that we will be — individually and communally — open to God’s leading into a variety of risks, and that we will approach Him with hunger for new ideas of how to risk.
God of peace, be with us as we risk.
Ben Wormleighton is the William Chauvenet Postdoctoral Lecturer in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics.