The topic of this note is “Fellowship”, but let me begin by saying that among all people, some are more blessed with individual self-motivation than others. This may be at work, at home projects, in academics, in daily exercise, in eating a balanced diet, in avoiding excess of any kind, and so forth. For folks such as this (Sempai James comes to mind), coming to training whenever possible is a no-brainer. James is a retired supervisor of social workers, but at 70 years old his retired life is anything but relaxed. He is up and doing his daily five mile walk long before the sun comes up. Each day, he meditates, stretches, lifts weights, punches the heavy bag and does work around the house. Later in the day, he does a second walk (this time with his wife) of three miles. And until recently, he spent much of his day helping care for his father-in-law (nearly 100 years old), who passed on earlier this year. And he still finds time to come faithfully to karate training and pitching in where ever he can help and training as hard as anyone. We’ll miss his presence for three weeks in August, when he and his wife take a well-deserved vacation to Arizona to visit his son (a youth pastor) and his family in Tucson. Not all of us possess such strong self-discipline…but fortunately for folks like me, the Lord provided some help in our lives.

I often wonder at the way the Lord designed the world, and us in particular. Aside from everything else, He definitely designed us to enjoy and benefit from the phenomenon of fellowship. I remember as a child, learning about why geese or ducks flew in their “V” formation, about vast schools of fish that flash and dart in amazing unison, about huge herds of bison in North America and wilderbeest in Africa. I learned about the value of flying or swimming next to each other, which made their journey that much easier due to the positive “wake” effect. I learned about “safety in numbers” associated with herds. I am also sure that each of the individuals enjoy the fellowship of each other’s presence.

Don’t you find a similar experience when training in line, next to your sempais and kohais? Training in karate-do is a many-layered thing…at one level, it is a truly an individual effort; one struggles, sweats, and strains to do one’s best…but when done in congress with fellow karate-ka, one’s individual efforts are raised to another level, almost without effort. Not surprisingly, the hardest part of training is…getting there, on a consistent basis. One day, you’ll be tired; on another, there’ll be a great show on the television; or you might be feeling under the weather, or perhaps a less than stellar day at work/school/home. Invariably, if we can pull ourselves out of the bed/sofa/chair and make it to the training place, these little obstacles melt away and we enjoy another great training session doing the karate-do walk….in fellowship with our friends who also motivated themselves enough to make it there. Throughout the class, you can feel the energy of your neighbor and actually be invigorated by it. Moving, kicking, and punching within this group environment feels natural and positive.

Each time I come to class, I am routinely surprised by who I find in the line-up that day…sometimes it’s comprised of only white belts with a few blues mixed in….other times, it’s greens and blues with some purple sprinkled in…on occasion, only the senior sempais show up. Usually though, it’s a mixed bag of all the different ranks, and on certain mornings, the entire ministry seems to be in the line. I realize that whomever greets me that day, was called to train that morning, (despite all of the other events, urgencies, and distractions that require their time). Therefore, I am always compelled to try my best to help them train and make the best use of their valuable time…after all, if He called us all there together in fellowship, we really owe it to give it our best eh?

To those who have never spent much time in a dojo, a reasonable assumption is that the sensei teaches, and the students learn. In reality, I think a sensei is more of a facilitator or conduit, through whom the training experience is channeled. I may have years of training/teaching under my belt, but I certainly don’t have all of the answers nor all of the knowledge about the art. I’m still learning myself. For the beginners who know next to nothing about karate, certainly a large percentage of what they pick up during the session comes from the sensei, the sempais and watching/training with their fellow karateka. It’s sort of an “I teach, you learn” type of process for the white belts and lower color belts. With the passage of time, however, more and more of the learning, while conducted by an experienced sensei, ends up being a process of self-revelation for everyone. Students learn through focused repetition, and in bits and pieces, will experience “Aha!” or “I’ve got it!” moments. At the same time, the sempais and the sensei often experience the same “Aha!” moments while demonstrating or teaching. In other words, each of the participants gain from the process. Some call this effect…synergy, a word that was popular or faddish back when I was in college during the early 1970’s. Basically, it meant a special, greater power that came into existence when two or more elements were combined…a net result that was greater than the sum of the parts (think about combining the three ingredients for gunpowder). For us Christians, another way of describing synergy is, “When two or more are gathered in His name…” I don’t know how it works, but when the Holy Spirit enters the place, as the sensei, I let it do its work and try not to stifle it. Practicing karate-do in fellowship, we are able to plug into His power of synergy and train and learn more than we ever could individually…and far more than I could ever hope to teach you.