Faith in Motion: The Train Series

 

Session Two: Assigned Seats

Learning To Stay With What We Are Given 

Eventually, the train arrives.

Waiting gives way to movement, not with fanfare, but with direction. Doors open. Passengers board. Tickets are checked. And then comes a detail we rarely linger over.

Assigned seats.

On a train, you do not usually choose who sits beside you. You do not redesign the car. You do not negotiate proximity. You are given a place, and often, a person.

This is where the journey begins to shape us.

Assigned seating confronts a fantasy many of us carry about spiritual growth. We imagine that once movement comes, we will feel more control. More choice. More agency. But the train teaches a different lesson. Progress does not mean autonomy. It means presence within limits.

Scripture is honest about this.

Jesus does not invite people into abstract belief systems. He invites them into proximity. Crowds press in. Disciples follow. Lives intersect in ways no one curated. Growth happens not through ideal arrangements, but through shared space.

Assigned seats teach us how to remain ourselves without managing the environment.

When you sit beside someone you did not choose, a quiet work begins. You notice your body. Your impulses. Your desire either to disappear or dominate. Proximity reveals where you are still reactive and where you have learned restraint.

This is not about endurance for endurance’s sake. It is about consent. You are not required to merge. You are not required to perform intimacy. But you are asked to remain human.

On a train, there is closeness without ownership. Elbows brush. Knees adjust. Silence is shared. You learn how to take up space without taking over space.

That is spiritual formation.

Many of us come from seasons where proximity was unsafe. Where closeness meant demand. Where being seen meant being consumed. Assigned seats can stir old fears. But the train offers a different possibility.

You can remain seated without shrinking.
You can remain present without being possessed.
You can share space without surrendering selfhood.

This kind of presence requires maturity. It asks us to stop narrating our worth through accommodation or resistance. It invites us to practice groundedness instead.

Jesus models this again and again. He eats with those who misunderstand Him. He walks with disciples who disappoint Him. He remains present without overexplaining Himself.

Assigned seating is not punishment. It is practice.

It is where we learn how to be with others without losing ourselves.
It is where we discover which boundaries are walls and which are simply clarity.
It is where love becomes quieter and more honest.

The train moves whether the seating is comfortable or not. But who you become during the movement depends on how you inhabit the space you are given.

Some journeys do not ask you to relocate. They ask you to remain.

And remaining, done well, is holy work.

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Reflection Questions

1. Where in my life am I being asked to stay present with people or situations I did not choose?

2. What reactions surface in me when proximity feels uncomfortable or inconvenient?

3. How do I typically protect myself in close quarters, through withdrawal, over-accommodation, or control?

4. What would it look like to remain fully myself without managing the other person?

5. How might this season be teaching me the difference between intimacy and possession?