So, big news for Real Life on the Palouse. And anytime change happens, people are bound to respond in all kinds of ways. Please, before you respond to anything that you see in the paper, online, on Facebook, or the rumors that are bound to fly around, read this...
Some times, it is so hard to not "get even."
That person said that one thing that was so mean and out of context.
That thing that was written about you that was so unfair.
People's ignorance seems to know no bounds. And it hurts - BAD! Everything in me wants to respond, to lash out, to vindicate myself, my friends, my family, my church. Certainly God would want me to do that - right? Of course God wants the truth to stand! So I MUST retaliate to let the world know what is what! Or should I?
Jesus makes 9 statements that will change your life. We call them "The Beatitudes." Not a great title for them, but none the less, that is another topic for another post, another time.
The Beatitudes are what is known as a "Chiasm." This is a Jewish literary tool that is used often in the Bible to help us find points that God is trying to make. In a Chiastic structure, the center is the point.
The center of the Beatitudes? Blessed (Happy) are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Mercy is the Jewish point. Jesus teaches us that our lives should be defined by the mercy we give to other people. That is tricky, cause that means that people are going to give us reason to not be merciful. And we will have the desire to extract vengeance - to get even. To make them pay!
But Jesus is way too brilliant to just use one layer of meaning in His teaching. The Beatitudes are also linear. They build on one another. We start with the poor in spirit being blessed because (literally translated) of them the Kingdom of Heaven is. then we have the Meek being blessed because they will inherit the earth.
Now, I am not saying that if you act like Jesus is telling you to, then you will get all these buildings and lands and power and status. Pursuing those things is at the heart of the world's mindset of power and empire. At the heart of Shalom is peace and contentment regardless of what we have or don't have.
But here is what I think Jesus might actually be saying... Meekness is defined as power under restraint. And in the order of things, I cannot ever be merciful if I am not first meek.
Here is perhaps one implication... I am not merciful or meek because it is easy or convenient or even because I feel it. These characteristics are true of me because I choose to up hold and protect the reputation of God first - before I protect myself, my church, my family, my friends.
So, our church is finalizing the purchase of space to meet in for services. Anytime that a church does something like this in a community, there are lots of questions and lots of potential opinions. Many of those opinions are rooted in fear and ignorance. And my temptation is to respond, to show them the error of their thinking. I want to correct them, defend my church, protect something that I care very deeply about. And to make matters worse, it seems as though these people who say, or write these foolish things treat something so very dear to my heart as trite and useless. And it hurts.
So to our church family here at RLOTP... I am begging you to not get sucked into all the things that will be said about what God is up to through our church. Don't get into a Facebook debate or write letters to the editor or any of the other thousand ways that people are going to try to incite debate and argument that can only serve to hurt what we are trying to accomplish. Stay the course and stay meek, merciful, and silent.
Jesus has asked us to be merciful and meek. To me, that means that we don't respond. We don't get sucked into trying to defend our church and our God from people's ignorance and fear. We live in an amazing country that gives people the freedom to say whatever they want about whatever they choose. Please, if you truly care about protecting Real Life as a church and more importantly the reputation of God, keeping your self under control and just being silent is truly the best option. I believe that we glorify God when we do this.
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