Where is your focus?

Over the past few months, I have seen a thought crop up from time to time in the various social media resources that I use.  It says something along these lines.  If you are leaving a church because you have been hurt by the people there, you have been putting your focus on the wrong thing.  Now, I will say that I agree with the overall idea of such a statement, though I also think such a statement does not fully grasp what it means to be drawn to Jesus through the message of Good News.

So let's tackle the first part first.  If you leave because you have been hurt by the people, you have been focusing on the wrong thing.  There is a way in which this is true.  We gather as God's people because of what God has done for us in Jesus, the Christ.  We are gathered as fallen, sinful people, whom God has redeemed through sending His one and only Son, who gathers people to Himself through His death and resurrection.  Our hope is not found in being a part of the Church, but instead, in being washed, redeemed, cleansed, etc., by Jesus.  We don't become part of the Church for the Church's sake, per se.  We become part of the Church because we are rescued from sin, death, and the devil by Jesus.

That means that, when we gather with the Church, we are gathered with people who are just the same as us.  Sure, their sins and temptations and weaknesses and flaws may be somewhat different in presentation and scope from ours, but really, we are all the same.  We all stand condemned because of our sin, and we all stand with the eager expectation of forgiveness and life because of Jesus.  Not a one of us should look upon another with pride, as though we are doing better in our walk with Jesus than another. 

Our reality in the Church is that, as gathered sinners, we WILL hurt each other.  We are not suddenly immune to sinning against our fellow members of the Church.  Our human sinfulness and weakness will inevitably reveal itself in those relationships.  Now, our hope is that we handle those occasions with humility, confessing our sin, asking for and granting forgiveness readily.  Yet, we will not always do so.  But our hope is not in how "right" we are with other people.  Our hope is found in how God has made us right through Jesus.

So yes, we can fix our focus on the wrong thing, on people instead of the Savior.  And even though we should remember that we are gathered because of Jesus, we also remember that we are gathered together with other sinful people in the Church.  We cannot escape that reality.  Jesus calls us to Himself within the Body of Christ, which means that we are in connection with others.  We have brothers and sisters in Jesus, and the expectation is that we will live our lives in fellowship and connection with them.

That means that we cannot simply dismiss our relationships with others, as though it is just "Jesus and me."  Our reality is that Jesus redeems us, and as redeemed people, we live out that redemption with other redeemed people.  Now, part of being redeemed means that we strive to love our neighbor as ourselves.  We put the needs of others as more important than our own.  We practice humility, as though others were of greater concern than us.

That means we remember, when we hurt another through our sinfulness, that we are called to reconcile with each other.  We don't pretend nothing happened.  We don't let anger fester and build.  Instead, as Jesus says, we leave our gift at the altar, and first go and be reconciled to our brother or sister.  Jesus Himself suggests that our act of reconciliation is more important than our act of worship.  And so, when we realize that we have hurt another, or that another has hurt us, that reconciliation with that person takes precedent, even over our worship of God.

While the "ideal" church (notice the small "c" this time) does not exist in this world, we are gathered into God's Church to practice the same reconciliation that has been given to us in Jesus.  If we leave the church (small "c" again), perhaps it is that we have lost focus on what is of most importance.  It's on God's redemption in Jesus, and in living as reonciled people together.

Distrust

As we live out our lives, one of the things that I have come to believe is foundational to a healthy life is having those people we can trust in life.  Many of us spend a lot of time searching for those people that we can truly "be ourselves" around.  We want to know that they are safe people, that we can open up to them, and that they won't betray that trust.

Yet, we find ourselves living more and more in a skeptical, jaded world.  In a day and age where everyone has the opportunity for a knee-jerk reaction on Facebook or Twitter or on their blogs, it seems that trust isn't seen as highly as it once was.  We see how untrustworthy so many are around us, and we cannot help but feel the lack of trust that exists around us.  And for many of us, this becomes a personal problem.

What do you do when you don't have someone with whom you can truly trust your life?  You want to have someone with whom you can be open and honest, but it's really hard to develop that kind of relationship with someone.  Spouses continually are breaking trust, as is evidenced in the divorce rate.  Friendships fall apart as gossip enters in, and trust is broken.  And even in churches, relationships that are founded in Christ Jesus are torn apart as confidences are betrayed, and as God's people fail to develop trust among one another.

Satan loves distrust.  He loves to isolate us with the thought that no one else can understand or be trusted with our precious thoughts and lives.  And sadly, he finds an all-too-willing ally in our sinful nature.  There is that part of us that wants to use the juicy thoughts or confidences of others as a way to exalt ourselves, or to draw more attention to ourselves.  And the more we indulge that sin, the greater the distrust that builds up, and the more difficult the task for the Holy Spirit to bring about Christ's reconciliation.

I don't have any easy answers for distrust.  But I do have one thing that I know for sure.  Jesus is not bound by our distrust, nor does He find Himself restricted only to those who truly trust.  Jesus is beyond our trust or distrust, and can work even in the lack of trust or the presence of distrust.  That's because Jesus Himself fully knows who we are, and has overcome both Satan and our sinful nature through His life, death, and resurrection. 

That is why we strive to build up trust, and to fight against the things that cause distrust.  And then, when reason for distrust enters in, we strive for reconciliation, as Christ has reconciled us to God through His death and resurrection.  We strive for confession of sin, and for forgiveness of sin to be granted.  When relationships have been torn, we strive to repair those relationships in God-pleasing ways.  And in all of these things, we give thanks to God for His gracious gift of forgiveness.

Initiating Reconciliation

In light of yesterday's post, one question that I know people tend to have revolves around who initiates the reconciliation process.  Common assumptions tend to flow in both directions.  There are those who think that the process should be initiated by the person who is the affected one.  After all, they are the one that is being bothered by the problem or the conflict.  They have the hurt feelings, and so they should take the first step forward.  That's one side of the argument.

The other side of the argument looks at the person who caused the issue in the first place.  After all, they were the one that did the damage.  They spoke the hurtful word, or did the hurtful action.  It seems natural that they should then be the one that should make the initial effort to correct things.  This line of thinking tends to go like this.  They did it, so it's their responsibility to make things right.

So which one is the correct one?  That may seem to be the burning issue.  But here's the thing.  Asking the question in that way tends to direct us to the one to whom we should point the finger when conflict or hurt feelings are unresolved.  We want it to be someone's fault.  And from a biblical standpoint, I believe that's why God's Word doesn't give us an answer to a question phrased in such a way.

So what does God's Word say?  Well, let's look at a couple of places to see.  In Matthew 5:21-26, Jesus talks about the person who remembers that their brother has something against them.  They should leave their gift at the altar, and first go and be reconciled.  That would seem to suggest that it's the person who initiated the conflict.  If that person's brother has something against him or her, then they are to seek that person out to resolve the conflict.

However, when we look at 2 Corinthians 5:11-21, we see a somewhat different picture.  There Paul talks about the ministry of reconciliation.  In Jesus, God took the initiative.  God was the one who had been "hurt" by our sin, and God took the first steps.  Likewise, the apostles weren't waiting for the sinful world to come to them for reconciliation, but were going forth on God's behalf to be reconciled.  This would seem to suggest that the person who was hurt should be the one to initiate the process of reconciliation.

So which is it?  The way the Bible seems to paint the answer is this.  It's the one who realizes that reconciliation needs to take place.  In that respect, the responsibility doesn't fall only on the person who initiated the conflict, or on the person who suffered at the hands of the other.  It falls upon the one who first realizes that reconciliation needs to take place.  That person then approaches the other person/people to initiate the process. 

So if you find that reconciliation needs to take place, it falls upon you to be the one to initiate the process.  It doesn't matter if you were the one hurt, or the one who did the hurting.  Once you realize that reconciliation needs to take place, start out down that path toward forgiveness.

Dealing with Hard Feelings

One of the sad realities of this fallen, sinful world is that people will inevitably have their feelings hurt over one matter or another.  Sometimes it's something so seemingly small, like a word taken out of context, or even when someone fails to smile at us or say hello to us.  Other times, the hard feelings are truly "earned", as when someone says something to us with the intent to bring hurt or pain.  But by and large, I would dare say that most of the time when we encounter hurt feelings, it comes because of a breakdown in communication between two or more people.

So what do we do when this happens?  Well, first, we should realize that there are typically two perspectives to this.  The one side is that of the person who has the hurt feelings.  They are on the receiving end of whatever happened.  But there is also the perspective of the person who caused the hurt feelings, whether they intended to or not.  And one thing I have found, quite often, is that the person with the hurt feelings tends to nurse those feelings in silence, and quite often, the person who caused the hurt feelings doesn't even have an awareness that they caused hurt feelings.

As Christians, we are people who have been reconciled to God through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.  Because we have been reconciled, we also seek to reconcile with others, especially those who share our faith in Christ Jesus.  We don't want to let hurt feelings linger, knowing that they are very damaging.  We want to bring them out to the light of day, so that we can work on them, deal with them as necessary, and then move forward in the love and forgiveness of Christ.  Not only is this the way that God would have us deal with these things as Christians, but we also see that there is value to this as we live our lives.  It's much more energy-consuming to maintain hurt feelings or anger toward another than it is to be reconciled.  It's much nicer to live life when you aren't trying to avoid someone, but instead look forward to seeing them.

In 2 Corinthians 5:11-21, St. Paul writes about the ministry of reconciliation.  It's what God wants for all people of the world, not only for Christians.  That's why we strive toward reconciliation as Christians.  In fact, this is such a vital role in our lives as Christians that I typically find it very helpful to lead congregations through the whole reconciliation process, even when there aren't major conflicts to be dealt with.  We will always have conflict and hurt feelings in life.  Knowing what God has done to forgive them, and knowing what we can do as God's people to be a people of reconciliation, truly does help the body of Christ move forward together.  May we be about this, for the sake of Christ our Lord!