New Thoughts (08/09/10-08/12/10)
As a starting point for this study, I note that I have clearly taken an event that came much earlier in time and have inserted it here. Why I originally chose to do so, I no longer recall, other than that it groups the three visits Jesus made to this household more closely. However, had there not been this earlier visit, the sisters would have had no cause to send messengers to Jesus when Lazarus took ill (Jn 11:1). So, there was clearly a relationship already developed by that time.
Add to this that the Martha we see in John’s account, while clearly consistent with the woman we are introduced to here, has made clear progress in the intervening time. But, that is a subject I reserve for the moment. For, apart from noting the discrepant arrangement I have made of things, I want to get right to what strikes me as being the key to understanding the whole event.
The problem, you see, is not that Martha was serving, any more than Mary’s choice of sitting before Jesus to hear His teaching was really a problem. As the series my wife and I have been listening to of late says, “Not wrong, just different.” Neither serving nor stillness is wrong. Let us get that straight from the outset. Martha is not presented as a negative character type, here. She is presented as one we can all easily recognize, perhaps in ourselves, perhaps in others. If in ourselves, it is probably a characterization that fits us better in some seasons than in others, and it may well be that hearing some of the typical teachings around this verse, we have felt that righteousness requires us to somehow suppress those Martha tendencies. But, that’s not the issue!
This issue is this: Martha was distracted by her serving. All of those preparations that she saw needed doing, and her natural inclination to see to it that what needed doing got done had caused her to lose sight of why it needed doing in the first place. I believe it was the NET which had offered a footnote commenting on the fact that her absolute absorption in the business of hospitality rendered her almost wholly inhospitable. How does that guest feel who sees you flitting about in all your effort to make them comfortable, and yet never has the pleasure of actually sitting to visit with you? Has this shown hospitality? Why, they could get better than that at the local inn, if it was only service they wanted.
How does that guest feel who is thus treated? You know, it’s entirely possible that they are going to suppose you have quite a negative view of them. Are they that repulsive, that you busy yourself so to avoid their company? Do you suppose that they are just come for the free meal, cheapskates that want the service of the inn without the tab? Of course, this is not your intent, but it is the impression you may be leaving.
Or perhaps the situation is worse: that you could really care less about those you serve and really only want the praise for a job well done. That would hardly be unusual. Who doesn’t like a pat on the back when they have really put their all into a task? But, natural or not, it is not a good reason to do as you do.
But, come back to the issue Martha faces. She was distracted by all her serving. Distracted from what? From her guests? Well, yes, there is certainly that aspect to the matter. Having just watched my dear wife prepare for a visit from daughter, spouse and grandchild, I was a bit concerned with all her preparations the day prior. Don’t wear yourself out trying to make it all perfect, dearest. But, the wisdom of her decision was there the next day. She was free to be hospitable because the meal preparation was all but done already. She wasn’t so tied up in the kitchen as to be unavailable to her family. She was able to serve without being distracted by it.
Martha, whether because of the circumstance, or by her nature, was not in such a place. She had, we should note, been the one to offer her home for these visitors. She being who she is, we can be assured that she knew the state of her larder, what was on hand and what it would take to satisfy a dozen or so hungry men fresh off the road. If she was taken unawares, it was by her own choosing. But, having chosen to serve, she was now so distracted by the demands of service that she had lost sight of the reason for serving. Indeed, what we see is that she is so caught up in her chosen service that when the full effort of that choice becomes apparent, she begins casting about her and wondering just how it can be right that nobody else is choosing as she chose.
Oh, we’re back to that, are we? Is it not our constant issue that whatever it is we see as most critical to this kingdom walk is what we are certain everybody else ought to be focusing on? Is it not our nature to suppose that this one aspect, or that one, but certainly one, is the absolute key to ministry? Why, I’ve heard it in recent weeks referring to our upcoming men’s retreat Worship is going to be critical! The whole success of these three days will depend on good worship. Stuff and nonsense! Of course, I would be almost as quick to suggest that it will depend on the teaching, but that’s equally foolish. If we must suppose success depends on one thing, then it is on One thing: that God is not only present, which He always is, but is manifestly so.
As an engineer, I am quite familiar with the attitude that sees my project as the only project that matters. It often refines itself to the point of seeing my little part of the project as the part that really matters. You know, without this effort of mine, the whole thing’s going nowhere. What happens, though, is that we lose sight of the fact that this is equally true of pretty much every other part. Is the worship critical? Yes. But, then, everything is critical. Is the teaching critical? Absolutely, but then so is the time for simple fellowship. So are the meals. So is the fact that the accommodations are comfortable. Why? Because any one of these things either serves to keep men’s attention on what God is doing, or else it distracts us from that very thing.
Martha was distracted. Serving in not an evil. It is a good. We are called to be servants of the Most High God, and as such, are called to serve one another. But, when service becomes distraction, when our attentiveness to that need to fill the need distracts us from the God we serve, we make of that good thing an evil, even as we make the Law of God, good and perfect in itself, an evil by our abuse of it.
Do you know one of the easiest ways to tell when you have lost perspective in your efforts to please God? You get anxious. Oh, what if I’m not doing enough? What if I’m not doing it right? What if I’m so much here that I’m not enough there? And all of this what if business leads us into a terrifying trap, for we look up and realize, oh no! I’ve been worrying, fretting, anxious, and worry is a sin. Now I’m a sinner again! (As if I ever ceased from being so, but that doesn’t cross our minds in the moment.) This gives us greater cause to worry, and that greater worry causes us to put yet more effort into doing something, anything to make it up to God. What are we thinking? Well, we’re not thinking, that’s the problem. We have managed to drop into a pure emotional, utterly irrational, response. And, yes, men are just as prone to this as the womenfolk.
What does Jesus instruct us? “Be anxious for nothing in life. Don’t worry about what you’re going to eat, and don’t worry about what you’re going to wear” (Lk 12:22). Why not? Because you ought to know by now that God’s got you covered. Now, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t put some effort into storing your food so it won’t spoil. It doesn’t mean that you can just sit back and God will drop full-cooked gourmet meals on the table for you. Neither does it permit of having a total disregard for those clothes you have. Stewardship still applies. But, they shouldn’t be something that’s always on one’s mind. They shouldn’t consume us.
But, I want to focus your attention (and mine) one something important in that instruction. Nothing. Yes, Jesus follows with examples of food and clothing, because these are daily concerns for us. But, the fact of the matter is they are but two examples out of an infinite list. And that whole list is excluded from our anxious thoughts b the command to be anxious for nothing in life. Do you understand that this must necessarily include our efforts to serve God? Don’t do it in a state of anxious concern.
Of course this is no more license to do as you please in your efforts to honor God than that commandment leaves us free and clear to just lay back and wait for the food and clothing to be dropped on our doorsteps. There’s a difference between avoiding anxiety over things and becoming presumptuous in our lazy willingness to ‘let go and let God’. There is a vast swathe of territory in between and somewhere in that territory is where we are called to live. Serve, but don’t be consumed by service. Prepare your meals, but don’t become all worked up about whether you’ll have enough tomorrow, or whether you’ve done the preparations precisely right.
Those of us not caught up in the day to day of the household may have a different list of concerns that occupy us. Am I doing my job well enough? Will I be caught in layoffs, or downsized because of my age? Is my industry so changed by shifts in business patterns that I will become obsolete next year? I watch folks around me consumed by this kind of thinking. No, it doesn’t show with nailbiting nervousness. But, I see guys who are right now on vacation, and yet, they are working almost as if they were not. I see guys come in month after month, talking about the long hours they are putting in. And, I can only ask, why? If your management can’t figure out a real schedule, how is that your fault? If you have turned in a schedule that forced you to work such hours in order to hit it, perhaps you should learn from that. If the project requires this much sacrifice from you, maybe, just maybe the project doesn’t really need doing.
But, I understand the pressures. Cheap labor is available off shore and everybody knows it. Companies are downsizing left and right, the economy’s so uncertain that the entire business sector seems to be running scared, and the government seems intent on scaring them more. Unemployment is at record heights, and so are mortgages, because it wasn’t so long ago that everything was grand and we bought big. Now, we’ve got the tab to worry about. So, we allow that anxiousness to gain a hold. And all the while, Jesus has not changed His message. “Be anxious for nothing.”
God is in control. How calming are those simple words, how hard to believe. With training, we learn to believe in certain areas. We allow that He is in control in some of the smaller things. But, then something new arises and suddenly, we are not so sure. But, He is, and that’s the main thing. So, we come to issues of serving Him, and somehow that seems to be in a whole different category. I mean, look what happened to Aaron’s sons. We need to be careful here. God will not accept just anything as worship. He makes demands. He has requirements. Yes, all of this is true. But, my friend, if He has gone out of His way to save you, to call you, to make you aware of your adoption into His household, can you really suppose that He’s going to leave it to chance as to whether you serve Him with honor or not?
No, you can’t just do what you want and call it worship. No, you can’t just put anybody whatsoever in the pulpit and call him a preacher. But, if you are His; if, because He has had a heart after you, you now find yourself with a heart after Him, then you need to know that He provides. It is His name! God Provides. Chance? Chance doesn’t exist. There is God. God is in control. Where He is in control, His purpose stands. Whatever it looks like to us in this darkening world, the simple fact is God is in control. Nothing is left to chance. His purpose stands. Does it seem the Church is waning? God is in control. His purpose stands. He’s done far more with far less, brother. We don’t fall into complacency, but we certainly don’t fall into anxiety. We don’t become distracted by the failings of the fallen, nor even by the failings of the chosen. We pray and we trust. Belief demands no less and no more.
Although I have reversed the time sequence here, the contrast between the Martha we see here and the Martha we find mourning the death of Lazarus is both instructive and encouraging. It is encouraging in that what we see of her in that later scene is very clearly her. She is quite recognizably the same person. But, she is much different than she had been.
There was a line from an old Charlie Peacock song running through my thoughts last night, which comes back to me again now: “We’re a whole lot different, we’re a whole lot the same.” I had actually been thinking on it last night in conjunction with our upcoming men’s retreat. It is the story of the body in brief. We share much, but there is much about each one of us that is unique. But, that same line describes the personal journey of sanctification. Yes, there is a great change that has come upon me in this rebirth. Yet, that change is not so radical as to render me unrecognizable to those who knew the old me.
This is what I see in Martha. She has changed. Time with Jesus, having had her perspective corrected in this encounter, has allowed Him to shape her character along more pleasing lines. She is still the same old Martha, yes. She is still inclined to serve. She is still concerned to see to it that all are being fed, even in that time of her own personal need as she mourned her brother’s death. But, something’s changed. She’s acquired understanding of her purpose in this. She’s found that one thing that Mary was already receiving.
Listen. Let me draw this to the point. God, when He created man, declared that what He had created was not only good, but very good (Ge 1:31). In the creation of man, creation was brought to its pinnacle, its completion. Now, yes, I am quite aware that verse actually speaks of all that He had made, when God declares things very good. But, every step prior to that, He had looked upon the cumulative effect and stopped at good. Only with man’s addition to the equation did the result draw greater appreciation from Him, for only in man was His image so reflected.
OK, well what was true of man as a class is, I dare say, true of man in the individual. If that’s a tad too highbrow, let me put it this way. God made you very good. He did not blow it in your design. Your character traits are not some terrible evil with which you must suffer all the days of your life. They are the who of who you are. God made you that way. Would you truly complain to your Potter? I’m sure He’ll be impressed by your concerns. But, no! He made you very good.
That said, if you are like me (and in this, I’m quite sure you are), then you have screwed up that design pretty good all by yourself. Yet, even this did not take the Designer by surprise. It’s been accounted for. It was accounted for there on Calvary. It was accounted for back before the first day dawned on Creation. God designed you, and He designed you with good intention for good purpose. There is a reason you are who you are, and He frankly wouldn’t have it any other way.
Oh, our sinful fallen ways may scratch up that fine character He built into us. We may have taken up habits that cause the fineness of our character to be tarnished, rusted, warped out of shape. But, I tell you this with full confidence: None of that has left us beyond repair. None of it. There is none so far fallen that he is beyond God’s capacity to set him on his feet. There is none with sins so great that they are beyond the blood of Jesus to forgive. None. But, what we have thrown out of alignment, we need Him to realign. What we have allowed to rust and rot we need Him to restore. Where we have made the edges rough, we need Him to apply the polish.
My! It takes me forever to get to a point, doesn’t it? Here it is. What we see in Martha is what others see in us. A whole lot different, but a whole lot the same. Changed but not beyond recognition. The same old me, but much more pleasant to be around. The sense of humor I had before God came and rounded me up is still there; sometimes to my chagrin. But, it’s OK. He made me that way, and where things need tweaking, He’s on the job. I can still be pretty edgy, for a number of different reasons, almost all bad. But, as He works upon me, these things begin to ebb.
This is the beauty of God’s plan for man. He doesn’t have to come in and so radically alter us that we are no longer who we were. Yet, we are no longer who we were. Paul, for all the radical change in perspective that he experienced following his surprise appointment with the Savior, was recognizably Paul even then. Those who knew him before still knew him thereafter. They may not have grasped how he could move from persecutor to promoter, but they knew it was him. Even Jesus, as we see Him grow up, had this impact on those who knew Him. In His case, to suppose He had changed in some radical way does not apply, for He was holy from birth. Yet, even the worst of children undergoes change as it grows. For most, a certain maturity develops, and those who knew the foolish child may have difficulty in recognizing and acknowledging the wise adult. Where from this wisdom? Isn’t this that punk kid I used to see hanging on the street corner, always up to no good? How then am I supposed to consider that he might be an upright and concerned citizen now, worthy of my support? I know him too well.
Yes, well, do you know yourself? Do you stop to think how many had the same questions about you? The natural order of life requires that we change and mature, else we weaken and fail. The heavenly order requires no less. You were once children, and had to be taught like children. But, the intent of all that effort was that you would grow up and start absorbing the lessons of adolescence and later, the lessons of the adult Christian. Many have chosen to remain in childhood, just as we see it happening in society. But, that is not the fault of God. That is not the fault of society. We have only ourselves to blame, and if we would but recognize that fundamental truth, maybe, just maybe, we’d grow up.
But, in Christ, we have the tutelage of the Holy Spirit added to the effort. We have the assurance of God backing us up. Indeed, we have the very power of God working on our inner state. And, let me say this: He works relentlessly. God is a gentleman, I suppose, as so many love to say. But, He is also the Almighty, the Unopposable Force, the King of all kings. He has sworn that by His own right arm He will do it, and so it shall be. He is faithful to complete it, and He’s not going to leave it to chance. He’s certainly not going to leave it up to you to get the job done, you fallible, finite goofball. He’s not stupid. No! He is working it out. He is choosing the edge that most needs attention and dealing with it. He works subtly, gently for the most part. We don’t even realize the change is happening as often as not. It’s just that at some point we begin to recognize that we don’t see things the same way any more. We don’t do things the same way any more. We don’t think about things the same way anymore. There’s been a great change, and it happened so quietly that we never even noticed. Oh, but the world about us did.
Returning to Martha and Mary, I want to note once more that Martha’s issue was not that she was inclined to serve, nor was Mary’s better choice that of lounging about. Indeed, Martha’s issue and Mary’s choice are one and the same: the good thing. Mary has chosen the good part, the one truly necessary thing. Martha, in all her effort to serve, has been distracted from that very same good part. But, what is it, this good and necessary thing? If it’s not rest (for, oh, how we like our rest!) then what is it that Mary has done that is so marvelous? It is not that she chose to be still. It’s that she chose to be still and know Him.
Perhaps I’ve already touched on this aspect, but it’s worth repeating. We serve, if we serve rightly, in order that those served can have the opportunity of coming to know Christ. Whether they come to know Him in stillness or in service, or a bit of both is not at issue. If we who serve are able to keep that end in sight, that purpose before us, then our service is not a burden, but rest in another form. We are at rest even amidst our activity, for we know that our activity is bound up in Him.
Ask yourself what it is that distinguishes the things we do around the church from the things we do to earn a paycheck. Well, of course, there’s the paycheck that comes from the latter. Yet, much of what we do for the church is of the same nature. So, how is it we are willing to do for free what we otherwise insist is worthy of pay? It is because we are doing it not for the church nor for the pastor, and certainly not for ourselves. We do what we do for God. We recognize that this faith into which He has brought us is a faith into which He has bought us. We are by all rights His bond servants.
What was a bond servant, for the concept is a bit archaic for us, isn’t it? Think of it in terms of the indentured servitude in which many first came to this country. Yes, we will provide your transportation and your keep. But, in exchange, we will require a term of labor from you. You will work daily for some predetermined number of years to pay off the debt that accrues to you for your provision.
Put that into the heavenly perspective, where the price of your transport out of the kingdom of death and into the kingdom of life was the price of Life itself. God died to bring you life. He purchased you at the expense of His own blood. The debt owed on such an eternal provision is an eternal debt. It can never be repaid. You have been bought into slavery to righteousness. You are not your own. Yet, the service our Master requires is, if we are going about it aright, no onerous burden. It is a blessed joy.
This is beginning to see that one, good and necessary thing. Oh, it’s entirely true that He is Lord and Master. He is also Loving Father and Cherishing Husband. He is also Protective Eldest Brother and Dear Friend. In this our spiritual infancy (for even the mature amongst us in this life have yet an awful lot to learn), it is well that He is also our Patient Tutor. The Good Thing. He Himself is that One, Good and Necessary thing. Mary, in her restful attendance upon His words, has chosen to give Him honor. Martha, in her efforts to serve, could easily choose to do the same. But, in this instance, she has lost sight of His honor as the purpose of her service, and begun to view that service as an end to itself. She has slipped into glorifying her works rather than His goodness.
We all do this, I dare say. We see it all the time, mostly in others. It’s much harder to see it in ourselves. But, it’s there. The thing that ignites our passion for the things of God: that’s what everybody should be concerned with. Whatever our particular gift is, we tend to forget it’s a gift and try and make it a requirement. Anybody who is not exercising our gift is clearly slacking, not doing their bit for the kingdom. See, we don’t view that as the limbs of the body, so Paul’s lessons about noses and feet and so on doesn’t seem to apply. But, this is exactly what he’s talking about. As Peter would remind his own charges, “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another. Be good stewards of God’s grace (for your every talent is by His grace not your sweat), if you speak, speak from God [prophesy?]; if you serve, serve in God’s strength not your own. In all things whatsoever that you may do or say, let it be such that God may be glorified through it” (1Pe 4:10-11). That’s a tall order. But, that’s the order.
Notice the one good thing in all of it: God’s glory. Be good stewards of God’s glory which He has benevolently chosen to impart into your keeping. That glory is not your own, but it is handed into your keeping, granted for your use, if you will. Of course, in granting us such boon, God has also put upon us a responsibility: a responsibility of love. Since it is God’s glory that powers your gift, use your gift to magnify and demonstrate His glory. Not yours. His. Keep your spiritual eye on the goal, the reason. If your attention is upon that one good thing, and upon He Who Is that One Good Thing, your service will not weigh you down, but lift you up. Though you be ever so busy in the things to which He has called you, yet you will be at rest in Him, doing them in His strength, and therefore able to soar with the eagles, even as He has said.
Come, then, and bow before Him. Come and accept with all humility the gift He holds out on offer to you. Rest to the weary. Peace even in the busiest of times. Strength to run the race, and such a marvelous prize to entice you onward toward the goal. And He Who stands with hands outstretched to bless you with this gift, is He Who has sworn on His own incorruptible and unchangeable name that by His own right arm, He will do it. Indeed, He has said, “It is finished!”
Oh! Listen to David sing of this matter of the One thing! There is a man who understood what a great thing had been handed to him in being called by God. For all the power and might that was given him, David saw something completely different that truly drew his attention and his love. “One thing I ask of the Lord. One thing alone I seek. The whole of me is caught up in attaining to the goal of dwelling in His house all my life that I may behold His beauty and meditate upon Him in His Temple all the days of my life” (Ps 27:4). I tell you, David has gained his Desire. Hear it again, and understand that as David speaks, so it is for you whom the Lord has graciously chosen out of darkness. “The Lord is my portion, my inheritance, my cup. You, Lord, support my lot. You have set the boundaries, and I find that they enclose pleasant places for me. Truly, my heritage is beautiful to me” (Ps 16:5-6).
This is my story! This is your story! As we go through the fleeting days of this earthly life, whether the day blows foul or fair, whether trials come or blessings flow, God has set the boundaries and He has established them in a fashion that enwraps wonderful territories for us. He has done so in accord with the Truth that He is Good, that His plans for you are to prosper you not to harm you, that He is working all things in such a way as will be for your best good. Now, that prosperity He has in mind for you may not include wealth such as the world measures wealth. But, whether you be rich or poor by that measure, yet you are rich in Him, satisfied in Him, the inestimable riches of Life and Righteousness poured out to overflowing into your coffers. Truly, my heritage is beautiful to me! Truly, if I but keep this great and certain outcome before my mind’s eye, then I find rest in whatever He may call me to do or endure.
See, this is the thing we discover over and over again as we walk with the God Who Is. He forces us to reassess what we think we know. We come to Him thinking we’ve got life all figured out. We are worse than sophomores in our self-confident delusion. But, He takes no offense at our pompous self-importance. He simply arranges events such that we are forced to see things differently.
God a gentleman? Again, let me stress this point. He forces me to see things differently. Things I thought I knew, even having been aware of His call, even having answered His call, I was forced to acknowledge were just plain wrong. I hadn’t got it. I had reshaped the Truth of God to fit what seemed more satisfactory to my way of thinking. But, God will not be mocked. He will not suffer us to make of Him an idol. We will (because He sees to it) worship Him as He Is. Else (because He has chosen us not for glory but for infamy) we are left to worship our own vain imaginations in fruitless self-deception.
But, because He has called me His own, He forces me to reassess what I suppose myself to know about Him. He forces me to let go of my preconceptions when the clear revelation of His Word speaks contrary to my thinking. He brings me into situations that sharpen my understanding of what it means to be His, of what it means to be Him. No, I am not saying that I think I am He. Not by a long shot. Yet, as I mature, and as I face the challenges of trying to guide another life to maturity, I get insight into what it is like for Him with all us myriad children each straying from the good way with wild abandon, each more interested in being considered right than with actually being right, each inclined to see ourselves as more than truth allows. For we all, as sheep, have gone astray. That seems never to change. But, our Good Shepherd does not suffer us to be lost in our wanderings. His love is too great. His sheep are too valuable.
Before I close out this study, there is a clarion call from such passages as this to take time for some self evaluation. It is a call to do one of the most difficult tasks, and seek to make an honest assessment of where I am. I am inclined, as seems typical for those who consider the story of Mary and Martha, to spend that effort in discerning where I am on the Mary-Martha scale. Am I one to be satisfied by just being, sitting in the presence of God, or am I one more inclined towards taking active part in service to Him? This is the obvious question, and the easier to answer. I do not sit still well at all. My inclination is to activity, even in all my laziness. My activity may trend more toward the mental than the physical, but it is no nearer to Mary’s stillness for all that.
However, my place on that continuum is of less import than the followup question. Am I there for the right reasons? As I have been noting in this study, the issue is not rest or action. The issue is motivation. If I rest, do I rest unto Him, or simply slack off? If I labor, do I labor unto Him, or just fill the need? These are harder answers to gain a clear answer on, and harder to face. If I look at my current state, I am nearer to Mary’s end of things than usual, at least so far as the life of the church is concerned. It is rather as if I had an ‘out of service’ sign hung about my neck. Having been very busy in this and that aspect of service, I am currently in a phase of pulling back from pretty much all of it.
Why? Am I doing so to honor God, or am I doing so out of offense? That’s difficult. I am convinced of there being no particular offense to which I am reacting, yet I am also aware that in some regards, it was offense that bred the climate for rethinking my commitments and priorities. It was not so much a case of I’m offended by you so I quit as, recognizing the offense, and the opportunity to pull out of a task grown onerous, why continue? Indeed, I can paint it as being the case that I pulled out in order to end offense, to avoid offense. Of course, how much of that is me dressing up my foregone conclusions in holy attire and how much is the true motive? It is in just such places as these that the heart grows wickedly deceptive. I pray, however, that the motive was and is as proper as I like to think.
I might also review some of the activity in which I was involved. Why was I involved? Well, certainly there’s that sense of perceived need. Who else was going to do it? Of course, that alone leads to very bitter service. Why is no one else doing it? No, there was a season there when I did what I did with a very clear sense that it was for God I acted, though man was served. But, somewhere along the way the balance shifted. I served not out of any particular sense that God was being served, but to help out a friend, to support a brother, or simply because nobody else was available. Well, I have to ask: when service to God’s house devolves to participating in activities that one doesn’t concur are truly ‘of God’ as we tend to say, is God being served? I don’t see how it can be so. A line is crossed. I am either a mocker in the midst of a true move of God or I am abetting an imposter, and neither of these things can possibly be right in the sight of God.
In the short term, this has clearly (at least in my mind) contributed to the pulling back. I can no longer tolerate the perceived coercion to be part of that with which I have fundamental disagreement. There is a point, to be sure, up to which we can agree to disagree. There is much about sound doctrine that men of good faith can in that good faith arrive at contradictory conclusions. It seems shocking, yet I know it is the case. It is frustrating in the extreme, for both parties in such a situation are firmly convinced of the truth of their convictions, and yet, they know the opposition to be true men of God even as themselves.
God! How can this be? Well, of course, Your ways are not our ways, and we are not at Your level nor even particularly close. Is this simply to teach us how to be humble as regards our own limits? Is it to recall us to our need to be patient one with another?
Yet, I find this line, which Paul also recognizes. It is a line that I ought not to cross. I have in times past, thinking I was doing right by accepting the differences in viewpoint, but I no longer see that as being the case. It is one thing, you see, to accept that others may hold a different, even an opposing conviction on matters of faith and sound doctrine. It is one thing to accept that even so, that other brother is just that: a brother, and one as truly concerned to please God as myself. It is quite another to go against my own convictions on the matter and support him in his in an effort to get along. Right about then, God has left the picture.
To some, particularly in this modern day world, that must sound very reactionary. But, it’s not. Not at all. We are all of us called to pursue God as best we may, to know Him as best we may. There are, ever and always, those matters upon which there can be no disagreement amongst those who would be called by His name. But, there are many more matters which, though they loom large in our thinking, and though they do indeed have great bearing on how one understands God to be, yet they are not cause to break fellowship. They are matters of conscience, not matters of salvific import. But, as with Paul, I need to realize that accepting that another may hold such opposite views is not the same as saying I must set aside my convictions in favor of theirs.
This is not, as some might choose to assume, a function of deferring to the weaker brother. There is a time and a place for that. But, there is a whole range of issues wherein it’s not a case of weaker and stronger. It’s not a case of Christian liberty versus a bound conscience. It’s a matter of Truth. It’s a matter of how we have come to understand Truth. Oh, it’s quite certain that we may be incorrect in our understanding. Yet, where we stand with conviction as to the Truth, to knowingly and willfully violate the Truth as we understand it: this is wrong. It’s not about setting aside prerogatives that we know we have right to in support of one who doesn’t understand it to be so. It’s about moving in direct violation of one’s own conscience, a conscience informed by God. If indeed we are incorrect in our convictions, surely He will bring the correction, and having corrected us, will leave us not only free to change course, but committed to changing course.
Thinking upon this, it is of a piece with how I have been led to deal with such theological differences in times past. Pray. Pray not that God will avenge those who dare to disagree with my clear and accurate understanding. No! But, pray that He would bring His correction to whomever it is who needs correcting, that He would by doing so preserve the unity of His household. So many times I have done just this. No great confrontation; no in your face, let’s get this straight argument. Just prayer. Humble prayer, willing to acknowledge that it’s at least an equal probability that I’m the one who’s off in his understanding. And, how many times have I found that in short order, that change has come, and unity has indeed been preserved.
This is the unity God loves. It is not a unity that pretends there are no differences, that acts as though truth doesn’t matter. It is a unity built upon Truth. It is a unity built upon humility. It is a unity that is wholly informed by God and wholly entrusted to God.
Long and long I have held to this sense of things when it came to matters in the church. Yet, somehow I have neglected to see that the same things apply within this little church which is constituted solely of my family. There are plenty of doctrinal differences that exist between my understanding and my wife’s understanding. I have often enough simply let it slide. Yes, I find some of your beliefs to be wholly off base, yet I know you are a lover of God and a child of God, so I’ll just let it be. But, then it must necessarily come about that silence appears to be acceptance, and if there is acceptance, then why don’t you do as I do? If you think these things true (which you’ve never said otherwise), then why do you reject me when I ask you to do them?
In recent weeks, this has been changing, and the change has been incredibly uncomfortable. Yet, it is bringing about that very transparency and intimacy of which I was thinking and praying not more than a week ago. God does tend to answer more swiftly when our thoughts are nearest His! It’s painful, though. It is unnatural to me to be so open in my differences. But, the conviction is upon me that convictions matter. I shall not violate her conscience and require that she recant of these things. They are matters that one can reasonably disagree. Yet, they are also things that are for all intents and purposes anathema to me in my present understanding. Is it possible that I am wrong, even having been over this ground so many times? Yes, though I find it doubtful. Yet, that doubt is part conviction, part pride, isn’t it?
So it is that, having just endured one of these newly transparent moments, wherein it was needful for me to say clearly yet as lovingly as I might that no, I don’t accept that sense of who God is, or what lies behind the current situation. It’s not a matter I’m in the mood to jump into a debate upon. It is something settled within me unless and until God chooses to bring His correction. And so, it occurs to me, finally, to pray as I would pray for disagreement in the Church:
God correct whichever of us is in need of correction and restore the unity to this place where it is most critical.
This I have prayed, in the presence of my beloved wife, and I am as certain as is possible between two people that in so doing, her heart echoed my own. And, certain of that, I am even more certain that God will move, for once again, it is a prayer that is near to Him.
So, Lord, I would simply repeat that prayer. And, if it is not understood, may that same apply as regards the other challenges and changes that we face together. You are aware of the issues of which I speak, though this is not the time or place for laying them in the open. You know, as You have watched us, that we are arrived at what we believe to be the correct course for us, and You know that, in our own separate ways, we are convinced that You have brought us to that belief. If we are incorrect in that, then I fully invite You to bring correction there, as well. It is, after all, Your will that we are both seeking, and it is Your will that we both, as we perceive You leading, will follow. So may it ever be!
