Preface:
ALLL-right. I am going to write this blog... know that I write out of love. Wholly out of love. Keep in mind that this earth is temporal, and I just long for Heaven. Heaven on earth is not achievable, but we are called to work for it anyhow.
Also, I'm sorry, but I am ADD. Or maybe that's just my excuse for my extreme fondness for parenthetical self-interruptions. I do not call them digressions, for I find that in my musings they add a depth... it's like breaking down an essay into an outline. You get many levels of specification. Or application. So, I apologize. I'll restrain myself as much as possible, and when it proves impossible, I will do my best to avoid confusing you. And when that proves impossible, then add a comment to this blog telling me that I failed utterly. I would be thoroughly amused. :) It wouldn't offend me since ultimately I am writing for myself.... stop. Now THAT was the beginnings of a digression.
Prologue:
My heart is sortof breaking right now... though, it's hard to break what's already broken. Hm.
We people are so cruel. We human beings... why do we hurt one another?
Note: I am not from Mars or anything. I am a human being, and thus wholly include myself in all allegations against humankind.
For several years now, one of the things that has weighed heaviest on my heart is the severe disunity of the Church. Gah! I fell into the trap of generalizations... calling Christians as a whole "the Church" is like calling the United States as a whole, all its government(s) and people(s) "the State." As with all generalizations, judgements passed often do not apply on a narrower, more specified level.
Huh. I've already had three disclaimers, and I haven't even gotten close to the point. I'll just plow ahead, then.
Severe disunity. It's like a human body, the Church. Or the church... either way. God shows us so much through how he has ordered nature. Single-celled organisms... very little. They exist of themselves. They, like every other living thing, cannot claim full independence. Everything needs its environment to live. A little bacteria in a human body, though it's its own self, needs the human body to live and function just like the human body needs the oxygen in the atmosphere and the water and a number of other external things in its environment to survive. Hmmm... A proton needs an electron and neutron to serve its purpose. An atom needs other atoms in order to fulfill its potential... to "live," per se. A molecule needs other molecules... An organ needs the other organs to function and to make a functional cell... A cell needs more cells to make an organ (bigger organ, this time), and that organ needs other organs to make a body. A body needs an earth. Earth has its incredibly specific needs in order to function ("live") as Earth. {Sidenote: It wouldn't seem that way, since the Earth just sortof is suspended in nothing. I would have written that Earth is merely maintained by God... but our planet is not the end-all. It keeps getting bigger and bigger... the solar system, the galaxy, the cluster, the universe... though ultimately "through Him all things live and move and have their being." And as far as being suspended, lonely, in space—well, don't we all feel that way? And how do you think that little bacteria floating around in you feels? Well... if it felt.} Anyway, you get my drift.
So what would happen if the electron rebelled against the atom as a whole? What happens when an indwelling bacteria attacks its host? If a liver rejected its intended function? ... Eventually the smaller unit, as well as the larger, will die. Or change.
{Oh dear. I see the need for parentheses. I have to here state that I believe in civil disobedience. I believe in giving to Caesar that which he claims, and to God all that He requires. I believe there is Truth... human authority is not the ultimate authority. That said...}
I sense not only a disunity among individuals or individual ministries in the individual church, but a severe disunity in the Church—all churches who preach and claim to believe in Jesus and the Christ, Son of the Living God, who gave himself up as a sacrifice for our sins. The spotless Passover Lamb.
We're people… yes. Sinners… O yes, yes. I know. There's that saying, "If you are looking for the perfect church, just know that when you find it once you step inside it it will no longer be perfect." Where there are fallible people, there will be strife and some amount of pain on some level.
But that's not God's will. And God is the only true Unifier out there, for only he really Loves… and only he can change the heart of man. And it is God's will that we serve Him above all else, and love eachother right under that. It is His will that we undergo a transformation of the mind. It is His will that we be one with Him, and of one mind with one another. That's His will... Like I said, however: Heaven on earth... sinfilled, fallen earth...
Body:
Moscow-Pullman and the surrounding townlets (yep, baby towns) have almost innumerable churches. All this writing is about one in particular, and how it lead me to all these thoughts. This church's name is Living Faith Fellowship.
I have known many absolutely wonderful people in my time spent in Moscow who go to or have gone to LFF. When I first came to Moscow, I had been warned by a friend who was up here a year before me not to attend there. It wasn't something I really thought about. God pretty quickly directed me to and plunked me solidly down into the Crossing. Plus, as a Freshman who knew no one, Pullman seemed far away and finding rides didn't sound like fun.
It's a large church, LFF. The bigger the church, the more fallible people in one place. I was not perturbed by anything I ever heard about the church. Flying opinions don't find they're mark in me, sinking in and becoming my own. I will be the first to admit that I know very little about the church.
Today, however, I got onto a blog on blogspot… truthaboutlivingfaith.blogspot, if you want to look it up.
Basically, for those of you who don't, it's a blog begun by people who have suffered at the hands of other people and have left the church. I had, as I mentioned, heard things about the church. Reading people's writing about it has a very different effect.
The reason this brought up the old weight on my heart is that, though I know the pain they are feeling is as valid as any feeling, it appears that the blog has no purpose other than to mull over, dwell on, fester with that pain. I read many different entrants' opinions and inputs. There are varying opinions. Some were from people still in the church, gently or not-so-gently defending what they know and love. Most are from people outside of the church. Some bitter, enraged, blatantly admitting an inability to forgive, and some gentle, more reasonable, less apt to throw into their comments phrases like "horrible people," though no less full of pain.
The blog's proclaimed purpose is thus: "We are an unlikely group of former members of Living Faith Fellowship recounting our experiences, pains and victories. Some left on good terms but still deal with the pain. Others left regretfully with tears of frustration hot on their faces and still deal with the pain. This blog is meant to shield others from the heartache, help in healing the countless wounded and perhaps provide a roadmap out for people who are still abused and hurting." Yet, in reading, there is a mass disregard for the "help with healing." There are many many recountings of personal experiences, and angry retorts, and high-emotion opinions. There is no one exhorting anyone to "love one another" and "love your enemy." There is little living out of "love is patient, kind—not jealous, bragging or arrogant, not acting unbecomingly nor seeking its own, not provoked, not taking into account wrong suffered…" and especially "not rejoicing in unrighteousness, but rejoicing in truth…"
It is obvious that these people have been hurt. I do not deny that. We cannot control what is done to us, only our response.
This blog is running wild. More people are being hurt by nursing their own pain… and the rift between those who have left and those who stayed is widening. We should want to strive for reconciliation! Not disunity!
I am not perfect.
I am fully aware that any judgement I pass,
I am passing upon myself.
We need to be founded on the Word of God. Don't dish out what's been dished to you! Work to restore one another, not enable one another to take into account wrongs suffered, acting unbecomingly in doing so. Such proclamations of the sins of others, even unnamed in the comments, is a sort of rejoicing in their unrighteousness! And in allowing this to continue on the blog, wallowing together in the muck of pain and bitterness, is a rejoicing in their own unrighteousness.
The blog could have been established as a shining spiritual victory over death and pain. As it is, it may take years to undo the further damage done. The blog could have been as Jesus turning the other cheek, the Amish families' forgiveness or their daughters' murders… as returning good with evil, "setting hot coals on their heads" (for, from the hurting's perspective, the church and those in it are the "enemy" to love… again, generalizing… take with grain of salt).
I am not absolving the church for whatever may or may have happened to create this response…
I am not absolving those who left for this response just because they are in pain.
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I am not writing to pass judgement on anyone.
I am writing to pass judgement on everyone. Especially upon myself.
Reading this blog stabbed me. Not just with pain for the people hurting. Not just with pain for the church… or the Church, universal. It stabbed me with conviction. Personal and deep.
I am the pain-giver so often talked about in that blog.
I am the pain-dweller, who sits and rails.
I give in to my emotions and let sin run rampant, abounding with justifications.
I am both.
I am all.
I am a sinful human being.
But, coming back out of myself, I can shout out:
Awake! Awake, O Zion!
Clothe yourself in your strength! Christ, who is your strength!
Clothe yourself in beautiful garments! Christ, who is your righteousness!
O Jerusalem, the holy city;
o="" church="" the="" redeemed="" and="" blessed="" of="" god="">
Shake yourself from the dust, rise up,
O captives,
Loose yourself from the chains about your neck,
O captive Zion!
Awake! Arise! And Love!
Live, Love! And be FREE!>
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We do not fight against flesh and blood, but against the forces of darkness...
Stand firm. Cling to the Hope that you say you have, for He is faithful to keep His promises. He will go before you.
O death where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?
