I even hate typing that phrase, but, yep, that's what the church is too often known as. Why, why, why do believers fall so prey to hurting others with their judgment, gossip, and comparison? Doesn't God over and over tell us to extend His grace to others?
In the past 24 hours, people have told me these things:
"I was told I was an embarrassment at the church function because I pronounced the word 'wash' as 'warsh'."
"My husband just admitted to having multiple affairs and everyone in the Bible study knew it and not one person prayed for me during the prayer time. However, they prayed for another gal's sick aunt."
"My marriage is a disaster because of how much I despise my wife's religion. I hate it because it reminds me of my parents who told me over and over all the things I'd go to hell for as a child. I can't stop taking my anger out on my wife, simply because she grew up in the same church I did."
"I really don't think the people in my church would accept me if they knew I was going to counseling."
"I couldn't sit in the baseball stands with my male friends because of what everyone in the church would think, so I just sat there ale. None of the gals from the church talked to me, so I just ended up going home and crying. Aren't we adults, for heaven's sake?"
"My best friend loves God but won't ever set foot in a church again because of how Christians have treated her."
"I'm scared. One of the big guys at church told me I was oppressed."
If this doesn't make you upset, then you're either:
(1) forgetting that we are talking about the bride of Christ here
(2) grossly underestimating the sickness of the sin in your own heart, or
(3) deluded by this false expectation that Christians are supposed to be "better" than others
To point (3), Christians are humans indwelt by Christ. When they are acting human, His fullness/reality/glory (however you want to say it) are occluded. When we are acting against our self-centered, self-glorifying, self-concerned impulses, Christ has more room to be more apparently manifest. That's only when we seem any "better" at all -- when we get out of our own way.
I really could go on and on about this topic, but I won't. Do you have a statement that a believing brother or sister has said to you that would fit in with the top of this blog? Or, how have you contributed to "shooting" a fellow soldier in this war against evil?
It's a fact that too many soldiers have been killed by friendly fire. It happens when fellow fighters aren't careful. Who have you accidentally wounded by your uncontrolled weapons of words and actions?
Thanks for thinking about it before the Lord. We can't unenlist from the army of God (thankfully), but we can do something to change its reputation.
