When We Butt Heads in the Pews

My central thesis in preaching and teaching on Matthew is that one of the author’s major concerns in writing the gospel was teaching his readers how the community of faith was supposed to live together.

Being part of the faith community is a non-negotiable for Jesus. As I have said in the pulpit recently, there are no Lone Ranger Christians. You can’t follow Jesus all by yourself; the path of discipleship wasn’t designed to be a solitary road.

Sometimes we wish we could walk it by ourselves, because it’s not always easy to be part of a community. We might discover we are called to follow Jesus alongside people whom we may not particularly like. Or we may protest we are too “different.” Or we might say, “I’m not comfortable around people like that.” We might not like the way another member of the community prays or sings; we may disagree with their politics, or find their wardrobe distasteful.

But that’s all beside the point in the faith community, or “church,” if you like. When God calls us to follow , there is always a group of disciples ready to accompany us on our journey of faith. And these disciples are just as flawed and imperfect as you and I are. We learn on the road together. That’s the beauty and the struggle of church.

Fortunately, the Gospel of Matthew also gives us some great advice on how to navigate the conflict which will ultimately confront any church. In the eighteenth chapter, Jesus gives us a three-step process and one guiding principle by which disciples are supposed to handle conflict.

The three-step process goes like this:

1) “If your brother or sister sins against you, go and correct them when you are alone together. If they listen to you, then you’ve won over your brother or sister.” (Matthew 18:15)

This step is the best piece of advice I’ve ever heard, and as a pastor, it is the primary way I advise all staff and laypeople to act towards each other: if someone has wronged you, then you are supposed to go to that person directly and speak to them about it. Not to a third party, nor to Facebook, nor to anyone else.

This is also the least-followed piece of advice I have ever given. It’s difficult to confront people with whom you are in conflict. I know that because it’s hard for me, too. However, it’s the best way to address conflict, and it prevents things from circulating on the rumor mill or gossip circuit. Most conflict in the church would immediately cease if this practice were followed as a general rule by everyone.

However, Jesus recognized that this tactic wouldn’t always work …

2) “But if they won’t listen, take with you one or two others so that every word may be established by the mouth of two or three witnesses.” (Matthew 18:16)

If the situation escalates, Jesus recommends that you take one or two friends with you to confront the person with whom you feud. The presence of others keeps everyone honest, and can de-escalate tension.

But if that doesn’t work …

3) “But if they still won’t pay attention, report it to the church. If they won’t pay attention even to the church, treat them as you would a Gentile and tax collector.” (Matthew 18:17)

This step sounds extreme; in fact, it sounds as if it can be used as justification for kicking someone out of a church. But is that a bad thing?

Let me suggest some moderating thoughts about this passage:

First, I believe that this is an extreme step to be taken only when and if someone’s behavior is harming someone else. We can all think of situations in which a church member’s actions could be so destructive that we would have to take drastic measures to keep them from hurting people in the congregation.

However, this process ensures that there would be no arbitrary and punitive measure taken against anyone. If there is a problem, the offender is confronted privately first; if he or she doesn’t respond to mend the problem, only then is the matter widened to a larger group of people.

And third, scholars have argued that treating people like Gentiles and tax collectors isn’t as bad as it sounds. After all, we know how Jesus treated Gentiles and tax collectors — he ate and drank with them! He treated them as people worthy of his time and attention!

Finally, there is one overriding general principle that Jesus preaches about community life — forgiveness. Just after teaching this process of conflict resolution, Peter asked Jesus, “But what if the same person keeps sinning against me? How many times do I have to put up with it? How many times do I have to forgive — as many as seven times?”

We all know how Jesus answered: “Not seven times, but seventy times seven.”

Forgiveness is the heart of church life. This is the only thing that will hold us together in the end. For we will offend each other, we will sin against each other, and we will say harmful things and do hurtful things. That's just the way humans do each other.

But as the redeemed disciples of Jesus, we have a remedy for reconciliation — the ability to say, “I forgive you.”

Let’s learn to say that a little more frequently.

Landing On Your Feet

After Vacation Bible School this summer, Rev. Kay gave me a gift. It’s a little wind-up plastic monkey. When it’s wound up, it does backflips. Backflips!!!

And here’s the amazing thing — it lands on its feet every time. EVERY. TIME.

It’s become my favorite desk object.

Anytime I go through a rough patch, I wind that monkey up and watch him flip. I’m always amazed that he lands on his feet. In fact, there’s always a little bit of dramatic tension just before he jumps, because I worry that maybe this time he won’t make it.

But he always does.

I don’t know how he does it. Yet that’s how I want to be.

I always want to land on my feet. I never want to be brought so low by a circumstance or piece of news or life situation that I can’t get back on my feet and keep moving forward.

Compared to most people, I am extremely fortunate. I have been blessed with good health, and my family and friends have, too. My parents are still alive, and I’ve never lost anyone close to me yet. I have always had employment, and I’ve never worried about feeding my family. We’ve always lived in a secure and stable environment, and we’ve reaped multiple benefits from being American citizens.

However, I have had professional disappointments. Having to leave Cameroon was the most difficult thing I have ever had to do, and it caused me some personal distress. It took me several years to get over the pain of leaving early.

Somehow I “landed on my feet,” and regained a sense of purpose and meaningfulness again.

After leaving Cameroon, I experienced another major disappointment in my appointment to the church in Rowlett. As I rebooted my pastoral ministry in America, I ran into another obstacle when part of the congregation resisted my interactions with the Muslim community, as well as some of my public social justice work.

This, too, took the wind out of my sails, and I found myself reeling yet again.

But I “landed on my feet,” and found myself with the appointment of a lifetime — Kessler Park!

Ministry isn’t easy, of course. The grind of church politics and administrative minutiae sometimes makes me want to reconsider my life choices, but in the end, I come back to the call of God on my life. I remember that I am tethered to that call, and that it gives me meaning and purpose.

One of the Scriptures that has helped me “land on my feet” time and time again is a story at the end of the Gospel of John. Poor Simon Peter denied knowing Jesus three times on the night of his arrest, and he is still wrestling to absorb the fact that Jesus has risen from the dead. He finds himself sitting on the beach, when Jesus leans over and asks him, “Do you love me?” Peter is quick to respond, “Yes!” Jesus says, “Then feed my sheep.”

This exchange takes place three times. Each time, Jesus’ question is met by Peter’s “Yes!” Each time, Peter’s “Yes!” is met with Jesus’ command to feed his sheep.

Jesus concluded the conversation by saying, “Follow me.” Peter did, and it’s fairly obvious that he landed on his feet quickly. He weathered the personal storm, the shame of having denied his Lord, by becoming the de facto leader of the nascent Christian movement. He got on with the business of feeding the sheep, of leading the flock with a gentle and deft touch.

Every time I feel shame and insecurity, I imagine that Jesus is asking me, “Do you love me?” I always answer, “Yes of course, you know I do!” And he always replies, “Then feed my sheep, and follow me.”

You have to be on your feet to follow Jesus. That’s why I’m confident I’ll always find myself standing in the end.

To Rebuild Trust

A couple of weeks ago, I preached on Acts 4:32-37 which tells how the early believers lived life together. They participated in a kind of “Christian communism,” in which everything was held in common, and everyone’s needs were met.

Some of you rightly pointed out afterwards that there is a very problematic story right after this passage. Acts 5:1-11 tells a disturbing tale of a husband and wife, named Ananias and Sapphira, who are part of this community. They sell a piece of their land, keep some of the profit for themselves, and give the rest to the apostles. However, they don’t tell the apostles that they kept some of the money; they claim to have given the entire profit to the community.

The Holy Spirit tells Peter that they are lying about this fact, and the two of them die — right in the middle of the church gathering! 

I’ll admit that if I could remove any text from the New Testament, it would be this one. I refuse to believe that God struck two people dead because they lied to their pastors — God doesn’t work that way! I don’t want to speculate on how this story ended up here, who wrote it or why, but I don’t believe it actually happened like this. I can only imagine that Luke (the author of the Book of Acts) wrote it because he’d heard from a friend who heard from a friend that Ananias and Sapphire were struck dead in the church and — gasp, they had some secrets!! You know how gossip works …

Regardless of how this story ended up in our Bible, I want to point out that the emphasis in the story is on the deceit of Ananias and Sapphira. They did not die in the story because they didn’t give all their money up, but because they lied about it. 

The “lesson” of the story, as disagreeable as it might be, is that lies destroy community. The early Christians must have been aware that, in order for their fellowship to prosper and grow in spite of constant opposition and persecution, they must be entirely open, honest, and transparent with each other. There was no room for deception, dissembling, and secrets.

Lies tear communities apart, because they destroy the fabric of trust that hold us together. If we can’t trust each other to tell the truth about our life together, then we will not be able to stay together. 

That’s why I fear what our current White House is doing. Almost every day, the Administration sends a press secretary to a podium and asks him/her to lie publicly. It began on day one with Sean Spicer insisting that the crowds for Trump’s inauguration were “the biggest ever,” plainly a lie if there ever was one. Now it’s Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ job to fib. Her press conferences are a constant stream of false facts, misleading statements, and untruths. (Seriously — how many different words can we use as synonyms for “lies”?)

As a result, our national sense of unity is eroding. We don’t trust each other, beginning with the people elected to the highest offices. It trickles right down to our local communities and neighborhoods.

The same thing will happen at Kessler Park UMC if we don’t tell the truth to each other as fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. And that’s what I’m most concerned about.

I know that sometimes it’s easier to just lie; we don’t like admitting our shortcomings or confessing our faults. We tell untruths to make ourselves look better, or to “protect” somebody’s feelings. But it always backfires. Lies have a way of circling around and hurting us. 

In last Sunday’s sermon, I argued that a New Reformation would be centered around community, and that we needed to rebuild trust within our faith communities. There can be no trust in communities and organizations if the truth is not paramount.

It’s not just a matter of not telling whoppers; we must learn how to be transparent, to stop holding tightly onto secrets, and to be honest with each other. 

Join me in praying daily that we become a community of trust, truth, and transparency. And I promise not to preach about Ananias and Sapphira any time soon!