Month: March 2014

Brothers and Sisters

I once had a conversation with a Chinese Christian friend regarding her frustrations with some other members of our local gathering of believers. Attempting to explain the apparent pettiness of the behavior she was observing, I responded that they were acting like siblings in a family. She looked at me blankly. She had grown up under the one-child policy in mainland China as had most of her acquaintances, and she had no context to understand the behavior of brothers and sisters.

Scripture is abundantly clear about how we should be treating one another as the family of God.

Romans 12:10 (ESV) Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.

2 Corinthians 13:11 Finally, brothers, rejoice. Aim for restoration, comfort one another, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you.

Galatians 5:13 For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

1 Timothy 5:1-2, Do not rebuke an older man but encourage him as you would a father, younger men as brothers,older women as mothers, younger women as sisters, in all purity.

Unfortunately, many children in the family of God struggle to put into practice the self-sacrifice required to love in this manner, myself included. What prevents us from living this out within our fellowships? I grew up as the middle child in a family of seven children. Often I felt as if I were sitting in the eye of the hurricane as it all swirled around me. However, here are a few observations I have made about siblings that I think could serve as a warning to brothers and sisters in Christ.

  • Siblings can be territorial. If you grow up sharing your room, your clothes, your food, your parents etc., you can long to carve out a space that belongs to you alone.  

Within the fellowship that can mean that, you feel your specific ministry, focus, or cause should have priority when it comes to resources, space, and exposure.

  • Children may bond with one particular sibling at a time. Depending on the child’s needs for a playmate, confidant, defender, or whatever, they may be drawn more closely to one sibling over another. No one could beat my brother Joe for imaginative play, but if I wanted a quiet conversation, he might not have been my first choice.

Within the fellowship, on the positive side, this should mean that we could find someone who will help us with whatever area of struggle we are facing. Negatively, it sometimes means that we only stay close to those who make us feel good about ourselves, which can lead to cliques that exclude and isolate others.

  • Siblings can be brutally honest, even harsh in their criticism of one another while still feeling that they love one another. I am frequently appalled at how harshly my teenage sons can criticize each other’s politics, choices, and ethics (The question last night- who would you be responsible for saving after an apocalypse – nearly developed into one!). Yet how often, privately of course, they express concern about the well-being and future of the other. The philosophy seems to be as follows: I disagree with everything you say, but I love you because you are my brother.

The enemy is determined to divide and conquer our fellowships, by magnifying the minutia to destroy unity.  What we are willing to “die” for, should be the essentials of doctrine and faith, not just our desire to be right and win the arguments. Most importantly, remember, we are blood relatives, by the blood of Christ; we must love one another.

  • Families can develop an isolationist, us against the world, philosophy.  I do remember some epic battles involving swinging purses, battering flute cases, and me ending up with a black eye. While a family may seem to insult one another with abandon, no one from outside the family had better try it! I feel that my own personal family lines were a bit blurry; since we tended to adopt and include others into our clan on a regular basis. There was so much togetherness going on that our friends wanted to join us.

Within our fellowships, yes, we have been called out to be separate from the world; however, there needs to be something that attracts others. The family lines need to be blurry enough to let others into our togetherness regardless of whom, where, or from what they may have come to us.

  • Siblings are forever. At some point, most people will lose their parents, but for the most part, our siblings will be with us throughout our lives.  In these days of social media, it is possible to stay as connected as we are willing to be. Myself, I find great comfort in that fact. Like walking through the wild world, knowing someone’s got your back! Yes, I do realize how blessed I am to have siblings like that.

However, that is exactly my point about the family of God. No matter where you are if you can find another follower of Christ, you have found family. When we first moved overseas, and I was overwhelmed with culture shock, I would find myself weeping whenever I attended church. I know the locals thought I was crazy, but it felt safe; it felt like home.

In spite of the multitude of divisive issues these days, but I found myself wanting to sing this gospel song,

We Will Stand

Sometimes it’s hard for me to understand
Why we pull away from each other so easily
Even though we’re all walking the same road
Yet we build dividing walls between our brothers and ourselves

But I, I don’t care what label you may wear
If you believe in Jesus, you belong with me
The bond we share is all I care to see
And we can change this world forever
If you will join with me, join and sing

Oh you’re my brother, you’re my sister
So take me by the hand
Together we will work until He comes
There’s no foe that can defeat us
When we’re walking side by side
As long as there is love, we will stand

Loneliness or Solitude

Much has been said and written in the last few years regarding the concept of “community” in the family of believers. I do not disagree with the principle involved. We need community, fellowship, and to each use our God-given gifts as parts of the whole that makes up the body of Christ.

Somehow, that teaching seems to overlook the fact that for whatever reason some do not have a community. Some are serving where they do not have access to other believers. There are those who in answering the call of God, or for refusing to compromise their convictions for companionship, feel very alone.

Certainly if at all possible, one should seek out other believers as Hebrews 10:24-25(ESV) states, “24 And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another”.

In the mean time, while you are searching, here are some suggestions to redeem the time of loneliness.

First, turn your moments of aloneness into a garden of solitude. Let God redeem your alone time as an opportunity to focus on and fellowship with Him. Henri Nouwen suggests,

“To live a spiritual life we must first find the courage to enter into the desert of our loneliness and to change it by gentle and persistent efforts into a garden of solitude. This requires not only courage but also a strong faith.”[i]

The following is an old German Hymn that expresses this so well.

The Paradise of God

Where the heart of God is resting,

I have found my rest;

Christ who found me in the desert,

Laid me on His breast.

There in deep unhindered fullness

Doth my joy flow free—

On through everlasting ages,

Lord, beholding Thee.

There I find a blessed stillness

In His courts of love;

All below but strife and darkness,

Cloudless peace above.

‘Tis a solitary pathway

To that fair retreat—

Where in deep and sweet communion

Sit I at His feet.

In that glorious isolation,

Loneliness how blest,

From the windy storm and tempest

Have I found my rest.

Learning from Thy lips for ever

All the Father’s heart,

Thou hast, in that joy eternal,

Chosen me my part.

There, where Jesus, Jesus only,

Fills each heart and tongue,

Where Himself is all the radiance

And Himself the song.

Here, who follows Him the nearest,

Needs must walk alone;

There like many seas the chorus,

Praise surrounds the throne.

Here a dark and silent pathway;

In those courts so fair

Countless hosts, yet each beholding

Jesus only, there.

By T. P., (this was all that was listed for the author)

Second, realize that ultimately no one will be able to meet your deep emotional needs fully except the One who made you. Trying to meet those needs through another person leads to a grasping type of neediness. Nouwen says,

“No friend or lover, no husband or wife, no community or commune will be able to put to rest our deepest cravings for unity and wholeness. And by burdening others with these divine expectations, of which we ourselves are only partially aware, we might inhibit the expression of free friendship and love and evoke instead feelings of inadequacy and weakness.”[ii]

Christian writer Beth Moore puts it this way, “God is the only One who is not repelled by the depth and length or our needs”.[iii]

Thirdly, truly realize that you are never alone if you are in relationship with God. Hebrews 13:5, “I will never leave you nor forsake you”.

The following is a quote by Elisabeth Elliot relating a thought by Amy Carmichael; both women were well acquainted with loneliness.

“Some of you are perhaps feeling that you are voyaging just now on a moonless sea. Uncertainty surrounds you. There seem to be no signs to follow. Perhaps you feel about to be engulfed by loneliness. There is no one to whom you can speak of your need. Amy Carmichael wrote of such a feeling when, a missionary of 26 (she had to leave where she was and travel to another country). “All along, let us remember, we are not asked to understand, but simply to obey…On July 28, I sailed and as the boat containing my friends moved off from the ship, a chill of loneliness shivered through me. Then like a warm love-clasp came the long-loved lines- ‘And only Heaven is better that to walk with Christ at midnight, over moon-less seas.’ I couldn’t be frightened then. Praise him for the moonless seas- all the better opportunity for proving Him to be indeed the El Shaddai, ‘the God who is Enough.’”

Elisabeth goes on to say, “Let me add my own word of witness to hers and to that of the tens of thousands who have learned that He is indeed Enough. He is not all we would ask for (If we were honest), but it is precisely when we do not have what we would ask for, and only then, that we can perceive His all –sufficiency. It is when the sea is moonless that the Lord has become my Light.”[iv]

God please help me find “Enough” in You today!

[i] Nouwen, Henri J. M. Reaching Out. New York: Doubleday, 1975.

[ii] Ibid.

[iii] Moore, Beth. Breaking Free Updated Edition. Nashville : LifeWay Press, 2009.

[iv] Elliot, Elisabeth. Keep a quiet heart. Manila: OMF Literature Inc., 1995.