As Christmas has started and the craziness of the holiday season has come upon us, my wife and I have been dealing with many interpersonal struggles with others in the organizations with which we volunteer. In both cases we are running into people who are bullying us or others or both. All we can think is, “Don’t we already have enough going on!”
Like normal, we are looking to our faith to help guide us on how to deal with some pretty tense situations.
Article 22 of the Mennonite Confession of Faith states:
“The same Spirit that empowered Jesus also empowers us to love enemies, to forgive rather than to seek revenge, to practice right relationships, to rely on the community of faith to settle disputes, and to resist evil without violence.” (full text available here)
This is especially hard. Our human nature wants us to pull “these” people aside and tell them to knock it off, but our faith tells us to live in peace with them. This discussion has prompted some interesting conversations of late around this topic. Does living in peace with others mean not standing up for ourselves? Should we, like the Mennonites in the 16th century, simply move on or do we stay and make a stand?
What we came to is that we need to make a stand.
There are examples in scripture of Christ standing up for others and for himself. It isn’t the action that is an issue, it is the approach. The one that resonated with me was when Christ answered those who were ready to stone the adultress:
6 They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him. But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. 7 When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.
Christ didn’t respond rashly, He took his time, thought through His answer and then answered calmly. It isn’t that we can’t speak up for ourselves or others and this demonstrates that point.
If Jesus could show love during times of strife and conflict, isn’t that something He expects us to emulate?
So, my wife has started to handle the issue on her side, and I will handle mine soon. I just pray that as we work through these situations that we show the love of Christ and that at the other end, relationships are strengthened and we can be used as His light.
An Ordinary Methodist 