Jesus is Family is another great book by Jon Zens. His books are power-packed and can be used for personal study or for group discussion. I recommend all of his books, they can be found on his website. Below is an excerpt about prickly people.
As we have talked about ideals in Jesus’ family, we must face the reality that ekklesia in this age is far from perfect. After people commit to following Christ, “then Jesus calls his friends into community with others who have been chosen for the same path.” Jean Vanier went on to say, “This is when all the problems begin! We see the disciples squabbling among themselves, wondering who is the greatest, the most important among them! Community is a wonderful place, it is life-giving; but it is also a place of pain because it is a place of truth and of growth the revelation of our pride, our fear, and our brokenness.”
Years ago Vernon Grounds wrote a terrific article, “Fellowship of Porcupines,” in which he pointed out that we all are capable of poking each other with our quills. Most of the time we don’t mean to, but it happens nevertheless. That is why Paul knew Christ’s family had to be a community of forgiveness. “Bear with each other and forgive one another; if any of you has a grievance against someone, forgive as the Lord forgave you.” Paul knew there would be rough spots in the Body, but he encouraged the saints to let the Lord’s life flow through them in kindness, just as they had received from Him.
The truth is, many of us struggle with imperfection in the Lord’s family. A lot of the time this occurs because we are longing for that safe family, and often it seems to take years to find it. After we function with joy in it for a season, we soon learn that it’s not the utopia we thought it would be. Then we then sink into various negative reactions.
Henri Nouwen spoke about the dangers of desperate people looking for a “final solution.” “It is sad to see,” Nouwen said, “how people suffering from loneliness, often deepened by the lack of affection in their intimate family circle, search for a final solution for their pains and look at a new friend, a new lover or a new community with Messianic expectations. Although their mind knows about their self-deceit, their hearts keep saying, ‘Maybe this time I have found what I have knowingly or unknowingly been searching for.’ It is indeed amazing at first sight that men and women who have had such distressing relationships with their parents, brothers or sisters can throw themselves blindly into relationships with far-reaching consequences in the hope that from now on things will be totally different.”
When we come into a spiritual family with the highest of expectations, thinking this is it, we run the risk of creating even deeper problems. Nouwen underscored the point, “by burdening others with these divine expectations, of which we ourselves are often only partially aware, we might inhibit the expression of free friendship and love, and evoke instead feelings of inadequacy and weakness. Friendship and love cannot develop when there is an anxious clinging to each other.”
We simply must have a realistic, not utopian view of ekklesia. Unconsciously looking for “the perfect community” will always end in disaster. Again, Nouwen astutely observed, “To wait for moments or places where no pain exists, no separation is felt, and where all human restlessness has turned into inner peace is waiting for a dreamworld. 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.”
We see Christ in each other, we don’t look at one another after the flesh, but we also can’t forget that we are capable of letting each other down. Jean Vanier aptly captured this needed balance: “Communion means accepting people just as they are, with all their limits and inner pain, but also with their gifts and their beauty and their capacity to grow-to see the beauty inside all the pain.”
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