AN AGE OF SPLINTERING
We live in an age of fractured community. As sociologist Brene’ Brown suggests, it is a response to anxiety. In an anxious age people are uncomfortable with ambiguity and so we are seduced by ideological groups that offer us clear, certain answers. In politics we see it in the refusal of people to compromise and the fear of being tainted by any association with the opposition. In churches we see it in the quick willingness to split off rather than be associated with the less than perfect denomination. The sad part is that the new splinter group quickly discover that the new group is not that pure either. The rise of community churches that are disassociated from all national bodies allows one to be a part of something members can shape by their own desires. As Brown suggests, in an anxious age we want certainty in the midst of uncertainty, perfection in the midst of a chaotic world, and refuse to accept that our local decisions have an impact on those beyond us. It’s our church and we focus on local issues, unspoiled by the complexity of national and world-wide factors.
PERFECTION VERSUS IMPERFECTION
The irony of our hunger for purity is that it challenges the very nature of our faith. When one reviews the biblical story, it quickly becomes apparent that God doesn’t choose to work through perfect people and perfect communities. From Abraham and Sarah through Saul/Paul and the early church, all of them are imperfect people. With the exception of Jesus, God chooses to work through imperfect people and communities. The people who caused Jesus to become angry were not the sinners (imperfect people) but those who demanded perfection (the Pharisees). The community that Jesus chose to surround himself with was made up of disciples and other followers that continually exhibited less than perfect qualities.
LETTING GOD BE GOD
The challenge for clergy is to lead a people who don’t make an idol out of their perception of perfection. It is God who is perfect, not the church or individuals. Churches that split in search of the perfect community are in danger of separating from the very type of people who God chooses to work through. If “God were in Christ reconciling the world to Godself and not counting their sins against them,” maybe we need to allow God to be God and allow God to work through us. To be reconciled one to the other in an imperfect community may be a “PROPHETIC WITNESS” in our fractured world.
