I'M ALL RIGHT, JACK & JACKIE!
For years I knew I was right, and other so-called Christians were wrong.
Then, of course I met others who were as equally convinced of their own superiority. Obviously they were deceived; ignorant, stupid, or immoral, perhaps all three!
Now, years later, having prayed and struggled for unity, I find myself in a very different place, and burdened by our continual dishonouring of one another.
Where God looks for love and acceptance, he often finds only suspicion, competition and rivalry.
I am now convinced, more than ever, that we will have to give an account for all our exclusions and narrowness.
The Charismatics, for their insistence that spiritual gifts are vital to validate maturity and ministry. How many notches dy'a have on your gunbelt?
The Baptists, for their dogma that you're not ok until totally immersed, and their governmental paralysis.
The High Church/smells and bells brigade for their emphasis upon ceremonial beauty of holiness and distaste for any enthusiasm.
The Roman Catholics, for their amused condescension and attribution of rebellion to anyone who challenges their authority. They are the only true Church!
The Liberals, for their vague impersonal and impotent gospel of nice works and good manners. If it is nebulous then it's acceptable!
The Social Activists, for their obsession with good works and avoidance of personal involvement with the Most High.
The Liturgists, for their sacerdotalism and restrictions upon the laity.
The Reformed Churches, for their arid intellectualism and pharisaical legalism.
The New Churches for their denial of two millenia of history and their futile determination to re-invent the ecclesiastic wheel.
The Nominal Christians, of whatever denomination, for their lip-service and unaltered lifestyles.
The pre-millenial fundamentalists for refusing to ' fellowship' with anyone who disagrees with their end-times theology.
The red-necked American and wealthy British churches, for their implicitly held racial superiority.
The British middle-class churches for their complacency and refusal to seek and admit the lower classes.
The anti-female denominations for disguising their chauvinism under the cloak of 'Biblical' integrity and exegetical accuracy.
The African churches for their tribalism and superficiality.
The American churches for their Empire spirit.
The Rwandan churches for refusing to confess their silent complicity in the 1994 genocide.
The French churches for their coldness and parochialism.
The Congolese churches of the diaspora for their self-absorption.
The Kenyan churches for their insistence that everyone else owes them a living.
The Zambian churches for their syncretism and shamanism.
The Prosperity churches, for their refusal of suffering and trite triumphalism.
The ultra Orthodox, for denying that anyone else is a Christian, period.
Are you still there?
Well done. How hard it is to be one of the few who sees the Truth!
I stand convicted of pride, arrogance and generalisations.
There's hardly anything in this Indictment for which I have not been guilty at some stage in my life!
I'm looking at a very large plank in my own eye at this moment, so I'm afraid I can't look any more at the problems and shortcomings of others!
I remind myself that when we point at others with one finger, the other three always point back at ourselves.
I'll conclude with this.
All of us stand accused for the rapidity with which we accuse each other of heresy!
QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER......IN GROUPS OR ALONE...
1. Share your experiences of things people have done to/for you in the past which have built Unity and that you have really appreciated.
2. Ditto as to behaviours and words that have undermined Unity. What was it that you found particularly painful/hurtful, and why?
3. Reflect upon the responses, and what this discloses about the personalities, and the sensitivities/filters /lenses you and other people operate.
4. What can you learn about yourself and other people from these exercises?
5. How can you contribute (more) to Unity as a result of this exercise, in one-on-ones, small groups and on Sundays at your church meetings: in your family and at work?
6. Is there anything you need to put right? Anyone to whom you should apologise?
7. Is there anyone to whom you can send messages of appreciation and encouragement?
8. What would you like to receive, as well as give? State your need, and be honest!