The Tenderness of the Gospel
“I really don’t like humans right now,” she said with every ounce of conviction. My dear friend with the sweetest and most hospitable spirit had just witnessed the harsh reality of what it means to be in a relationship with a community. A community that opposed her and her family. Every relationship – every community - has some level of harshness at some point. After hearing her story, I didn’t fault her, and honestly, I had been feeling some of the same.
I caught myself thinking this week, “with all the rules, decrees, and laws that the church places on humans, it feels easier to just be a hermit or monk living in solitude.” Without other humans we wouldn’t be in messy relationships that trip us up – cause us to sin, as they say.
It feels like these days we argue and divide ourselves over who we love, how we love, and what we do with our bodies (before, during, and after specific decisions). We divide ourselves over what to read, where people choose to worship, who we vote for, what color the other person is, and whether or not they will improve our property values.
We divide. Not the Gospel.
I was feeling, at best, like I once did at 16 alone and hopeless in my bed after a revival service. How can anyone live up to the rules of righteousness or ever be good enough to hit all the necessary triggers for God’s love, acceptance, grace, and salvation? Perhaps it would be easier to just build walls around our hearts and not be in relationships that might one day cause us to make a decision that is decreed all wrong.
Then, yesterday, in the course of my daily work, I interviewed a pastor, a client, about his vision for the future of the congregation where he serves.
“If 1200 people attend worship, why does it matter? What difference does it make if they come?” He answered me in my favorite way – with a story.
“A man in our congregation had once been part of a faith community where because of a single decision in his life, he was no longer invited to the Lord’s table,” he shared. “He got remarried and began attending our congregation with his new wife. For 6 years, she came forward for Holy Communion and I watched him sit in his seat believing he was unworthy. Then, one Sunday, with tears in his eyes, he came forward. Palms open.”
It had taken years for messages of love and acceptance to break through that single message of rejection and exclusion.
For 50 years, this man believed that God didn’t welcome him at the Lord’s table because of a single choice he had made.
“In that moment,” the pastor continued, “he experienced the tenderness of the Gospel.”
It melted my heart. It melted my feelings of not wanting to be around humans.
It convicted me too.
Bad theology kills. I believe this in my core.
But - I also believe and have seen that bad theology is what actually separates us from God – not God. Not even our actions – but rather the belief that our actions or choices mean that we are unworthy of God’s love.
And church – people get this message from us.
We make people believe they will never live up to the requirements for salvation.
But God made the way.
We make people believe that God can never love them.
But God so loved the world.
We make people hard to the tenderness of the Gospel.
But God keeps breaking through.
God did not call the church to make salvation impossible.
God called the church to baptize – which in fact means to profess that GOD welcomes each and all into the family.
God called the church to share the Good News of Jesus Christ who loves and welcomes the poor, the outcast, the lost, the broken, the sick…who welcomes all.
God also called us into community.
My sweet friend eventually shared, “There are so many things I want to post and say, but ultimately, they aren’t who I am or who I am called to be.”
All these rules, decrees, and laws we make are only words until we recognize that inside each decision a child of God makes is identity, past experiences, trauma, lack of teaching, personalities, and emotions.
God did not give us thrones. God gave us each other.
God gave us the tenderness of the Gospel.
My prayer this day is that I lean into that tenderness in all I say and do, especially in my relationships with others.
My prayer is that we, the church, do the same.
And friend, if you are reading this and feeling separated from God’s tenderness because of the teachings of the church, my prayer for you is that you find a place for the welcome you long for and deserve in your life. I pray that you find a place that comforts the grief that comes from feeling rejected or broken. I pray that the Holy Spirit, who has already claimed you as a child of God will be known by you in your own heart and space and mind. YOU ARE BELOVED!
Breathing Prayer for Centering Today
Inhale: God’s love
Exhale: leads with tenderness
Inhale: God’s love
Exhale: includes you