david hayward. artist. cartoonist. teacher.

Colossians 3: 14, extolling love, peace and unity, suggests that the burden of unity rests upon the offended, not the offender. As we have been forgiven, so we forgive. The supreme example is Jesus forgiving his murderers even while they are in the act. We cannot wait for repentance, restitution or retreat in order to enjoy peace. It is up to you and it is up to me to forgive and clothe ourselves with love. Now.

It begins with me. There is no point in giving me steps to peace if I don’t believe in peace to begin with. There is no use in explaining to me how to live in unity if I don’t value it, think it is impossible, or have a fundamental resistance to its manifestation. Laws might be made and kept to convey unity and feign peace, but these laws only betray my propensity towards hate, division and war.

Rather, it is urgent that I look inward. Why am I not at peace with the other? Why is it I cannot love the other? I might think it is because of anger. But what is at the root of my anger? Perhaps it is hurt. But what is at the root of my hurt? Perhaps it is fear? If I look closely enough, observe these movements in my mind, then I will begin to notice the release of this fear, the hurt, and even the anger.

I recently spoke with a friend who’s wife left him. He was bitter, angry and alone. He couldn’t forgive her. He was so angry with her. We talked. After a while, he noticed that his anger was rooted in hurt… he was deeply hurt, betrayed by the one he loved. We talked some more. He began to notice that at the root of his hurt was fear… fear that he would be betrayed, forsaken and finally abandoned. Once he recognized these movements in his mind, he noticed his anger begin to dissipate. After some time he even began to notice his capacity to trust in love again. The peace with his ex-wife began with him. In his own mind. Not by her repentance, restitution or return.

In today’s atmosphere of the interweaving of an incredible diversity of cultures, philosophies and religions, it is so easy for misunderstandings to occur. It is so easy to offend and be offended. If we could get past our anger, past our hurt and observe our fear of the other, perhaps we will watch our divisions dissipate. Maybe even a willingness to live in peace with the other will arise. If we will have an attitude of forgiveness (be-fore it is requested or required, give whatever is needed to make peace), then unity will be enjoyed.

The most mature spiritual person can actually seem to be the most childlike. There is a confusing enigmatic character to the spiritual life in general.

But when you gather different spiritual lives in one community, the anomaly compounds exponentially. Community life should feel paradoxical. Especially the religious community life. The healthiest churches might actually appear to be the least healthy.

This because diversity is more valuable as a sign of health than homogeneity. In my experience, homogeneity is usually forced and should always be held suspect. Homogeneity, again in my experience, has always been a thin veneer of conformity necessitated by the powers.

Paradox is not easy to live with. The mind is uncomfortable with it and wants to settle on one or the other of the opposing ideas. But as one matures and develops the art of holding two apparently opposing ideas simultaneously in the mind, paradox is understood at a very deep level. Then one can see life at work where death seems to prevail. And one can also see death at work where there proposes to be life. Or, as in a church, one can perceive a deep order in the midst of chaos. And one can perceive deep division where the primary presentation is homogeneity.

I saw love in our chaotic community, and that was its order. Love is the bonding agent manifesting the unity of the Spirit. It is not agreement. It is not compatibility. It is not adherence, obedience, charismata, style or anything else. It is love that manifests itself in voluntary and willing fellowship with others who are different, even on significant levels.

Which is why it is difficult to keep a church together that is paradoxical in nature. Different people, from the pastor to the visitor, are always pressuring, lobbying, praying, expecting, longing and working for their own fantasies of what the church should be to become a reality.

We must rest in the paradoxical truth that the church can seem alive and dead at the same time.

I’ve decided that there are two kinds of church-goers. Pastors, leaders and churches have to understand this.

First of all, there is the family dining-room type. This type of church-goer doesn’t consider herself a church-goer, but a member, a part of the family. She believes that being faithful and committed to one community is important and necessary for the quality of the life of that community. She considers the church community her spiritual family, and to go to another church would be the equivalent of having an affair. It would be a sign of unfaithfulness and spiritual lust. She might visit another church, but only when it is a public event like funeral or wedding or something of that sort. She might go to the odd conference, but she’ll be very selective on which ones she attends.

Then there is the other kind: the restaurant type. This type of church-goer will probably find a church that he will consider his main church or even his home church. But no one church is going to meet all of his needs. Not any one church is enough. He doesn’t consider going to another church spiritually adulterous, but ecumenically support and spiritually necessary for his own health. He might go to one church to get the meat for his spiritual diet. But he’ll go to another church to get his dessert. And he will probably go to any other church or conference in town to get his treats, especially when there’s a guest speaker.

I’ve been a pastor of both types. I’ve realized that even though I thought I was providing all the nutrients necessary for a healthy spiritual life, not everyone thought so. They might have appreciated what I offered, but it wasn’t enough. I was often informed that I served meats but no sweets. Some never realized that for me to offer their desired dessert menu would have been radically at odds with the main course I offered.

Some people were satisfied with what I offered. Some weren’t. That’s just a reality every pastor must face.

I don’t subscribe to using IC to stand for Institutional Church in a negative or pejorative way. Institutions can’t be helped. Biblically, institutions are of the created order. They just are, just as we are. My own immediate family is full of institutions. Marriage is an institution. Family is an institution. Public education is an institution. The government we find ourselves under is an institution. Even our supper is an institution. We have instituted it almost every day at around 5pm that all five of us sit around the table and eat together, as much as we are able.

The problems would start, however, if it felt like an institution. If it becomes forced, contrived, demanded, required, staged, and it no longer is permeated with grace, love and care, then the natural truth of it dies and only the institutional and organized shell remains.

The great American essayist Wendell Berry writes in his excellent essay, “God and Country” (in What Are People For?):

It is clearly possible that, in the condition of the world as the world now is, organization can force upon an institution a character that is alien or even antithetical to it. The organized church comes immediately under a compulsion to think of itself, and identify itself to the world, not as an institution synonymous with its truth and its membership, but as a hodgepodge of funds, properties, projects, and offices, all urgently requiring economic support.

This is why I think such voices such as Berry’s, who is often called a prophetic voice in America today, are needed in this world. He helps us differentiate between the truth of, say, the church, and the false of, say, the accretions that attach itself to it. I recognize that even though I am no longer on staff at an institutional or organized church, I am still a part of the church and desire to be a responsible member of it.

It is my community. So it is my personal challenge to be a part of the institution in a responsible way.

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Lisa and I just celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary. We have loved each other for over 31 years. What has kept us together for so long? What makes us a happily married couple?

Is it compatibility? People who know us know that we are very different people. Some would even call us incompatible. Is it because we agree on major issues? No. We disagree on all kinds of things. She has her way of thinking and I have mine, and at times they radically differ.

What is it then? It is love. It is love that has kept us in harmony for all these years. We’ve had our arguments, fights and even very short separations. We have had periods of long struggle where we’ve had to learn how two so totally different people can find unison and live together. It is love that binds us. I love her with all her differences. She loves me with all mine.

This is how there can be harmony within all communities, even the community of this world. It will not be agreement or compatibility that unites us in a harmonious relationship. It will be love. This is why I never demand that people agree theologically or that they conform to a certain agreeable lifestyle. This will not create harmony. It only creates the illusion of community, while at the root of it is enmity.

It is love that unites. That starts with me. That starts with you.