You Expect Me To Do What!

          This past week our students finished up the Rhythm series that they have worked through this past month.  Each week includes a discussion question that our parents and their students are encouraged to wrestle through together.  The fourth week’s question read as follows, “No person can have a life in rhythm if they are not at peace with the people around them. In the final week of this series students will be challenged to be in rhythm with others, to be passionate about serving those they encounter and to seek forgiveness and reconciliation when needed. How can you work at making this a regular practice in your family?”

Tension is one of those things that we often feel uncomfortable with and try to remedy as quickly as possible.  However, have you ever stopped to think of tension as a good thing?  For me, the need to view tension in a new light started when I started searching the Scriptures, asking challenging questions, and seeking to make my faith my own in college.  I realized that the tension I was feeling wasn’t a negative thing but rather something that was positive because it was causing me to search out who God really is and how that directly affected my life.  Asking challenging questions sometimes actually deters us from spiritual growth, as we are too afraid to ask these questions for the fear that we may be met with ridicule or laughter or even worse a phrase that offers little closure, “I don’t know the answer to that question.”  What would happen if we started asking challenging questions that we may not have the answer to but would cause us to search the Bible, pray for answer, and seek the solution together?  Is all tension bad not at all, in fact it may be one of the largest sources of our spiritual growth.

With that being said, our youth ministry experienced a healthy dose of tension this past week, based on the following story.  I shared about the summer between my sophomore and junior year of high school when I was dating a young lady who happened to be a pastor’s daughter.  Growing up in a small church I found myself going to a larger church for youth group as we only had a couple of students in our small church.  One of the other students who drew me into this other youth group was my girlfriend at the time.  Shortly after I started attending there, which led me to church camp for the first time where I accepted my call to ministry, I found our relationship slipping away which led to eventual heartache in my life as she broke-up with me.  While this was a challenging time for me several of my friends and especially my youth pastor reached out to me to stay involved in the program.  I decided to stick around knowing that I would probably see my ex-girlfriend weekly.  She actually stopped coming to youth group for a while and I remember feeling relief from the situation.  However, a few months later she came back and because of her amazing singing voice our youth pastor allowed her to lead our youth worship team!  I remember feeling so frustrated that he would allow her to lead after the way that she hurt me and then I stumbled across a powerful Scripture that made me take a second look at the situation.  

That Scripture was Matthew 5:21-24 which says, “You have heard that it was said to our ancestors, Do Not Murder, and whoever murders will be subject to judgment.  But I tell you, everyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment.  And whoever says to his brother, ‘Fool!’ will be subject to the Sanhedrin.  But whoever says, ‘You moron!’ will be subject to hellfire.  So if you are offering your gift on the alter and there you remember that your brother has something against you, leave your fit there in front of the alter.  First go and be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift.” (HSCB)

As I thought about this passage I realized that the problem was not with her but with me.  I needed to seek to forgive her and move on with my life but this was a challenge.  However, with time things began to get better as we decided to seek “reconciliation” for the sake of our own spiritual journeys.

As you read this maybe there is someone that you need to seek reconciliation from.  Maybe there is something that you need to forgive for something that happened in your life, even if it was years ago.  If that is the case for you my prayer is that you will allow the healthy dose of tension in your life to be a reason to move you to reconciliation and/or forgiveness.