#298 Brotherly and Sisterly Love

In my last post I argued that our sins—ALL of our sins—hurt us, even if they don't hurt anyone else (at least as far as we can tell). I used Christians' current debate about whether or not God approves of sex within same-sex marriages as an example. However, I don't want to leave the wrong impression here. People who identify as LGBTQ+, including Christians, have been hurt far too often by the church.

When I made my argument about sin hurting us, I DID NOT mean to say that we should kick LGBTQ+ individuals out of the church or avoid them as Christians. If I want to start kicking people out of the church for being sinners, I will need to start with myself and then move on to kicking out everybody else. (Now, I believe there are times when it is appropriate for congregations to exclude individuals from some privileges of church membership because those individuals refuse to heed the church's call to turn away from their sins to God, but we won't get into that right now.) Christians are redeemed sinners. We are sinners who are being made holy by the work of God, but we are still sinners. As long as we live in this life, we will not be perfect, though we keep striving to follow Christ's example, and He keeps helping us grow.

As a pastor, I end up talking about sin quite often. It's not something I always enjoy or get excited about. But I talk about sin because it's important part of talking about God's grace to us in Jesus. And I try my best to talk about sin out of love. I really believe that our sins hurt us, weakening our trust in God. And I can't just sit by silently and watch people I care about do things that hurt them. I wouldn't want others to sit by silently and watch me hurt myself.

Too often we act like the church is some sort of club for "good" people or righteous people. Too often we get this country club mentality where we want to keep others out. We should act like the church is a support group for sinners. We should want everyone to come in and hear about how Jesus forgives us and renews us and calls us to a new and richer life. We should encourage and challenge and accompany one another in following Jesus. But I think by and large the church in America is failing at this. I as a pastor and a Christian am failing at promoting and practicing this. Rather than viewing fellow Christians as brothers and sisters that we can journey with, rather than welcoming visitors exploring what Jesus is all about like family members, we so often see each other for a little while on Sunday and then go back to (hopefully) trying to live the Christian life—all on our own. So often we're weakening ourselves and hurting each other by not devoting ourselves to this brotherly and sisterly love. People who identify as LGBTQ+ have often borne even more of the weight of my and our failure.

So please, you and I need to take our relationships as Christians beyond the walls of our church buildings. We need to do and share life together. We need to wrestle with sins together. We need to be patient and kind. We need to love one another by helping each other follow Jesus more closely. We need to keep pointing one another back to Jesus' love. We need a support group. We need a family. Thank God that He gives us one.

Grace and peace,

BMH