Living in the Spirit
June 21, 2018
Scripture Reading: 2 Corinthians 6:1-13
As we work together with him, we urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain. For he says,
‘At an acceptable time I have listened to you,
and on a day of salvation I have helped you.’
See, now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day of salvation! We are putting no obstacle in anyone’s way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, but as servants of God we have commended ourselves in every way:
We have spoken frankly to you Corinthians; our heart is wide open to you. There is no restriction in our affections, but only in yours. In return—I speak as to children—open wide your hearts also.
–2 Corinthians 6:1-4a, 11-13
I do not know what the original problem was but at the least, Paul had a communications problem with the church at Corinth and this letter labeled 2 was his attempt to correct the situation. We do not have anything labeled 3 so we do not know the success or failure of this correspondence. His denial of placing obstacles in anyone’s way leads me to think his previous instructions had seemed onerous to some.
Communication is hard. We come loaded with the baggage of our lives, culture, education, failures, and successes. The person or people we are trying to commune with each come with their own set of influences and then another layer is added if they come as a group. I spent several years writing policy or supervising the writing of policy for a government agency and know well the problems of guiding 8,000 or so employees to work within a common framework. Some truly understood differently than it was intended. In a few instances, I was pretty sure some disagreed with the policy and chose to interpret it differently as a result.
How important is it as Christians that we all are on the exact same page? Would we use some of our time and skills better if we tried to understand from what perspective others viewed the world? Even very homogenous people may be of differing ages and stages of life. My mother lived during the Great Depression and she never ever wasted anything as a result. We children did not adopt that level of conservation. We grew up during the time of the throwaway culture of paper cups and plates. At my annual Christmas party, I would find her standing at the kitchen sink carefully washing the plastic plates and utensils. I finally gave up and switched to using pottery and stainless steel, at least I could run them through the dishwasher.
We do not have to be on the same page, but we need to know what page we are on and be willing to share that with others so that some mutual understanding arises. Who knows? We might learn a whole new way of being by learning from our combined experiences.
Prayer: Lord, grant us insights into ourselves and the others with whom we work toward a world ruled by love. Amen.