A Lesson From Pachomius

A man named Pachomius, an Egyptian soldier, became a Christian after his release from the military. He soon became a follower of another man named Palamon who was an ascetic, whose idea of the Christian life was self-denial and a solitary existence.

But Pachomius began to question the idea of such solitude as an effective way to develop real spirituality. His questions were honest, practical, and down to earth:
● How can you learn to love if no one else is around?
● How can you learn humility living alone?
● How can you learn kindness or gentleness or goodness in isolation?
● How can you learn patience unless someone puts yours to the test?

 He said, "To save souls, you must bring them together."

I think Pachomius was brilliant. He resisted the lean toward the solitary life so popular during his time. While certainly different from what we see today, there is a growing tendency among modern Christians to something akin to “individual” faith. It’s behind the statements people make about not attending church. “Well, I just think I can be as close to God alone in the forest, or at the lake, than I can be with him in church!” What they’re saying is that they don’t need anybody else. God and themselves is plenty.

We see similar attitudes in young people today. They simply do not see the need for “church.” They are bailing out by the droves. They are not the only ones, just the latest wave. We’re actually well into a generation or more of people who don’t see the value of gathering together at church. They think they can do just fine, thank-you-very-much, without having to show up for meetings.

The ascetic has long believed that the deepest spirituality was developed alone with God. Thus they hid away in caves, wandered the deserts, or lived in remote places where they could enjoy a very private, intense kind of faith. At least that’s what they thought.

Pachomius, however, saw the flaws in this thinking. His questions are right on target, and they are still on target for us today.

The Bible teaches that we should love one another. But without somebody around to love, it’s impossible to develop a loving spirit.

Humility? Impossible living alone or separated from other people.

Kindness and gentleness, by the very definition of the words, requires some other person to be the recipient of our actions.

One of my favorites is patience. Yes, you actually need a few people who drive you up the wall for patience to become real in your life.

But we’re still not good with these things. Too many run away and hide, or at best, surround themselves only with those who create no tension at all. Those who do this remain in an immature faith.

Which brings me to the point I want you to hang on to. Why should we invite people to church, invite them to become involved with us, invite them to settle in and become part of our church family?  Because they need us and we need them. Neither of us can grow like we should without the other.

Churches can get comfortable. We begin to feel safe and we’re grateful that we achieve a peaceful and settled atmosphere. But this is the mindset of the hermit. We need to be constantly stirred by fresh faces and new lives among us. It’s in the sharing of life and its constantly changing face that we become what God desires us to be. Invite some folks to church!

Time To Deal With Real Sins

1 Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love, 3 being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. – Ephesians 4:1–3 (NASB95)

In 1937, a researcher at Harvard University began a study (originally named The Harvard Study of Adult Development) on what factors contribute to human well-being and happiness. . . Over the period of 72 years, several men have directed the research. For the last 42 years, the director has been psychiatrist George Vaillant. In 2008 someone asked Dr. Vaillant what he had learned about human health and happiness from his years of poring over the data on these 268 men. You would expect a complex answer from a Harvard social scientist, but his secret to happiness was breathtakingly simple: "The only thing that really matters in life are your relationships to other people." – Joshua Wolf Shenk, "What Makes Us Happy?" The Atlantic (June 2009), pp. 36–53

I believe the secret to church unity is in the first three verses of Ephesians 4. It simply matters how you live with other people. And Christians are called to live a particularly different kind of life.

You cannot be hypercritical, complaining, and grumpy. It matters how you engage others, how you talk to them, how you treat them. You cannot be selfish and self-centered. You cannot be irritable and hard to get along with. All these, and anything similar to them, are destined to ruin your relationships with others. This is true whether it’s relationships at work, at home, at school, at church, wherever you are.

I learned a long time ago that if you want to find some of the most cruel, unkind, uncaring, and hurtful people then go to church. What’s amazing is that very often they are the very people who think of themselves as solid, sound Christians!

The real truth is that the Christian calling, and the Christian life is something very different from what such people think it to be. It’s time we stop being afraid to call these people on their sins -- the real sins that are actually mentioned in the Bible. Pride, arrogance, insensitive roughness, impatience, intolerance, and a lack of love are all real sins. They violate God’s will. For too long, we have allowed these sins to live unchallenged in the church. The result is that outsiders see these traits for what they are, and they are choosing to go elsewhere. One great reason people are fleeing the church today is that it's not really the church.

There is a right way to live with other people. Spend your life living Eph. 4:1-3.

Thoughts On Unity

Just about the time I think I've got the time to write for this blog, I prove that I don't. No more claims about being back on the blogging scene. I'll write when I have time.

I've been thinking some about unity. After all, those of us whose religious heritage rises from the American Restoration Movement have been immersed in thoughts, talk, and behaviors relating to unity. We are (were) a unity movement. At least we were a unity movement in the beginning. Somewhere along the way, unity began to slip away from us. Doctrine came to be more important. Differences and distinctions in doctrine began to identify how dislike we were from others. We narrowed our doctrinal focus. Our movement woke up one day and we were standing over here, with everybody else scattered over there, and the only way to solve anything was if all those other folks moved toward us. OK, I have greatly over-simplified some really complex issues, but you get the idea.

As many others have noted, the American Restoration Movement has produced numerous divisions, and every one of them over some point of doctrine. It appears to me that the effort to unify on the basis of common doctrine has limited possibility. It's not that doctrine is unimportant. It's that unity based on doctrine demands more than human beings seem to be able to manage. Unless, of course, everyone is willing to see everything my way, for that would solve all the problems.

I was reading from the book of Ephesians, chapter four and first few verses. Here's what it says:
1 Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called,2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love,3 being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Eph 4:1-3 (NASB)

Here's what struck me. It is definitely a passage calling us to unity, but it is not a passage that sounds like a call to rally around the doctrine flag. Instead, it's a passage that calls for a response of the heart: humility, gentleness, patience, tolerance, and love. You could call each of those doctrine, for they are surely taught in scripture, but they aren't the issues that normally carry the doctrine flag. These are heart issues, attitudes, the building blocks of emotional bonds. Here are the tools of unity.

If we would step back for a moment and think about the people with whom we feel the closest, most secure unity, I think we would immediately recognize those building blocks. I am unified with people with whom I share a mutual humility. Let one of us become haughty and overbearing and unity begins to fade. I am most unified with people with whom I am gentle and who are gentle with me. Let one of us become harsh and mean-spirited and unity begins to ebb. I am most unified with people with whom I am patient, and who are patient with me. Let one of us disallow the other our shortcomings and misunderstandings, or our lack of insight or effort, and unity dims. I am most unified with people with whom I am tolerant, and who tolerate me. Let one of us become irritated beyond reason and unity weakens. I am most unified with people I love and who love me. Love enables us to put up with a lot, and unity requires that ability. Lose love and unity is a dead hope.

Perhaps we've got it backwards. The approach of the past has been to demand doctrinal uniformity before unity could exist. Maybe we need to unify on the basis of humility, gentleness, patience, tolerance and love, and then it would be easier for us to resolve our doctrinal differences. I know this: I can have more worthwhile and productive discussions about doctrine with people with whom I enjoy a mutual spirit of humility, gentleness, patience, tolerance and love. Get rid of any one of those elements, and you've upped the difficulty of even talking about doctrinal differences. Get rid of two or more, and unity is impossible and so is doctrinal agreement.

As the Psalmist would say, "Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity!" (Ps 133:1).