The Hatfields and McCoys... Romeo and Juliet... feuds in the church?!?!?!

March 8, 2010

Father, I am just so confused. I have no idea what the “problem” is… and neither do they, I don’t think… I mean, it’s like one of those multi-generational old-time-down-south feuds where no one can even remember how or why it started… and it doesn’t end until some tragic Romeo-and-Juliette-type bloodshed hits both sides at once and wakes the sides up to the foolishness and pointlessness of their fiercely-held, entrenched, our-side-is-right (even if we’ve totally forgotten the original cause of the dispute) vendetta.

Jesus – You died for all of them. You love all of them. They all claim to love You. And even to love “the church” … even to love each other! But they seem blind to what is going on, and how anti-love, anti-church, anti-You, anti-each-other it all is!

Papa, I can’t go on being part of it… even as “just an employee” …

You know, it does seem to me that maybe my “neutral” presence is propping up their dysfunctionality. Maybe – yes, I think it is true – they see me as this anchor keeping them together and afloat in this storm. Instead of them needing to turn to You!! Oh dear God – You just showed me that!

A friend explained to me about the possible “co-dependency/enabling” I might be doing… but I didn’t, till just now, see myself as blocking them (or at least giving them an excuse) from throwing themselves on You… or even as excusing them from facing the situation face-on, and realizing how they really have no choice but to cast themselves directly on You, and allow You to do whatever You know needs to be done to… I don’t know… change hearts? Totally dismantle a “church” that has become far more a dysfunctional organization that a part of the body of Christ? ….

But I do suspect there is fear of what it could mean … and determination to prop up this – Oh Papa, I don’t even know what to call it anymore… it just doesn’t seem to bear the defining hallmarks of Your church (or even of a “traditional organized church”) anymore. But they obviously don’t want to let it die… and maybe it’s gone too far to save/ resurrect … mind you, resurrection does come out of death … and brings a new body, a new life, a new spirit… resurrection is a spiritual, LIFE process, YOUR process… and it seems to me that this whole “dying” thing has somehow lost YOU, lost YOUR LIFE, YOUR LOVE…