The current elected leaders and committees are attuned to
growth now and there is the question of healing. Yet there is a sharp memory of
past hurts and hopes to not only grow but restore to membership those who
left. This is almost always the case, at
least on the part of some members, in organizations that survive a
conflict. Some talk has gone on about
the how of this. There is the first grab
at “just invite them back.” But this
always smacks of not recognizing the hurts on the part of those who left and
those who stayed. Someone got burned and
wisely left the fire. Others stayed and
tried to control the fire once they saw the flames. They have different perspectives on the
situation and the journey of integrity.
And there is as always the question of forgiveness and who forgives what
and to what effect. And beneath this is
the question of blame and how we use it to injure each other or go pat it to get
to truth.
We, in our house, have wondered about the truth and
reconciliation process employed in South Africa as a model of organizational
healing. This however requires a
willingness to sit with each other in respect, patience, with a desire for a
truthful way forward. It requires the willingness to recognize that truth has
many sides, like the Eastern story of the 6 blind men and the elephant. That raises the question: Who is willing to
invest this care in the organization as a way of healing the past to create
this way forward. Many organizations just
seek to leave the past as a rumor of right and wrongs and repeat some of them
unaware.
In today’s reading from the Gospel of John we just leapt
right over chapter 6 into John 7:1-13. When I
went to see why, it was because chapter 6 was read just before Lent this year. Chapter
6 is a wonderful one on bread, feeding the 5 thousand, people wanting more,
Jesus offering living bread, people wanting that…until it meant following him
as the Living Bread of God, the one who houses God’s wisdom for a full and
costly life. This is the point where
many simply say: “I’m out of here…who can understand all this!!” Others recognize that while they don’t fully
get it, Jesus still seems the best hope for eventually getting to the core of
life in their time. They, though fewer in
number, stay as disciples.
In 7:1-13 Jesus’ brothers ask him to come to Judea for
the Feast of Tabernacles, a wonderful week of hanging out as family together in
“booths” to remember God’s faithfulness. Oh by the way, his brothers never understand Jesus
until after the resurrection. So Jesus
politely declines and says he will hang in the Galilee making the statement: “My time has not fully come yet, but your
time is always here.” Then he sends
his disciples on home to Judea, hangs a bit and secretly goes to Judea. Why secretly? Because the authorities are
beginning to be uneasy with his impact and his sense of truth and God’s
intervention in their common life. This
won’t stop Jesus, but he is not blind to choosing his times and places for
addressing truth and the conflict it can bring. The powerful often like to
muzzle truth that differs from their own version.
And so I come away from Jesus knowing there are times
when we can tell our truth and times that we cannot yet do so. There are times when our side of truth can
land on a listener and invite us both deeper. But this means their truth will
be invited to land on us as well. There are times when this can happen and times when this will not
happen.
Sometimes we have to bide our time, wait for the right moment
and atmosphere if what we want to have is a constructive effect. This is not the same as just being afraid of
conflict, it is rather prudent timing.
It does mean we will however have to sit with each other, listen, go
deeper, know we come from sometimes divided experience, listen some more, go
out on a limb to trust that a deeper truth will emerge. We may risk something or much.
This is how we save or enrich a valued relationship, a
marriage, a partnership, a beloved child/parent, a church, an organization, a
governing relationship like our nation.
It is also how we find and are found by God. So again I
come to prayer, I open my both fractured self and my best self in a place of
both my and God’s listening. I open to
Jesus in scripture. I will be gentle
with him and he with me. I will
grow. I must believe that God too either
grows or if not invites me to see a side I have missed. I remember “my time is always here.”
And the best churches and other organizations practice in some manner this way of
being together. And every now and then
they too have a conflict. Time to return
to listening and forgiving.
The water color above: Watching time | Kim, Se Hyung – Cairo American College, Egypt
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