Over the last three weeks, the main UK political parties have held their party conferences, all of them aware that before the next one there will be a General Election. (The SNP conference will be held in the next two weeks, I would imagine!) So, if you've been paying attention, you might have formed an opinion, or judgement, on the relative merits of each party leader, the three main candidates for the job of Prime Minister; they are all hoping that you and I will be kind to them and vote for their party when the General Election comes around. They expect that people will make judgements about them and that they will even feature on the front pages of the newspapers and the editorial columns; indeed there are some politicians, you feel, would be disappointed not to be on the front pages.
We also make similar judgements about other people, one another. I'm constantly amazed at how scathing Christians can be of one another and how disbelieving. We form judgements of one another without really knowing all of the facts. So this quote: "Be kinder than necessary" and it goes on "for everyone is fighting some kind of battle!"
We can be very critical of people who don't come to Church as often as they once did, but do we know the struggles of their lives? Or of people who drift away from the faith and blame them for their backsliding, but do we ever stop to try to find out the reason for their drift? What struggles are they facing? You might take time to look at the comments on my last blog and see one reaction to what I said then; it might be sad and depressing to think that Christians behave in that way, but it is surely true. The General Assembly of 2008 commended a huge report on Conflict in the Church; some scoffed and said surely that's not real; but it is all too real, I'm sad to say.
The natural human instinct in our relationships with other people is the Old Testament version: "an eye for an eye" - getting our own back! Again the Word Live website: "an eye for an eye and the whole world goes blind!"
"Be kinder than necessary" is not the way any bible text expresses our relationships with other people, but it surely captures the essence of the command to "love your neighbour as yourself". We're very good doing what is just necessary and no more.
So next time you are about to be critical of someone:
- a politician, a city councillor, a member of the proposed new community council - an ordinary person like you trying to do their job to the best of their ability.
- a leader of the Church, minister or elder - an ordinary person, whom God has called to be your leader and who is trying be what God wants him or her to be, to the best of his or her ability.
- a Church court (Kirk Session, presbytery, General Assembly) - made up of ordinary people like you and me, wrestling with big issues, trying to decide to the best of their ability.
Then "be kinder than necessary for everyone is fighting some kind of battle" of which you probably know nothing!
