Spending some time in the fifth
chapter of St. Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians I ran across some exciting
as well as somewhat troubling news. “If anyone is in Christ he or she is a new
creation: everything old has passed away, see, everything has become new. All
this is from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and he has given
us the ministry of reconciliation.” This really is exciting, that no matter who
we are or what we have done, the old can be put away and all, through the Grace
of God, becomes new. It is also rather frightening that we, like Jesus are
called to be reconcilers. Frightening because to be reconcilers we have to
admit that we may be wrong as well as right, we must at times find the strength
to apologize and to forgive. Jesus taught us how to do this, but it does not
make it any easier in practice. I suspect this was the reason Paul wrote this
letter to the church at Corinth. I suspect they were having “church squabbles”
which may have been turning into church fights. Paul is reminding them of who
they are and “whose they are.”
Paul goes on to tell the Corinthians
(and by extension, us) that we are truly “Ambassadors for Christ, since God
makes his appeal through us.” The best plan God has for reaching the world is
through us. While some people may wander
into a church or other “house of God,” most do not. Many people will, however,
run into us: at the grocery store, at work, on the ball field or the gym. They
will see how we act when things go our way and when they do not, and they “will
know we are Christians (or not) by our love.”
Paul proclaims that because of Christ’s
righteousness we can become the righteousness of God. Filled with the righteousness
of God we can recognize that all of us have burdens which are unknown to those
others, that we all sin and fall short of the glory of God. This knowledge
alone can help us find reconciliation with one another as well as with God.
The Church, the Body of Christ in the
World provides space where this reconciliation can take place. The church is
really a people joined together by our baptism: a people called to love not
judge, to forgive not to hold on to a grudge, to apologize rather than
encourage grudges in others, and to
realize that relationships are more important than our human need to always be
right. This is not easy since in addition to being Ambassadors for Christ, we
also happen to be human. But, the community of the local church gives us a
place of beginning.
As I write this I have just been made
aware that Pat Conroy, one of my favorite writers, died last evening, may he
rest in peace. Conroy’s writings were filled with relationships, “good, bad and
ugly,” relationships with himself as with those around him. His books deal with
relationships that can be mended and relationships that are beyond all hope of
redemption. He also deals with that most important of all relationships, that
with oneself. We learn from Conroy, just as we learn from Scripture, that “life
is not always easy, that relationships can be difficult and tragic. Conroy’s
works also show us that abuse, inequality, depression and addiction affect the
way we treat others and our selves, sometimes tragically so.
In his writing, Pat Conroy allowed
us, in fact, forced us to look at all of these issues as well as at the
importance of good therapy and medication, and the hard work of building and
rebuilding relationships. He shows us that it is not enough to ask God to
release us, but that we must use the tools God has given to the world which can
help us to be reconcilers and to be reconciled.
As Jesus and Pat Conroy and Jimmy
Buffett say, “The God’s honest truth is it’s not that simple.” BUT, it is more
than doable when we “seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor
as ourselves.”
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