Even with this generous demonstration of restraint and love,
the tension could not be fully removed from the room. We tried.
We would decorate the tree with twinkling lights and ornaments, and
surround it with pretty packages. My
mother and I would make paper chains and snowflakes to hang from the ceiling,
turning the entire house into a winter wonderland. We did not stop inside the house, the eves of our roof
would be covered with strings and strings of lights declaring to the neighborhood the joy we desired in the season. As a child I enjoyed all my mother did to redeem
Christmas.
Yet, all the good tidings and joy we could
muster could not erase the reality something very significant was broken. While I knew the discomfort of celebrating Christmas in a divorced home, I could never fully understand the effect this reality had on the season for my parents, at least until now.
Things have
happened in this past year which have caused me to see Christmas through an entirely
different lens. When I was a child my
Christmas wish was we could all get along well enough to be able to
celebrate without conflict. Now, as an
adult who has gone through his own divorce, I understand the impact it has
on Christmas at a whole new level.
Before you start to worry and wonder, my wife and I are just
fine. In fact, we may have never been
better. The divorce I speak of is not
between husband and wife, but between pastor and church. After walking through the Christmas season,
for the first time since my separation from the church where I served, I have no other way to describe what I
am experiencing and feeling other than a divorce.
This should not be a surprise to those who understand the nature
of the Trinity and how our relationships within the body of Christ is supposed to mimic what we see in the bond
between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
In them, we see a relationship which is bound together in a covenant
commitment, saturated with grace, where each member empowers the other through
service, and they experience the intimacy of being fully known, loved and accepted.
Some pastors evaluate if a position is the place they are called to serve by its ability to enable them to fulfill their personal mission and vision. They measure whether they should stay or go by a church's capacity to help them reach their potential, to develop
their giftedness, and to find the full expression of who they believe God has
created them to become. When a place of ministry no longer seems to be capable of allowing this
to take place they often feel called to move on.
Right or wrong, even when I did not have language to explain
it, I have never thought of ministry like this.
I have always seen the church where I served as the body I belonged to. The people I ministered alongside of were not
my employers or customers; they were family with whom I shared a covenant commitment. I did not see the environment as a place
where I could reach my potential, but as a place where I served so others could
reach theirs. It was a place in which we
could learn to extend to one another the grace we had received, and a place
where we could offer one another love, acceptance and forgiveness.
When this is how you view your place of ministry, it is not
a job, it is a life. Being separated from this life feels like a great
divorce. In families, sometimes divorce
is your choice, often because you imagine yourself having a different life. At other times, you do not choose it, it is chosen
for you by a partner who has ambitions which they feel you can no longer
fulfill. It is the same with
pastors. Some leave because they have
desires a particular body does not seem to be able to fulfill. At other times, they are asked to leave because of the
ambitions of others. In either case,
when you leave, if you have had any experience of the kind of relationship we
see modeled in the Trinity, it is going to feel like a divorce.
Without going into all the ways this manifested itself this
season, I will say, I now know what I imagine a parent, who has recently
gone through an unwanted divorce, must feel like when they are confronted with the reality of not being with their family at
Christmas. It is difficult to see them gather, knowing you cannot be part of it. There is pain in watching your family participate
in traditions you once shared. It is hard to see in the eyes those who had no
say in the matter, the awkwardness and hurt divorce brings to the season. It is even harder accept the reality you have
to no power to mend what has been severed.
What I will not know until next year, the year after, or
maybe many years to come is if it gets any easier. Can a family ever be replaced with another? Can a dad or mom simply find a new spouse and
set of children with whom they can set up a new life and in the process erase
the memory of the family from which they have been cleaved? Sometimes it feels as if this is the expectation. In people's questions about what is in my
future, I sometime sense their well intended hope for God to provide another community in
which for me to serve, where the effects of this divorce could be washed away. I do not have the heart to tell them this could only be possible if I looked at ministry
like a job, which I do not. I see my calling as an invitation to serve a people to whom I belong.
I have thought of what it might look like to simply give up
ministry as a calling and return to my family. The elder
who informed me my services were no longer required, also told me I was welcome
to stay. Sometimes, I am tempted to take him up on his offer, but I know this
was is wishful thinking on his part and on mine. I cannot set down ministry, even if it meant
remaining with the people I so desperately miss. I must confess I have played with this idea for
days on end. Each time the Father has been faithful to shake me out of my daydream and
remind me he did not provide me with a job, He imparted to me a calling. To try and set it aside is to walk in
disobedience. It would be breaching
another covenant in an attempt to restore the one which has already been broken. Despite my wishful thinking, I know this would not bring healing.
The Pharisees, in response to Jesus’ teaching about the inseparable
nature of the covenant of marriage, asked, “Why then did Moses
command to give her a certificate of divorce and send her away?” Jesus responded
to them, “Because of your hardness of heart.” This was a protection for the wife,
but it is not the kind of protection God imagined from the beginning. God the Father desired she (and her husband) experience
the kind of relationship He shared with the Son, and the Spirit. She was intended to know the unconditional
love of a covenant commitment, the power of grace, the mutual building up which
occurs when serving one another, and the intimacy of being fully known.
Whether the divorce I experienced was caused
by a hardness of heart is for God to judge, all I know is He allowed it. Maybe it was even for my own protection, even
if it was not the kind of protection God intended from the beginning. This is a hard truth to accept, but because
the Father allowed it, I trust He will also redeem it.
How?
I cannot yet say, but I do know the pain divorce has brought to this
season in no way deters me from the hope one day I will once again be united
in a community where we might be able to reflect the relationship we see in the
Godhead. This is not a wish dream; it is
the call upon our lives. Scripture tells us Jesus is the light
of men. This light was manifested in the
world through Christ’s incarnation and birth.
This is what we celebrate at Christmas.
It is now manifested through us.
He said of us, “You are the light of the world.” Involvement in ministry and community is not meant
to enable us to reach our potential, or accomplish our goals. Its purpose is to enable us to bear the image
of Christ and embody the relationship He shares with the Father and the Spirit, in the process making our Father's Kingdom present. In doing so, we are able to reflect His light with such brilliance, others will see Him clearly and choose to follow.
I
trust in some way which I have yet to fully discover and understand, God is
using this present divorce to hone my life into a mirror which reflects more
fully the light and life of Christ. This
is my desire and my hope. It will become the light which will be hung from the eves, declaring to my neighbors the true joy of the season.
“In
Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. The Light
shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.” - John
1:4
Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, “I am the Light of the world;
he who follows me will not walk in
the darkness, but will have the Light of life.” – John 8:12
“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be
hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a
basket, but on the lamp stand,
and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your
light shine before men in such a
way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” - Matthew
5:14-16
“Consider it pure joy, my
brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because
you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let
perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not
lacking anything.” - James 1:2-4
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