one another

Do you want your shoes back now?

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The age old saying goes: “You can’t understand someone until you have walked a mile in their shoes” (or variations on that theme). I get what it’s saying, but I don’t think it’s right. It’s not enough. Walking a mile in someone’s shoes is about us experiencing life as they do, but only to do it for a mile makes it temporary. And I assume that once I have walked the mile I can put my own shoes back on. They can’t, and it’s permanent for them.

I reflect on the horrific experiences that friends of mine have shared with me and realise that I can’t claim to be able to walk for a mile in their shoes. I have never experienced what it is like to receive the abuse, discrimination and be the subject of the hate crimes that they have been through. Even for me to suggest that I could try to walk in their shoes seems patronising and woefully inadequate.

I find myself challenged and inspired by these friends in equal measure. Challenged to consider my own actions and behaviour and inspired to do more, to be more… but more what? I can’t experience how it feels to be called hideous names, but I can be outraged about it. I can’t know how someone feels if another person crosses the street to avoid meeting them, but I can be broken-hearted by it. It feels beyond patronising for me to suggest that ‘I know how you feel’ when blatantly I don’t.

I have started to wonder about what Paul wrote to the church in Rome: “Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.” (Romans 12:15) What if I extend that to things like: “Scream with those who scream; rage with those who rage…” That feels a bit more empathetic, but it still doesn’t feel enough. So I read the wider context of that verse:

“Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.”

Romans 12:14-16

Hmm… so the empathy Paul is after comes in the context of likely persecution and the potential for division on the basis of status in the church. That complicates it a bit because it reveals how dangerous it was for the early Christians (especially in Rome) – and that was a shared sense of danger. I don’t experience that sense of danger in the same way as my friends, so what can I do? I want to be there for them, I want to help, I want to show them that they are not alone and that they matter. And it seems that the Christians might have been a bit class-conscious and were not being as inclusive as they should, particularly ignoring the underprivileged. But as a middle-aged white cis-gendered heterosexual male human living in England I am one of the most privileged people on this planet. There’s not a lot of danger for me and a lot of potential ways in which I might exclude others.

So then I notice that Paul urged the Christians to ‘live in harmony with one another’. Harmony is the opposite of discord. It doesn’t require everyone to sing the same notes, but to complement and augment each other as we sing the same song. If they are singing a soulful lament, there’s no harmony if you are singing a bouncy pop song. And you have to be there with them to be in harmony, you have to be present with them. To be in harmony you have to listen to the tune the other person is singing. You have to find ways of weaving your music into their music, being responsive to one another and allowing your singing to be shaped by their singing so that the voices blend. Replace ‘song’ with ‘life’ and you get the idea. That’s how we rejoice when they rejoice, mourn when they mourn, scream when they scream and rage when they rage.

And then if we read the whole of Romans chapter 12 we see that Paul seems to be urging the believers to intentionally be aware of themselves and their potential impact on God (‘living sacrifices’) and on other people. If we remember that it’s written to a group of Christians not an isolated individual we see that it’s an extremely collaborative thing, this church business. We collectively need to think about our impact on God and on other people, and to do the latter there is a lot of ‘one anothering’ to be done.

A while ago in our church we looked at the ‘One anothers’ in the New Testament and discovered that all of them are aspects of love – ways of putting love into action:

Love one another in the way that Jesus loves: bear with one another; encourage one another; build each other up; serve one another; forgive one another; honour one another; be devoted to one another; live in harmony with one another; offer hospitality to one another; live in fellowship with one another… and more.

That requires us to have an intention to faithfully put one another above ourselves, to be there for one another, to listen, to seek to understand, and to stand with one another. To give [of ourselves] and not count the cost.

I’m still working on this but I hope it’s becoming less patronising than a short walk in the wrong shoes. Perhaps it’s a step in the right direction.

recycled blessings

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1295032_torn_paper_6

In order to try to save trees and do a little bit towards helping the environment I try to do a couple of things: I try to print double-sided (saving paper) and I try to re-use bits of paper on which I have only printed on one side – using them as scrap paper. I started the double-sided printing a while ago, but I had started the reusing single side-printed paper as scrap a while before I found out how to make my printer print on both sides, which meant that I have had a modest stock of single-sided paper to use as scrap.

However over the weekend I reached for a piece of scrap paper and found that I had more-or-less exhausted my stock of scrap paper. It wasn’t so much that I had used it more frequently as that my double-sided printing had reduced the amount of paper available for scrap. I hadn’t expected that side-effect. In the end I had to use a pristine piece of paper to write on. It felt wrong (recycling-wise), and at the same time there was something lovely about writing on a clean piece of paper with a nice fountain pen. (Yes I am that sad).

So often there are unexpected consequences to our well-intended actions. You stop your car to let someone pull out in front of you and someone behind you gets angry that their journey is delayed. You make a phone call on your mobile while on the train to let someone know you are thinking of them in a time of difficulty and someone else on the train is upset that they have to listen to one side of your conversation. You walk to the shops rather than driving in order to keep fit and reduce pollution but the journey takes longer than anticipated and you miss an important phone call at home. You perform a magic trick on stage to entertain an audience and make a 4 year-old girl cry because her granny was the one sprayed with silly string at the end*. You get the idea.

The unintended and unexpected consequences do not make our original actions wrong. They do not mean that we should not have done those things (except perhaps not spraying granny with silly string). But we need to remember that we do not exist inside a bubble, we live in a society with lots of other people. Perhaps we should think more widely about our impact on other people: who else is impacted by our actions?

And while we are contemplating that are there ways in which we can expand the positive scope of our actions? That’s one of the questions that led to the establishing of the Fairtrade Foundation to enable people to buy goods that will more directly benefit the producers as well as the vendor and purchaser. Another way, I think, is by seeking to reciprocate and pass on the positive impact when we are the beneficiary. It blesses me no end if, after I have let a car pull out in front of me in a queue of traffic, the person I let pull out does the same for someone else further along the road.

Can you imagine the impact on our society if we all acted in that way, rather than in self-centred and selfish ways? Not just letting people pull out in front of us, but everyone seeking to bless others. In the Bible there are lots of ways in which we can do that for one another. These are some I have identified

one another image

I wonder whether this is part of what the writer intended in the letter to the Hebrews, chapter 10 (my emphasis):

23 Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on towards love and good deeds, 25 not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Is this also part of what Jesus meant by us being salt and light in our communities – adding savour and enhancing the brightness so that people “may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven”? (Matthew 5:16)

I’m not sure how all of this will help my scrap paper problem (except to say that I don’t need donations!) but in the grand scheme of things I don’t think that is as important.

Be blessed, be a blessing

*Yes, to my shame, I really did that!

one another

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A while ago I created some visual clues to a series of phrases from the Bible that all relate to ‘one another’ – how we should treat one another and be with one another. I remembered this recently and offer them to you for your amusement and perhaps edification. The answers are at the bottom of the page and I apologise for any brain strain this may cause…

Enjoy!4-give

 

serve

lettuce-spray-4practice-hospital-teafellow-ship

bee-de-votedconfused-voleon-her

bear with.JPGharm-on-kneea-gry

forgive one another; serve one another; let us pray for one another; practice hospitality to one another; live in fellowship with one another; be devoted to one another; love one another (it’s a vole); honour one another (on her); bear with one another; live in harmony (harm on knee) with one another; agree with one another (angry with ‘n’);