nakedpastor
I am a part of a stubborn community of people. But I’m thankful for that. It is partially because of our stubbornness that we are still here. But I’m thankful for it for another, more important, reason: they will not be coerced into doing something they don’t want just to fulfill some expectation, no matter how virtuous or noble.
The pressure to envision the community as something better or even other than what it is is inescapable and constant. My community, however, demands to be recognized and appreciated for what it is. For who they are! I always compare it to a loving relationship. If I constantly want my wife to look like Angelina Jolie, have sex with me every day, and worship the ground I walk on, then my expectations are eventually going to kill me and her. I will resent the fact that my fantasies are never fulfilled, and she will resent the fact that she herself is never loved. We will end up in divorce court because I refuse to see her, respect her and love her as she is, and she refuses to conform to my fantasies of my imaginary her.
I almost daily have to purge my mind of expectations, objectives, dreams, visions, goals and fantasies about my community or it will destroy me with disappointment , resentment and bitterness. The same for the community. If they constantly feel like they are never measuring up to my dreams for them, it will end in disaster. But the temptation is real because this is precisely how I was trained to oversee communities! This is how almost every community functions. And it is killing people and community. To unconditionally love these people as they are and this community as it is… that’s my commitment.
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