Extending Grace: The Ministry of Bearing

I can't remember when this idea first crept into my mind. We've been going through an excellent sermon series at church this fall about the facets of the Kingdom of God, things like fellowship, witness, simplicity, covenant, and persecution. It could have been in one of these sermons. Or the idea could have poked up its head in one of my conversations with a mentor or friend. I've also been leading a book study at church on Dietrich Bonhoeffer's pithy volume Life Together. I'm sure the idea partly came about through this book. Simply put, the big idea that's been on my mind and in my heart is the call that we have to extend grace to our fellow human beings.

Bonhoeffer gave me the words to express what this ministry is called in Scripture: the ministry of bearing. Paul writes: "Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindess, humility, meekness and patience, bearing with one another..." (Col. 3:12-13a). As I've thought more about it, my experiences in life recently have given body and shape to this idea of bearing with or extending grace to others. Or, more accurately, life has tested my limited ability to extend grace.

In church a couple weeks ago, my pastor introduced new members to the congregation. He said something like: "We have a divine call to welcome these new members into our congregation and to love them, to delight in their gifts, passions, idiosyncracies and oddities." The congregation laughed, but the truth is plain as day. We're all a bunch of idiosyncratic weirdos. Need any evidence? Spend 10 minutes with another person. Or, better yet, spend two minutes with yourself!

In my book study yesterday, we discussed the ministry of bearing with others as Bonhoeffer describes it. I was still trying to understand what this ministry was, so I asked three questions: 1) What is the ministry of bearing? 2) Have you ever thought of this as a ministry? 3) How do we practice the ministry of bearing? One person very thoughtfully said, "Well, it kinda sounds like putting up with others." We all laughed and agreed. I didn't expect to have my questions answered in one fell swoop, but there it was, clear as day. Bonhoeffer further describes the ministry of bearing:

"The freedom of the other person includes all that we mean by a person's nature, individuality, endowment. It also includes his weaknesses and oddities, which are such a trial to our patience, everything that produces frictions, conflicts, and collisions among us. To bear the burden of the other person means involvement with the created reality of the other, to accept and affirm it, and, in bearing with it, to break through to the point where we take joy in it."    

Notice he says that we "break through" to the point of joy. We don't usually get there right away. It takes struggle to bear this ministry faithfully. Perhaps this concept has been so striking to me recently because life has been so ordinary and this is a ministry of ordinariness. What could be more day-to-day than colliding with the created reality of our brothers and sisters? I could count out the examples from today alone in a few short minutes, but I do have two stories I want to share particularly.

The first story is from this summer when I took a day trip with my family to the Oregon Coast. For my family, family vacations are full of laughter and fun, but also memories of personalities colliding and expectations being thwarted. At the very beginning of the day, my dad insisted that he needed to deposit his check in the bank before we did anything else. Somehow, this started us off on a brilliant way of handling each other's "weaknesses and oddities." Whenever someone's oddities poked through and caused friction, we would gleefully shout: "Quirk! Quirk!" Instead of causing more tension, this simple statement released the tension, like the cap being opened on a soda. The tension fizzled away, and we would inevitably burst into laughter. But beyond just releasing the tension, acknowledging each other's quirks gave us insight into each other's needs and wants and gave us an avenue for communication. It opened up the possibility of extending grace to each other, and I learned a valuable lesson.

Bearing with each other isn't always so easy. It doesn't always have a good outcome. But this doesn't change our calling to bear with each other. In fact, I believe that God will, as he always does, extend grace to us as we extend grace to others.

Several weeks ago, my friend and I were cooking pancakes for breakfast. I had made a delightfully fluffy sour cream pancake batter, and my friend was in charge of flipping. As she poured on batter, flipped the pancakes, and slid the cooked hotcakes onto a platter, she told me about the tough time at work she'd had the day before. As she talked, I noticed that she was pressing all the air out of the pancakes with her spatula, thus ruining the airy fluffiness that had so excited me. The words were almost out of my mouth when a thought popped into my mind. She is upset, and she's taking her frustration out on these pancakes. It was a totally mindless act because she was focused on telling me her story. And what was I doing? Worrying about culinary perfection. Then came the three redemptive words: "Extend her grace." And I did. I shut my mouth and listened and ate flat pancakes with a new appreciation.

Lonely in a Crowd

On Saturday night, the Whitworth men's basketball team hosted an NCAA tournament game in the Fieldhouse for the first time in Whitworth's history. I decided to go to the game, even though I didn't have anyone to go with. As Whitworth is my alma mater, I figured I would be able to find someone I knew.

Before the game, I had a craving for Irish soda bread. By the time the bread came out of the oven and I had eaten dinner, it was 6:40 when I arrived at Whitworth. I walked into the Fieldhouse and tossed my $10 on the table, marveling at the noise of the crowd. The Fieldhouse was packed. I have never seen it so full, except perhaps for the Baccaleaurate service on my graduation weekend (and maybe not even then!).

Staring up at the crowds, I suddenly felt dwarfed and lost. I wandered around the perimeter of the room at the base of the bleachers searching for someone I knew and any seat in which to sit. Back where I started, I figured I was out of luck. I saw some professors I knew, but they didn't take initiative to motion me to where they were sitting. I finally found a spot to stand at the corner of the court against the wall. As I scanned the crowd, I suddenly felt an incredible sense of loneliness. I stood there watching the players warm up and was able to identify several familiar faces in the crowd, but no one made an effort to include me, to scrunch down on the bleachers to offer me six inches of space.

As the game started, I figured someone would see me and offer me a seat during the second half, so I watched the game closely, marveled at the incredible volume of the student cheering section, and enjoyed my close-up view of the action, careful not to let my distress show.

At half time, Whitworth alumni were invited to a reception in the lobby of the fitness center next door. I hoped this would be a good time to find people I knew. I walked next door, but soon realized that I knew no one in the room. I grabbed a cup of tea and went back into the Fieldhouse, where I expected I had a better chance of seeing people. It was no different. No one sought me out. No one walked down to say hi. No one invited me to sit or stand with them. For some reason, it became important that someone else take the initiative. It was hard to believe that in a crowd of 1800 people, I could feel so very alone.

Fortunately, the second half of the game was exciting, and I didn't think so much about myself. When the game ended (with Whitworth losing), I left quickly. I had no reason to stick around.

**
I got home that night and wondered if it had been worth $10 for two hours of feeling like an outcast. I have never minded being alone, as I have a personality that tends toward the introverted. However, I minded that no one took the opportunity to welcome me or to make me feel included. More than an indictment of others, the evening exposed my own selfishness. I know I have often been too busy or self-centered or scared to reach out to others who are lonely. The experience turned me inside out and made me vulnerable, but it also makes me want to be more like Jesus. Jesus who is the most profound example of one who includes the outcast, comforts the lonely, and takes the time to notice the individual.

**
The next morning in church, a woman said, "Oh Elizabeth! We saw you at the game! We wanted to invite you to sit with us but there was no room." On Monday, at lunch, a friend from Partners said, "Elizabeth! I saw you at the game. We were going to invite you to sit with us, but then I didn't see you again."

My encounters with these two women puzzled me. It made me wonder if, for some sovereign and inexplicable reason, God wanted me to experience loneliness. Their statements made me feel ashamed. I couldn't admit out loud that I had been achingly lonely. But perhaps if I had been bold enough to admit my loneliness, they would have understood. Surely I'm not the only one who's ever been lonely in a crowd.

To Love Is To Be

Two of my housemates moved out this week and another will move out on Sunday. They're all moving far away: Los Angeles, Princeton, New Jersey, Denver. It seemed appropriate that I stumbled across this quote on a friend's blog:

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one...Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.”

C.S. Lewis' insights are always astute, even poignant.

Astute observations are also why I appreciate my pastor. He preached on Ephesians 3:14-21 this past Sunday where Paul prays that the Ephesians may be filled with "all the fullness of God" (19). I imagine Paul knew a thing or two about saying goodbye to people. He spent at least two years in Ephesus and writes beautiful prayers on behalf of the Ephesians. Paul wants them to fully comprehend the "love of Christ that surpasses knowledge."

In his sermon, my pastor explored what the fullness of God might look like. He said he had always assumed that God's fullness meant blessings and good and prosperity. But if we look at the life of Christ, there is also hardship and betrayal and anger and grief. Since Christ embodied the fullness of God in human form, my pastor concluded that for our lives to overflow with the fullness of God we must also embrace "every emotion on the continuum of the human experience," joy, sorrow and everything in between.

I just noticed in the verse that the fullness of God is fundamentally rooted in love. Paul prays that we will "know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that we may be filled with all the fullness of God." We won't be filled with the fullness of God until we know the love of Christ.

And, ironically, love invites brokenness. The love of Christ ended in death.

Brokenness hardly ever seems like fullness. I'm always surprised when love ends in grief, in separation, in sacrifice. I expect love to be easy, to fix all the problems. But human love will never do that. And yet somehow, even as humans, we experience the fullness of God when we embrace love-giving-way-to-brokenness.

And ultimately, this is the only way we can know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge. This is the only way we will be filled with all the fullness of God.

Because someday brokenness will give way to love.

And we will meet the Source of Love himself.