Friday, January 27, 2012

Names

Although I am also piano teacher, I work part time as a housekeeper at a local Christian retreat center on the weekends. Its not a glamorous job by any means, but it pays off my student loans and I enjoy working with my co-workers.

The one thing  I often don't enjoy, however, is the guests. In the last four years I have worked there, I have met the nastiest, neediest, angriest people I have ever had the misfortune of interacting with. The worse part is that all of them claimed the name of Christ.

The worst, by far, are those who aren't just Christians, but who try to use their rank in Christianity as a way to cowl others to do what they wish. For example, tonight, there was a simple misunderstanding with booking rooms, which was unfortunately irreversible. The group had wanted rooms looking out over the beautiful river, and they had gotten the parking lot side. Sad, but not life altering.  As I watched, the pastor, THE PASTOR, screamed over and over again at our front desk staff about the issue.  The worst part, was that the pastor kept saying, "I'm the pastor, and I am so mad about this!! You need to fix this because I am the pastor!"

It  made me so furious watching the exchange. It made me want to scream, "How dare you use your position as a leader of Christ's people to try to intimidate someone else, especially over such a petty, petty issue. How dare you claim Christ's name but behave in such a way."

And yet..... and yet.... as I thought about it later,  part of my heart convicted that I do the exact same thing. I yell at people who cut me off while driving to church. I have been angry at the person next to me in the pew, even if I never screamed in their face.  I have hummed a hymn while walking quickly by a beggar, hoping that they don't notice me.  My heart has been just as ugly as that pastor's behavior.

As I think about Christ, the Christ who threw out demons, who hugged the untouchable, who ate with tax collectors, who gave grace to the broken, the poor, the weak,  the more it makes me feel so small. So weak. Claiming His name, claiming to be His hands and feet,  means so much more than dressing up and driving to a perfect little church once a week and hanging out with picture perfect people.

It means loving others more than ourselves. It means humbling ourselves. It means giving others the grace that we have been given.    

Tonight was a reminder of what not to be that I desperately needed. 

1 comment:

  1. Wow - powerful post, Johanna. Very insightful and convicting. Thank you for sharing and I hope all Christians can read this and be reminded of it as you just reminded me of it.

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