Recently I was a guest at an extended family function. It was a relatively small gathering and it was really nice seeing some family members that I had not seen in a while.
But what struck me more so that day were the people that were NOT there, but that SHOULD have been there because of their close family relation to the person hosting the function.
It got me thinking about how many families and relationships have been fractured over the past several years because of division, offense, and unforgiveness.
Parents estranged from their adult children, siblings barely speaking to each other, broken marriages, and the list goes on. In this particular space, I could count so many of those fractured relationships, and it really weighed heavy on my heart. Growing up I remember how all of us would be together in these extended gatherings and there was always a lot of food, laughter, and joy.
But somewhere over the years, the enemy has planted seeds of offense, division, and unforgiveness that have left people who were once so close to now…where they have not spoken to each other in years.
How did we get here? And more importantly, is there any hope for reconciliation?
The enemy’s plan from the beginning of time was to bring division. Division between God and humanity, and humanity to each other. And today, it is no different.
But what can we do? There have been undoubtedly many books written on the topic, but here are a few things that have helped me as I have had to walk through this in my own life.
- Pray – Ask God to intervene in a way that only He can. God is so big and so creative. When I submit my most impossible request to Him, I find that He is so good at working it out in His way and in His time.
- Change your perspective – I believe it is time for us to see things from the lens of the other person. Could it be that something I did or said hurt the other person? Did they perhaps misunderstand something I said, and as a result got hurt by me? There are always two sides to every story… and our eyes and our hearts can be open when we can see things from the other person’s perspective.
- Resist offense – Taking offense to something is the quickest and easiest way to fracture a relationship. When we take something that might have been said innocently or without thought and assume it was meant for harm, we set ourselves up to be offended. And that offense creates distance between us and the ones we love. Ryan Leak in his book “Unoffendable” says we should strive to be unoffendable, which is not about never getting offended, but instead it’s about not staying offended.
- Extend grace and mercy. We have freely been given grace from God through the gift of His son and we have been granted mercy from the eternal judgement that we deserve because of our sin. But, if we have generously been given grace and mercy from God, how can we not extend it to our own brothers and sisters?
- Remember that we are broken people dealing with other broken people. David said it so well when he said “For I was born a sinner – yes, from the moment my mother conceived me” (Psalm 51:5 NLT). As sinners, we will all inevitably disappoint and fail each other. Knowing that, I pray that we can more easily forgive, just as Christ forgave us.
My hope is that that more of us would lay down our right to be “right” and would pursue reconciliation, just as God has reconciled himself to us. It was when we were at our worst, that God reached down and pursued a relationship with us.
My church’s founding Pastor Mike Hayes said it so well when he would ask us “Would you rather be right, or reconciled?”
I pray that more often than not, I would choose being reconciled over being right.
~ Vijoy
