Repairing
Broken Relationships
If your brother sins against
you, go to him and show him his fault. But do it privately, just between
yourselves.
If he listens to you, you
have won your brother back.
Matthew 18: 21-35
A father tells this story about his holiday. "Last Summer my family decided to take a "trip" to Alaska. I imagined us all singing songs together as we travelled the long outback roads visiting places we had only seen on postcards and in books. But things didn’t work out as we had planned!
Mid-morning
out in the middle of nowhere, I looked down to see that a light on the
dashboard of my Station wagon had come on. Now over the years I have learned to
perfect my technique in dealing with these mechanical breakdowns... its
called denial.
So
my reaction to the light on the dashboard was to say to myself... "That's
strange. I wonder what that's all about? It can’t be a problem with the vehicle
because I had it all checked out before we left. It might be a faulty light.
Really it’s nothing to worry about. Maybe if I just keep on driving, the light
will go out and everything will return to normal."
But
of course the light didn't go out and things didn't return to normal. We ended
up broken down by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. And being
mechanically dysfunctional, I had no idea what was wrong or how to fix it!
Over
the next few days as the Station wagon was getting fixed, there were times when
I seriously thought about leaving it in Chatanka, Alaska and getting a new
one... because it seemed a lot easier than fixing it."
Well...
I share with you this story because this morning we are going to talk about a
far more serious kind of breakdown - a breakdown of relationships in our days.
And it seems to me
that many of us approach our relational breakdowns the same way that the father
of our story approached mechanical breakdowns - we see the warning lights,
but we ignore them and the relationship breaks down.
And
because we often just don't know what to do, or because we know that fixing the
relationship is difficult, time consuming and costly, many of us simply abandon
that relationship by the side of the road like an old vehicle. It’s not hard to
litter our lives with broken relationships we have never tried to fix. For some
of us, breakdown of a relationship is the source of constant unrelenting,
unrelieved pain!
·
A treasured friendship has been lost or scarred.
·
A marriage where the partners have wounded one
another and every conversation has an undertone of anger, defensiveness, and
hurt.
·
You have a brother or sister, a mother or
father, a son or a daughter with whom you are no longer speaking.
·
You have a friend, a member of the church who
has left because of some disagreement and you have been hurt by the separation
that exists between you.
Where once you enjoyed
the company of a person and shared many good times together there is now only
tension, anger or silence; where there was once a bond of love and intimacy,
now you only feel hurt because of the deep chasm between you.
The question is: Is
there anything we can do about it? Is there anything we should do about it?
The
first thing that needs to be said is that Jesus regarded fixing up broken
relationships very important. We know that to be true, because of what he did
to fix up the broken relationship between God and us.
He
thought that this was so important that he suffered and gave his life so that
we could be reconciled to God. Jesus clearly states in everything he says and
does that reconciliation was foremost in his plans and so also ought to be
foremost in our lives.
Jesus says:
"So, if you about to offer your
gift to God at the altar and there you remember that your brother or sister has
something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar, go at once
and make peace to your brother, and then come back and offer your gift to
God" (Matt
5:23-24).
The act of offering a sacrifice was about as solemn
an act as you could get. But here Jesus does the unthinkable - he issues free
passes for people to get up in the middle of a worship service, climb over as
many people as necessary and head for the door - provided they are leaving for
the right reason, namely:
- to fix a broken relationship
- to reestablish love where love has broken down.
As
important as making a sacrifice in the temple was, reconciliation is even more
important. Jesus said that the most compelling evidence that would convince the
world that Christianity is real and true is the way we love one another (John
13:35).
In
short, when there is a need for forgiveness between two people, especially
people who are brothers and sisters in Christ, he says, "Deal with
it". We can hide from the need
for reconciliation, we can sweep it under the rug - for awhile. But it’s still
there. You can hold a grudge, or keep resentment hidden inside you, and the
other person may not even know about it. But it eats at you, destroys you
inwardly. You think about it, you go around trying to avoid them, or their
presence gets you all upset. Jesus says, "deal with it."
Jesus
says that it’s always our responsibility to make the first move when a
relationship breaks down! We are to take the initiative in seeking
reconciliation.
But what if it’s not
my fault? What if it’s 90% the other person’s fault? What if it’s completely
their fault? What do I do then?
Jesus
says, "If you remember your
brother/sister has something against you, (that is, if it’s your fault
that your relationship with another person is strained,) then you go at once, (take the initiative), and make peace".
Jesus
also says: "If your
brother/sister sins against you, (that is, if it’s their fault that
things aren’t going well between you) then
you go to him....!"
Whether we like it or not - when a relationship breaks down, regardless
of who is at fault, Jesus puts the burden on us - on you and on me - to
initiate reconciliation.
He
does that because you and I have experienced the reconciliation that is ours
through the death of Jesus. We know what it is to feel the relief and joy of
knowing that the gap between God and us has been closed because of what Christ
has done for us.
At
our baptism we were joined to Christ, made part of God’s family, given a new
life, a new way of looking at the hurt and the pain our sinfulness causes in
the lives of other people. Because of Christ’s death we have been made friends
with God and it follows then that as his people we should initiate
reconciliation when a relationship has been strained or broken.
When
there has been a falling out, no matter who is the fault, it is our
responsibility to be so concerned about the other person, that we will seek
every avenue of making amends. Jesus gives us another tip for making amends
with those who have sinned against us in today's gospel reading.
It is this - attempt to set the matter
straight privately. Jesus is encouraging us to resist the temptation to make
the conflict public. Go and meet them face to face, just the two of you, in
private. Don't bring it up at a dinner party. Don't discuss it with your home
friendship group in order to get them to agree with you about how awful the
person has been. Don't get a whole bunch of other people involved in gossiping
about what happened. Go to that person in private and work it out there first.
Go
and speak to him/her, just the two of you, not with the intention of
"giving him a piece of my mind" and telling him "how messed up
he really is and that it’s time he got his act together", but with a
reconciling spirit, ready to listen and to understand.
Go
with the attitude that you want to be friends again, regardless of who is at
fault. As James says, "We must be
quick to listen and slow to speak and slow to become angry". But
how often don’t we get all this wrong? We simply want to vent our anger face to
face with the other person. Here’s an example.
I
thought, I was the most patient and coolest and collected person, until I moved
to Montreal. A while back, I was looking for parking place at Walmart. I found
one, but it was small it took me a little time to park. A driver of another car
behind me was not happy at all having to wait while I parked my car! And he felt the need to share his feelings
with me!
As
he drove past he rolled down his window and yelled, then said something in
French, I felt it in my heart, wasn’t a praise or God bless you, and
then he made a gesture with the middle finger as he drove off! Obviously he had a problem with me... but
didn't stick around to discuss it with me...
Now here's the point I want to make: This man did a lot of things right according to what Jesus said. He saw the warning light, stopped what he was doing and took immediate action. He didn't wait for me to come to him.
He didn't deny there was a problem (obviously I was taking too long to park). He came to me in private. He didn't have other motorists gossiping about me. He said the right things in French. And he was passionate, and impressively direct! But clearly there was no desire on his part to fix our relationship! He only wanted to blast me and move on!
Does that sound familiar? Too often all we are interested in is giving the offender a blast, a piece of our mind and moving on. We are simply letting our human side nature take control and we aren’t interested in fixing the broken relationship. We are not interested in working things out.
It’s here at worship, at this house of God that we are once again reminded of how far Jesus was willing to come to fix our broken relationship with God! Even though the breakdown between God and us was our fault, he didn't wait for us to come to him, he took that costly first step towards us, leaving the glory of heaven and sacrificing his life on the cross so that we might be reconciled to God!
As September 11th approaches with its gruesome memories, God speaks to us all about forgiveness, healing, and Restoring Broken Relationships. Jesus still comes to us today reminding us of his love for us, forgiving us for all of our wrongs and reclaiming us as his children and members of his kingdom.
Even though we find it hard at times to be reconciled to those who have hurt us so much and find it easier to strike back and be nasty, Jesus only responds with his undeserved love and forgiveness. It is with his love then that we seek to reestablish love when love has broken down! As Jesus put it so well in the Lord’s Prayer.
"Forgive
us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us."
Amen.
Rev. Samuel K.
King-Kabu
September 08, 2002