Do you ever just want to tell someone they are messing up? “Hey, you! There is a train coming towards you at 100 mph and I am thinking you may want to get off the tracks?” Presumably, we would all say something if someone was in physical danger, but when it comes to spiritual divergence it’s easy to stand idle and watch people get smushed.
Of course, we don’t want to think of it like that because we are good people. We mean well. In fact, it is often our meaning well that motivates us to keep quiet when someone is engaging in self-sabotaging behavior – and what’s more self-sabotaging than sin. We live in a world where the prevailing message is to stay in our own lane, live and let live, and it’s none of our business. There is an as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else mentality that might not be so absurd if it were possible. If we all lived in bubbles and our actions didn’t affect or influence others then maybe this idea would float. Certainly, we can’t decide for others. We have control over so very little. In many ways, surrender seems not only like the best option but the only one.
The work of mercy, to admonish sinners, feels heavy and laden with judgment. The word admonish is strong and clear. It’s also downright scary. Who wants to risk a relationship they value by pointing out the devaluing behavior of someone they love? Who wants to have the hard conversations of correction that no one wants to hear? Why wouldn’t we all keep quiet instead of blowing some obnoxious whistle of alarm?
My answer to this is to avoid the smushing. The smushing that can cost people their jobs; the smushing that destroys marriages; the smushing that creates addicts; the smushing that buries someone in debt; the smushing that ruins friendships…the smushing that could have been avoided had someone been brave enough to say something. “Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently. But watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted.” (Galatians 6:1).
It is important to do this work of mercy gently and in the spirit of love. No one likes hearing that they are messing up. No one likes to admit fault or acknowledge that their actions aren’t in line with their values. This is the hard work of love and one of the most beautiful acts of love we can do for one another. The people in my life who I am most indebted to, most loyal to, and most grateful for are those who have risked having a hard conversation with me. They came into my lane, got into my business, and pointed out the risks and consequences that went beyond the bubble of my life. I know it all sounds terribly dramatic, or at least just terrible. But when you really think about your own life, you have either been lucky enough to have someone yank you off the track or unfortunate enough that you wished someone had.
Most of us have been in that uncomfortable position of knowing someone is doing something wrong and not sure if they should say something or “mind their own business.” I certainly can’t tell anyone what to do but I know for me, I have never regretted a hard conversation made out of love and I genuinely feel grateful to those who have guided me. What about you? Would you say anything? Would you want anyone to say anything to you?
Read last week’s post: Mercy! Being Mama is Hard
All of the hoopla of a new year — a new decade can feel overwhelming like the throngs of crowds who enthusiastically greet it in celebration when the clock strikes midnight. This year I slept right through it. Partly because it makes more sense to start anew with a proper night’s sleep and mostly because I am just not that into the hype of a new year. I’m not interested in goal-setting or resolutions or crushing it (whatever “it” may be.) It’s not because I’m complacent or lack ambition or betterment. It’s just that for me, resolutions never seem to be the way to affect genuine life change.
I never understood the advice on public speaking about imagining your audience in their underwear. Maybe it’s because I don’t multitask well but I can’t imagine talking about God’s mercy while also trying to focus on an array of undergarments. Besides, it’s just creepy. While the intent may be to make the speaker more comfortable, I can’t think of anything more uncomfortable than a room full of people wearing only bras and briefs.
Virginia Slims cigarettes used to have an empowering ad campaign directed at women, “You’ve come a long way, baby.” If we ladies had come a little farther they would have left off “baby,” but it was the seventies and that’s as far as we had come: an anorexic cigarette, marketed specifically to our gender, empowering us to “bring home the bacon and fry it up in a pan.” (That was another ad campaign for Enjoli perfume).
Sometimes I feel like a tiny bird with an injured leg from an encounter with the claws of a crazed cat. I know how lucky I am to be here and how much worse things could be; yet, still, I carry a limp from my wounds that sometimes keeps me tethered to the ground. (I might start telling people that when they ask me how I am doing.)
Often, I feel like Queen Elsa in the 2013 Disney film, Frozen, with let it go repeating in my head like a scratched record or a warped mix tape warbling words of what has got to be the greatest three-word sentences in the history of ice queens.
In a reporting class, I took in college, if a student’s article had any factual errors, the instructor automatically took 50 points off their grade. It didn’t matter how insignificant the mistake was it resulted in an inevitable failure on the assignment. Fact checking was more important than your lead, punctuation, or your inverted pyramid. The paramount significance of accuracy in news reporting was underscored.
Last year, seventh-grade parents were given the assignment to write their children a letter explaining the meaning of life. Seriously? Why not just write the cure for cancer? Or, solve the problem of world peace? Or do ninth-grade algebra? The meaning of life?! 
I spend a lot of time with the devil I know. A lot of us do. We are stuck in careers, relationships, routines, and ruts that we long to change, but don’t. There is a litany of reasons for this: fear, laziness, uncertainty, and lack of confidence. It boils down to the notion that the devil we know is better than the devil we don’t.
In grade school, at the beginning of the school year, students are often asked to write about their summer vacation. However, as the sun begins to set on the season, I am contemplating how to live like its summer all year long.