That's Not Nice!

I trust this finds you enjoying cooler days as we head into fall. I’ve always found it helpful to frame life in terms of seasons, and have been thinking lately about the one we’re in now, nationally and locally.

It’s easy to look in the rear-view mirror.

It’s also easy to fear the future.

I think back to the season many of us took a stand, saying NO to jab mandates. That was regardless of how we’d arrived at that moment, regardless of what the future held in unemployment, loss of relationship, homes and more.

Presently, there isn’t as identifiable an enemy as those ‘jab or else’ days. Instead, increasing chaos swirls, worsened by a media feed that destroys our ability to think clearly. We often end up in quasi-paralysis, scrolling as detached observers. We tell ourselves we’ll eventually act, as soon as we find that perfect entry point or political leader, or the next Freedom Convoy type event to create enough momentum.

Meanwhile, our neighbourhoods, schools and businesses are decaying under the weight of lies and darkness. We have almost eradicated truth from our national landscape. State media feeds a largely apathetic populace complete nonsense, and lightspeed advances in artificial intelligence can put anyone, saying anything, on your screens.

But we’re not called to observe. If you’re reading this email, there was a season years ago where you refused to sit and watch, instead you stood and acted. You accepted the consequences.  

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Our family recently moved, for the third time in six months. Like any move, it feels we’ll never get everything into place or fixed up just right. Being in my late fifties also means our furniture all got much heavier the past couple years.

I’ve been convicted as we've been immersed in these moves, that things like a move or a home can become idols in our lives. Several decades ago, Francis Schaeffer wrote:

“I believe the majority .. will sustain the loss of liberties without raising their voices as long as their own lifestyles are not threatened. And since personal peace and affluence are so often the only values that count with the majority, politicians know that to be elected they must promise these things. Politics has largely become not a matter of ideals—increasingly men and women are not stirred by the values of liberty and truth—but of supplying a constituency with a frosting of personal peace and affluence. They know that voices will not be raised as long as people have these things, or at least an illusion of them.”

The “demands” of a North American life can rapidly erode principled resolve into a comfortable continuum of to-do lists, places to go, people to see. But how do we expect to shake our surroundings out of media-fed stupidity, unless we prioritize something other than our personal peace?

Mark 4 in the Bible alludes to this in the parable of the sower: “They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful^”

This is clearly a gospel reference, but bearing meaningful fruit demands we live in truth. Part of that is directly confronting the lies, evil and darkness around us. That can be ugly, complicated and… not very nice.

Pastor Mark Wanders wrote this in an excellent, short article a few weeks ago:

"Silence might feel polite, even “nice”, but it’s often just self-preservation dressed up as kindness.

We avoid discomfort, rejection, or conflict… and let others pay the price.

But when you speak truth in love — even if it costs you something — you’re laying yourself down for someone else’s good. That’s not “nice.” But it is kind."

More often than I like, I’m ever hearing, ever seeing, but rarely moving to action, responding to the world around me with truth, like I should be. Could I challenge all of us to find ways to move the needle, each day; responding (graciously) to a comment we disagree with; contacting a local school board to address curriculum; talk with your union or municipality, raising concerns over ideological markers.

Feel free to drop us a line and share how that goes over the next month.

Greg

"Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer." ~Romans 12:12