Tara — You told me I was nowhere near done reconciling.

 

I recently received an encouraging note from a real-life friend from grad school. She references a telephone conversation we had years ago, but most of you will, I’m sure, recognize in her story that ALL I did was share with her the exact same love and counsel that a friend had shared with me years ago. Plus, ironically, even though she credits me with this conversation (so apparently I did have it with her), I was actually really REALLY convicted when I read what she wrote! I’m a little lacking in the love department for certain people these days. Oh, I can try to justify it all I want. But mostly, I’m just a selfish person who would prefer to spend time with people I enjoy (i.e., people who don’t criticize, judge, and attack me. Regularly.) But many of us have certain, ummmm, challenging relationships in our lives—a neighbor; fellow mom in a sports league, music ensemble, church group; your mother’s third husband (some may call him your stepfather, but you prefer “mother’s third husband”; boss at work; church leader; daughter-in-law … I could go on and on.

But instead, I’ll share my friend’s testimony below. (I trust she won’t mind a few emphases and editorial comments added in by yours truly.) And I’ll also encourage you to always keep at the ready the classic CCEF article on dealing with difficult people in your church. I need to staple that one to my HEAD I need it so often. (Says the difficult person in her church …)

Hope you enjoy! Happy Monday to you all—

Your friend,
Tara B.

***

Hi again, dear Tara,

Here is my story that I would like to share with whoever would like to hear how God uses my dear friend Tara for His peacemaking purposes in my life …

When I called you almost a decade ago now, I wanted to tell you how hard I had tried to get along with a very significant person in my life. I wanted you to hear how I had done everything a Christian should do. I wanted you to hear how hard it was to try to get along and tell me that isn’t what God wanted for me. Which is exactly what you did, just upside down and backwards from what I expected! Where I expected to hear you tell me I had done all I can do, you told me I really hadn’t even started (offer your bodies as living sacrifices? You mean this is SUPPOSED to be HARD?!?).

I had gone to a Peacemaker Seminar with this person (supposedly to benefit a different relationship and I was just being supportive, but of course I secretly hoped this person’s heart would soften and ways of relating with me would change as well). I had done all the steps I learned at the conference; I was done, right?

When I called to ask for your help, you suggested we read Romans 12 — backwards. As we talked about not being overcome by evil but overcoming evil with good, I wasn’t sure calling you was going to go quite how I had in mind. We moved on to not taking revenge and giving the thirsty a drink — I remember a sense of bewilderment beginning.

This was real conflict! This person had really hurt me, over and over, stomped on my heart and left it for dead. And you’re telling me I’m supposed to be nice? [EDITOR’S NOTE: My friend, A., and I can have a good chuckle at this comment now because OF COURSE I would NEVER tell ANYONE they have to be nice in this situation. NO WAY. Lay down your life, bless, do good, pray for, and LOVE this person? Ummmm. Yeah. That I’d say because, well, Jesus said it. But I’d NEVER say you have to be NICE. Who could ever do that? 😉 ]

Tara, I couldn’t put on a happy face, but not in the middle of such heart-wrenching, core-of-my-soul anguish! I admit that my ears did perk up a little at the “I will repay” part. Finally, we were getting somewhere. [EDITOR’S NOTE: I can TOTALLY relate to liking that verse too. A lot. But isn’t that so telling about my stinkin’ ol’ heart? When I think about MY sins and weaknesses, I cry out for MERCY. I am grateful for God’s LONG-SUFFERING and KINDNESS. But when I think about THAT’S PERSON’S sins and weaknesses, I demand JUSTICE. Vengeance. I am graceless and impatient. SHIVER! It really creeps me out to see my heart.]
 
Even now as I re-read the “next” verses, I remember feeling how my strategies and selfish desires became exposed one by one: Bless those who persecute you… Live in harmony… Do not be conceited… Love must be sincere. Sin-cere. Without mask. Without hypocrisy. What would sincere love for this person look like?

Oh, my friend, it has taken years to begin to acknowledge the depth of manipulation of which I am guilty in this relationship! Over and over I look for the good I can cling to and see how short I fall of true brotherly love for this person. Somewhere around “Keep your spiritual fervor” and “Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer”, I think it started dawning on me that you were telling me I was nowhere near done reconciling.

By then, I was ready to hear that I had been thinking of myself more highly than I ought, according to how I saw myself. I could see no use in the Body for the person I was in conflict with. I had been hoping you would tell me I could, in good conscience, completely eliminate contact and put that relationship to death. One of the most annoying things about that person is/was giftedness in a specific area. I felt that because those gifts seemed more like an anomaly in an otherwise bad person, I could write that person off as useless and the gifts as not valuable, even nauseating. It continues to shock the socks off of me that God uses gifts to accomplish His purposes, even in people who do bad things. Thank goodness, because part of this journey has been discovering that I, too, do lots of bad things and often the good I do through the gifts God has given me seems like an anomaly, too.

As we concluded, I began to see how seeking to actively love this person despite continued failings and hurt was truly a living sacrifice, yet completely warranted because of God’s mercy toward me. What a relief that God doesn’t require me to change this person for Him to be pleased with me, that simply the offer of myself is enough.

I began to see how wildly God’s mercy diverges from the pattern of the world. [EDITOR’S NOTE: And so sadly, how wildly God’s mercy diverges from the pattern of the counsel you so often receive even from Christian sources: “God wants you to be happy!” “You don’t deserve this!” “She’s an antagonist— God doesn’t expect you to be around her!” “What do YOU get out of this relationship? He’s dysfunctional / an addict / a “toxic person”—cut him off!” Don’t get me wrong, of course, certain situations ABSOLUTELY require strong, careful responses—I’m thinking of truly destructive and dangerous behaviors related to addictions, sexual and physical abuse, mental illnesses, out of control rage. Believe me. I know. But what does it look like for the resources of the entire church (and sometimes the civil authorities and medical helps too) to be brought to bear for WISDOM to combine with LOVE? Not for fences or boundaries to be erected solely to protect US, but to minister God’s grace in its various forms to unbelievers (evangelism) and believers alike (discipleship / discipline). Oh, A! You have totally nailed this and I am so, so convicted by what you wrote.]

Tara, I began to long to be transformed so that I could test what His will for me was (even in this awful relationship). I’d love to sit down with you and tell you about the journey that began with that conversation; it is transforming how I do that particular relationship, and transforms every close relationship I have. Do you know that conversation came in a season of miscarriages, where God was telling me how He was going to put together our family, instead of me telling Him? [EDITOR’S NOTE: I didn’t know, A. I’m so sorry! I see photos of your amazing family and I have to be careful to not covet my neighbor’s adopted daughter. Oh, I didn’t know, A. Such sorrow!]

I am a completely different kind of mother for having begun that journey at that time.

Many more opportunities have come along since to look at my grotesque sin and how it has ravaged my relationships. I am so grateful for your kind, gentle look at my sinfulness; my heart has been encouraged many times over that you were willing to look with me at the reality of my heart and not turn away in disgust. Once (hopefully more?) after that, I was able to listen to the story of sin in another dear one’s life and respond in grace instead of discard the relationship in disgust. [EDITOR’S NOTE: Oh oh oh. But isn’t this just SO true? The more we see how wretched we actually are—the doctrine of total depravity is not just an interesting theological idea!—the more we can hear of our brother or sister’s vile sin without shock or rejection because we are overwhelmed with this thought: “I’m just like her. I’m just like him. Yes, my sin may look different. I may not struggle with this exact sin, but I definitely struggle. We both need the Savior. Let’s run to Him!”]

Thank you, my friend, for the encouragement and example. [Thank you, A. I love you!]

Gratefully,
A.”

[Re-post from 2010]

PS
One of my workshops at next month’s 2018 Women’s Leadership Conference (“Sticky Ministry: Word-based and Relationally-driven Women’s Ministry”) is on this topic of extremely difficult relationships. Here is the descriptive paragraph for the workshop. Hope to see you in Atlanta!

Our Stickiest, Murkiest Relational Quagmires (Tara Barthel) – How do we adhere to God’s Word in our most difficult relationships? Do our covenantal vows require us to “stick close” to everyone? What about when inter-generational differences, personality clashes, and social media mishaps make it so much easier to simply run away? Do we ever get to push back and defend ourselves when the relationships involve addiction, physical and emotional abuse, and huge violations of trust? In this workshop, we are going deep into the murkiest of relational quagmires with the hope (and confidence!) that God’s Word is sufficient to guide us.