People Are Not All They’re Cracked Up To Be

I was with a younger person this past week who said: “People are not all their cracked up to be.” It was quite a statement. The next day another child shared: “I try to be friends with kids in the neighborhood, but…” Most of us can fill in that statement from experience. The quote, “children can be cruel,” is common, (as if adults are not cruel), but the comments got me thinking.

People are often the source of our greatest joy and purpose in life. A sibling, friend, parent, or child can be the brightest light in this dark world for many of us.  Conversely, there is probably nothing we fear and hate as much as other people. Things don’t bother us. People do. Whether individuals or collective groups - they are what’s wrong with the world.

Often the people we choose to coexist with are similar to us in some fashion, and there are even unspoken rules about the differences we must tolerate. When we find ourselves for prolonged periods of time in close proximity to people who are different from us, things often happen. Sin, resident in us, separates us from God, and from one another.

I have been enjoying the TV series “The Chosen” which focuses on the band of men and women chosen to follow Jesus. What the series does well is play out the potential tensions among those individuals who want to be with Jesus, but don’t necessarily want to be with each other. Their diverse personalities, backgrounds, and beliefs provide a fertile ground for animosity and conflict… similar to us.

And yet God seems intent on bringing together very different people. It is a notable characteristic of the early church:

Now there were in the church at Antioch prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen a lifelong friend of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. - Acts 13:1

And whether it was the neglect of the Hellenistic widows or the inclusion of the Gentiles, people were the biggest problems of the early church. This theme is repeated in many of Paul’s letters:

Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all. - Colossians 3:11

So what is God doing?

I found myself saying to the second child: “People are weak and mean. It takes Jesus to make them powerful and kind.” Paul said it better:

For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility… For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father… In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. - Ephesians 2:14,18,22

I drew out the first individual and learned that in the midst of drama and rising tensions they chose to retreat to their room. I considered and shared, “When that happens to me, I find it helpful to pray. Not only does it help others, it’s good to have someone to talk to.”

The first wall of hostility is the one in my own heart.

Jesus’ prayer will be answered:

…that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. - John 17:21

Let’s pray this with Jesus, whether by ourselves in our rooms, or even better, with our brothers and sisters in Christ.