Divisions.

I sat at my computer and cried.
A while back a distant acquaintance of mine posted something to social media, claiming it was detestable, and I read it and, rather than thinking it detestable was so happy I said, "Praise the Lord!"
Some time later, still apparently in the throes of anger that had flared in them due to said post, they made a comment saying that if anyone did not feel their sentiments towards what they had posted that they could count their friendship over. Finito. Done-zo. They were not going to associate anymore with anyone who disagreed with them.

My heart sank.

That would mean me.

I was tempted to send them an email saying that, while I did agree with what they had posted, I would be heartbroken to know that some issue like THAT would make them want to cut off our relationship.
I reconsidered, wondered what the benefit of an email like that would be, suspecting that I would be fanning the flame of their in-vogue wrath all the more, once and for all sealing any kind of good standing or voice into their life I may ever have in the future.
I pronounced then to myself that if the relationship, indeed, was going to be fractured, that I would not be the one casting the final stone. If they wanted it broken, then they were going to have to be the one to break it.

Regardless, I still sat at my computer and cried.
I pondered the vehemence of their words. The frenzied fierceness I knew blazed in their eyes based on what I saw written in their typed words. How could it get to this, I queried.
We had grown up together in a sense. Family friends that lived a long ways away, we still would have the occasional summer weekend together at some middle point between the family homes, I always felt like we were on pretty good terms. Never would I have called us friends now, but never would I have called us enemies, either. When we were children we were closer, but then you know, when you don't live by each other, and when I spent my growing up years in a Believing home and they did not, a divide, no matter how amiable our childhood play times may have been, inevitably came. Somewhere along the way we spent that occassional summer weekend, even though in the same house, in isolation of each other. Our lives no longer overlapped and so our paths eventually stopped crossing.
We were always distant after that, something that grieved my heart both as a child when it first happened and now still, I realized, as an adult. But to be honest I hadn't thought much about it for a long time until I saw that post.

How had it gotten that far, I kept asking myself.
A few days later I was watching something, my mind still plagued by what had happened, and it brought to light the fact that sin divides. The devil wants nothing more than to separate people.

And he always uses sin, for what other tool does he have in his arsenal?

In the case of me and this acquaintance, I could see that our division came all those years ago due to this very thing. As a born-again Christian I was seeking different things from life than they were. I was trying desperately to run away from all of my sins, daily asking the Lord to bury them with him so that he might raise me to new life in him every day, and they did not self-nominate as knowing the Lord. It was the classic example of "The closer you get to Christ, the less like the world you become."
Our stances on sin, it seemed, had divided us.

Jesus talks about this very thing in Mark 3 where he says "If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand" (verse 25). Jesus is clearly pointing out that the enemy's Mode #1 for taking territory is Divide and Conquer; nothing with a sandy foundation can stand against the world, the flesh, and the devil's tempestuous winds (Matthew 7:26-27 & I John 2:15), and so we live in a world of broken, conquered people.

I think I was crying that day because I could see it. In those words on that screen I could see the fire that blazed out of hollow, broken eyes. This acquaintance of mine does not believe in the Lord of the Bible (their own admission, not mine), and therefore the only natural outcome of that can be that they don't know the peace he gives that is unlike anything else, the comfort from his love or the fellowship with his spirit that brings meaning to all our situations, the joy of knowing that all our days are written and are in his hands, and that he will make all things right and bring true justice to all.  If "The eye is the lamp of the body...." (Matthew 6:22) as Jesus says, then that day I could see into those blazing eyes, and there was nothing but emptiness behind the fire. Their words on the screen a plea with the world that they had a voice, too; that they did indeed have vindication, is what their desire was.
But it seems they are seeking those things from a world that cannot give it.

And so I wept. I wept over the path of destruction they are following in because it's the trendy path to follow these days. I wept for the emptiness I knew premeditated their biting words. I wept for a heart that did not yet know what it's like to be turned into beating flesh. I wept for their admission that they want no relationships in their life of people that don't agree with them; for the narrow world view that demands that.
And strangely, I wept for me, too. I know, I know, it sounds selfish.
But, and much as is the trend these days, their opinions are the norm. What they think is detestable I think is a "Praise the Lord," and what they think it a good feat for civilization breaks my heart because I believe the Bible says that it breaks His, too.
So in a way I was crying for myself, because I know that in the days ahead I will have fewer and fewer companions on my journey Home. I will have attacks on all sides. Not that I am surprised by this. The words of Jesus have always been true: "In this world you will have trouble, but take heart! For I have overcome the world," (John 16:33) and "Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn 'a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man's enemies will be the members of his own household.'" Jesus did not come to bring peace like they wanted (governmental peace that would overthrow the Romans); he brought a different peace. He knew that his words were divisive; what he asks of us some cannot give, much like the Rich Young Ruler who walked away because he could not accept what Jesus had said.
What Jesus has called his people to do has always been hard and it has always been divisive, in that it separates his chosen ones from the World (I Cor. 1:18). We are a people who do not serve two Masters (Luke 16:13) and therefore, we are alienated from the servants of the other master (Romans 6:15-23).
So I am not surprised by the events and trends of a post-modern culture. It just saddens me. If I didn't trust the Lord it would make me fearful; but I will choose to not be anxious. God is still God and he is still on his throne.

In a way it felt like they were persecuting me, even though of course they are unaware that they were. And it made me think about all those times in Acts where the disciples and apostles were flogged and imprisoned and beaten, and they always went away rejoicing that they could be persecuted for the name of Christ. I would hope that if a day like that were ever to come for me that I, too, would end in rejoicing, but I wonder about the other emotional response to persecution; the one I kind of felt like I was having. What about, like Stephen.....like Jesus.....when you look at your persecutors and those who agree with them and say, "Forgive them Lord, for the know not what the do"?

It must be both. Surely it must be both.

And so I encourage you, dear Wolfies, as you face trials of various kinds, do not let your hearts be troubled; but rather, in a spirit of thankfulness that you are a people approved by God and entrusted with the gospel (I Thess. 2:4) and will therefore suffer like him, give all your praise unto the Lord. And pray for your enemies. Or distant acquaintances. Or un-believing spouses. Or close relatives. Or wayward children. Or your sweet as a Georgia peach but still unregenerate neighbor: They know not what they do.