In that upper room, where feet were washed and bread was broken, the words most remembered by those present were distilled into a new commandment: Love one another.
It’s pretty straight forward. There’s a second part, a refinement of the commandment: as I have loved you. This second portion frees us from putting our own spin on it. Whew!
It’s a delicate thing, being put in charge of your own body, especially if you think of it as a long-awaited privilege for our spirits. Thank goodness there’s that chunk of infantile forgetfulness freeing us from our old state. I feel like I’m presently in that ridiculous position of a fifth grader having to take the Presidential Fitness Test and there’s just no way my untrained arms are gonna pull me up in the rope climb. I sit at the perimeter of the gym, worn out from the sit-up challenge, and watch Joel Kreider zip to the top of the rope hanging from the gymnasium ceiling, tap the top, then slide down and slap his hands together like it was nothing at all. We convince each other, in our humanness, that the details are more important than they probably should be. Does the president really need to know how strong our bodies are, or is he trying to make a statement? To me, that Presidential Fitness Test in elementary school felt more like an opportunity to judge. “Let’s line everyone up and see who the weakest are.” Then let’s celebrate the strong ones.
For the past year we’ve been reading the New testament at our house. We’ve just started the last book of Revelations. Before that we had studied the Old Testament for a year. One of the most prominent differences I’ve noticed, between the two sets of scripture, is the gentleness of the new commandment. Love One Another incudes Judge Not. It’s a difficult thing in our competitive society to avoid judging. There’s a difference between making judgments to protect and preserve and judging a person’s character.
It’s been just about a year since His Honor, Judge Connors, retired from the bench. He’s back to working from the other side as an attorney. He also uses his skill and experience as a judge to mediate when people don’t want to go to court. If someone asks how he’s enjoying retirement I answer, “I don’t know.” While Dave is able to respectfully and responsibly make judgements in relation to upholding law, he is also able to withhold judgment in a beautiful way. Better than most. He’s the best non-judgy judge I know.
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| I like him. |
When I was young we attended Alanon meetings. These support groups for families of alcoholics were pivotal to our mental health. If we walked in late to an Ala-Teen circle, they spread the circle open and welcomed us in without skipping a beat. They were really glad to see us there. On the other hand, there were piercing eyes from some people when Afton Hansen walked into church late, her little brood of ducklings wagging our tails behind her.
For years I beat myself up for my own behavior. Even today, when I rose from bed and needed to visit the bathroom before I did anything else, I rushed to pull the sheets from our bed and strip the pillowcases from the pillows before I left the side of our bed. Why, you might ask, would you not go to the bathroom and then come back to strip the bed? The reason, however ridiculous it might sound to someone else, is that I worry that I’ll forget to get back to washing the sheets. That’s how scattered an ADHD brain can get. That’s why we walk past the random sock on the bedroom floor rather than picking it up. Breaking our train of thought is risky. That may be part of the reason ADHD people have a hard time being early for meetings. We have trained our brains to walk right to the very edge before something else gets in the way. In the quest to not be early and let anything interrupt, we end up not pacing ourselves well and being late. Trust me, we judge ourselves enough for the rest of the world, you don’t need to add your judgement. How about we take the attitude of a group of people trying to help themselves heal? How about we celebrate that an addicted person gets there, no matter how late, rather than letting himself get lost in a binge?
I read about a village in Africa where, when someone commits an offense or crime, they form a circle in the center of the village and bring the offender to the middle. Then, one by one, the members of the community remind the offender of his worth. They remind him, and each other, the good things they have done in the past, and the value of their soul to their community.
Jesus, Buddha, Allah, and most other leaders whose lives have triggered discipleship in others, all taught that we are not given the privilege of judging the worthiness of souls. Leave that to higher powers. Ours is to let go and let God. Ours is to encircle. Ours is to embrace and enfold. We eat broken bread with each other.
