This is a sort of rambling look-back at the last two years and an encouragement for Christians to pause and reconsider outside of their circumstances and by looking at the broader picture. This look-back begins early in 2020, when society underwent a change akin to a pressure cooker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For those who don\u2019t know, a pressure cooker<\/a> is a sealed pot that uses pressurized steam forcing food to cook faster. It\u2019s great because the elements in the pot are all forced to cook together to create something that is a unique blend of the different flavors. Thing is, too much pressure and the pot can cause catastrophic damage. It\u2019s so much pressure that you have to slowly release the steam so that you can manually open the pot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That happened to all of us in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n There was (and while I\u2019m writing this in 2021, there still is) a global pandemic of a novel coronavirus strain that seemed to originate in China (then thought to be pneumonia<\/a>) and quickly spread to the rest of the world. To prevent the spread, there were closures of business, shutting down of travel, shutting down of in-person work and school, daily reporting of rising numbers of death, and parents now working from home while managing their children. No one got a break from one another and, even if this or that individual was afraid, they were surrounded by a cloud of fear, opinions, and pseudo-science.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the United States, it was also a presidential election year. The health crisis was politicized, party lines were deeply drawn, and positions that in the past were avoided as the basis of impolite conversation, became table stakes in the non-personalized, disembodied halls of social media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fellow Christians helped one another trying to encourage one another but few were ready. Overnight, people who were used to meeting together and navigating each other\u2019s foibles, were completely disconnected leaving non-expert pastors and elders and deacons trying to figure out how to leverage their internet connection to help.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Add to these ingredients the further centralization and mass adoption of the psychological human. The topic of identity was already big in regard to race and then gender, but it became a pressurized ingredient with everything else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Individuals, who were close to all of this, didn\u2019t look at this from a macro-perspective. They each saw their own situation is unique and, though it was, it all had a similar shape. Police officers and medical staff, all first responders who had to continue working through this, were navigating a situation that no one in the world was equipped to navigate since the last time something like this had happened was a hundred years ago and the world was nowhere near as psychologically connected as it is today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In public, police shootings, public outrage, social media abuzz with hashtags like #BlackLivesMatter, and political flames stoked by a President who used the bully pulpit in unwise and dangerous ways eventually leading up to the storming of the United States Capitol. At home, increased forms of abuse, depression, stress, fear, and a redoubling in sins that are within reach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In all of this, no matter what platitudes my fellow brothers and sisters could offer one another, we were all embroiled in all of it and we atomized our perspectives. No matter the number of times one would waive away the concerns, it was essentially part of the air we breathed and did not realize that we had parsed it all down to our own individual level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2021, these pressures, amidst loosened restrictions and new opportunities to work further from jobs, were part of the motivators of the great resignation<\/a>. In the workplace, some left their jobs in 2020, others just couldn\u2019t work at all and were supported by delayed payouts, but 2021 we saw an explosion of people leaving workplaces to go to other jobs. Low wages were seen for what they were: unimportant in light of greater things. Jobs that allowed the flexibility for a person to stay safe at home and were willing to pay for the needed talent of a now greatly increased digital marketplace grew. While the hospitality industry suffered, especially in restaurants who are almost begging for table waiting staff, other industries saw a dramatic need and uptick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2021, it got to the point that people were willing to take on debt while searching for a new job than continue in the conditions before the pandemic. Identity and mental wellness had long joined forces but now was united through the pandemic pressure cooker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This same thing was also happening with local churches.<\/a> 2020 was the year of explosive church splits and 2021 is turning out to be the year of the church resignation where people, be it leadership<\/a> or lay people, simply change their place of gathering and, sometimes, with no intention of actually committing to the church gathering or the perceived weak leadership<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Individuals saw their situation has unique but, the truth is, everyone had reasons<\/a>. The problem is that no one paused to look around and see that everyone had reasons at the same time. That should\u2019ve given everyone pause that, whatever individually is going on, maybe, just maybe, we\u2019re being affected by what is occurring at the macro level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It wasn\u2019t to be helped. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Protestants, who didn\u2019t have a proper understanding of the necessity of the physical, and maybe more than anyone, didn\u2019t even realize how missing facial expressions (or other non-verbal-yet-physical clues) are critical for human communication and relationships, snapped. Church goers, even in the frigid North East, who were uncomfortable with everything from handshakes to hugs, didn\u2019t realize that the non-human touch of a non-family member helped relationships. This wasn\u2019t helped by everyone leveraging the necessary tool of a face mask to prevent spreading of the virus. This wasn\u2019t helped by church leaders working to the point of complete exhaustion. This wasn\u2019t helped by weeks of disconnectedness inflating past issues to the point of incompatibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The BBC, in end of 2021, reported a spike of divorces and breakups<\/a>. The closest of relationships underwent such strain that these couples couldn\u2019t maintain unity: they had had enough. Time will tell if the same occurred in other countries. No fault divorce<\/a>, of course, leaves this as an easy option. Likewise, In June 2020, Lifeway reported<\/a> that one of the top pressure points for local churches was maintaining unity. It was a late warning indicator during a time that churches were starting to open again. The damage had been done and people hadn\u2019t really dealt with what was going on. Instead, leveraging the individualistic language of identity and mental health, and the tools of virtually meeting anywhere, many Christians were already referring to their own church gatherings\u2014that they hadn\u2019t had in a few months, basically 16 Sundays\u2014as oppressive, abusive, uncaring, or toxic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I find it telling that when Paul wrote the church at Corinth (you know, the messed-up church with divisions, idolatry, prostitution, people getting drunk at the Lord\u2019s supper, outright chaos during gatherings, and extreme power plays) not once did he tell the people to start a new church or find another church. He expected them to meet. The one time he comes close to telling them to stay home is regarding the Lord\u2019s Supper. He tells them that their meeting does more harm than good and that when they are coming together it\u2019s not for the Lord\u2019s Supper but for something else. Yet, instead of telling them to give up on being a church, he tells them to have their meals at home then come together to take part of the Lord\u2019s Supper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Thessalonians, formed after two-weeks of ministry, Paul checks up on them to make sure they\u2019re still meeting. The Galatians, being infiltrated by a crowd of people who are polluting the message that Christ also came to save Gentiles by grace through faith apart from works, Paul encourages to learn the Gospel again and to bear one another\u2019s burdens. Jesus sends letters to several churches through his intermediary, John. He never tells any of the people in those churches to go meet elsewhere. Instead, he issues a corporate praise and warning. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There were no other churches around. Nor was that an option. These people, of all types of different cultures, sometimes as wide as historically pantheon believing pagans and monotheistic Jews, had to figure out that they were one unified people of God and deal with all of the interpersonal and doctrinal issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I used to joke about the color of the carpets or if men wore ties as reasons for splits, but now, Christians have justified church splits and made it a moral high ground. Something Scripture speaks directly against. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I purposefully used the term Protestant above. Do recall, that the reformation was primarily an attempt to reform the church. That reform had to do with the fact that the church seemed to have abandoned Scripture in her other pursuits. Reformation is good but what must be careful about making every topic a die-on-the-hill issue that necessitates separation. <\/p>\n\n\n\nChristians in the Broader Pressures in Culture<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Individual Christians Drinking In Pressures Unaware<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Christians and the Pressures of the Resignation Culture<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Christians Ignoring the Pressures that Breed Disunity<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Christians Never Encouraged to Split Churches<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Christians Reforming Churches<\/h2>\n\n\n\n