On Facebook Conversations, Respect, and Doing Good

It’s Sunday morning. My kids are away this weekend, so the only noise that woke me today was my dog, Alaska. She scratched on my door asking to be let out. I worked my way downstairs, and made a cup of coffee, only to go back to bed with my journal. I’m pondering and praying.

Yesterday, I wrote a Facebook post that opened a conversation, a passionate one, but over the top respectful, at least for the most part. I’m realizing as I enter the final year of my thirties, how much I appreciate and value respect. It’s become one of my core values.

I value courage, I value honesty, and it turns out respect is almost as important to me as the first two. Kindness is a close fourth, but perhaps kindness is inextricably linked to respect.

As a child, my mother valued respect, so did my dad. My mom would turn on me in a blink with the reminder, “I am your mother. You will respect me.” I now say the same words to my own children. They, along with myself, must intuitively understand the word respect because whenever my mom said it, I knew exactly what she meant. It had something to do with honor. In my case, I was respecting her position, her care for me, and I was not permitted to show disdain, or communicate in a condescending manner. For both my parents, it was not only what we said, but how we said it that mattered.

I was always permitted honesty, and encouraged to share my heart, even about my mother’s mistakes. She was quick to apologize and make amends. But respect was expected. Always.

I’ve written here and there about my mother’s mother, my Granny, in past blogs. I suspect this respect thing is one of her legacies. Granny was a small woman, hardly 5 ft. tall. She carried herself as a dignified lady, and expected people to treat her as one. As a result, she never seemed small in stature, but tall and strong. Her approach to prayer, the respect she used when talking to God, is likely one of the reasons I’m a Christian today. It’s hard to talk to someone you don’t believe in with the sort of respect she used in her prayer life.

Speaking of faith, one of the reasons Christianity attracted me as a faith, had to do with the way Jesus is portrayed in the Bible. Jesus had a canny way of speaking truthfully to people, but always with great respect for their humanity, especially, for those the society marked as unimportant and cast-offs. To those who were untouchable, he touched. To those who were sick, he healed.  To those who needed answers, he suggested they first learn to follow him and the answers would be discovered in community.

Real honest love begins with valuing a person. Always. Not simply for what they do, but primarily for who they are. 

The Sermon on the Mount is extreme, actually. We are to bless those who curse us, turn the other cheek, and walk the extra mile – all in the name of Christian charity. We are to lend to the one who asks, and above all we are to pray for our enemies. It’s Christian ethics 101 and it’s absolutely challenging.

How do we, in this political climate, in the society in which we live right now, walk out The Sermon on the Mount? How do we speak up without becoming angry people? How do we stand up for what we believe in without sounding condescending to those who oppose us?

There is a way.

When one reads the words of this sermon it can be overwhelming, but when one studies the life of Jesus, that sermon becomes astonishing and so very winsome.

Forgiveness and love and respect lay at the heart of it all …

We are all so very tired. So exhausted. I am weary of sexist men treating women like objects. I’m so weary, I almost feel like throwing in the towel. And my country is divided straight down the middle. It’s getting downright hostile.

I pray. I ponder…

For two and half years, right out of high school, I lived on a ship and sailed around the world. On board this ship, lived 200 individuals from over forty countries, of all sorts of Christian denominations, from exuberant pentecostals, to the most conservative Mennonites.

One of the things I loved about life in this international community were the discussions we shared around the tables at meal times. We bantered, we debated, we discussed. And then, in the morning, we woke up and went on our way to do the work we were called to do. Our common cause was our faith. Our devotion was to walk out and practice the ways of Jesus. Our community was built and cultivated on respect and love for our neighbor. (Not perfectly, mind you. The ship was not a Utopia.)

The revolutionary thing about Jesus is that when people make practicing his ways their highest aim, Jesus has the capacity to unite the strangest people. The weak, the poor, the wounded, and the foreigner somehow manage to come together and build friendships with the strong, and powerful. Against all odds. 

In Galatians, Paul reminds his readers not to grow weary in doing good. Doing good. 

We go on Facebook and banter, discuss, and say things we think need to be said. I believe this is absolutely vital and good for us as a society, whether we do it on Facebook or around our kitchen tables, we need to do it. We must be thinking people who talk about what we believe, and grow and change and collaborate thoughtfully with our friends and neighbors. 

However, we must not let those Facebook conversations overwhelm us. We must get up in the morning and go about our way doing good … loving our neighbor, listening to the downtrodden and tired, lifting up those who are laid low, and building communities rooted and established in respect for all. 

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