Last week, I spent some time with a young man that our team
is discipling. Amissi has consistently
shown maturity and promise.
Unfortunately, though, over the past few months, another church leader
has caused him (and us) a lot of pain.
As we bumped along the dirt road together, Amissi and I talked about the
different ways he could respond. This
was his conclusion: "Some people are telling me that I should come to
terms with the fact that this man is just always going to treat me that way. They say I should just keep working with him,
ignoring the problem. Others are saying,
though, that it may be time for me to distance myself from him and treat him
like an unbeliever...But, I can't do either of those things. He is my brother in Christ - I must be
reconciled to him."
I appreciate so much that Amissi is committed to doing the
hard work of reconciliation. And I
carefully expressed to him that while his goal is a worthy one, at some point
he may need to let go of the possibility of real reconciliation if this other
leader is unwilling to do the 'dance of reconciliation" with him. But, I tried hard to emphasize that his
spirit reminded me of Jesus' promise that those who hunger and thirst for
righteousness will be filled. His desire
for true fellowship is a good and a worthy goal. While it would be easier to follow his
friends advice and either abandon the relationship or accept a counterfeit
reconciliation, Amissi is rejecting those poor substitutes for peace and holding
out for genuine trust and cooperation.
The truth is that Amissi, Gamito and others are in a
complicated, life-draining situation that has dragged on and is distracting the
whole church from being a light in the community. These two men feel that strain and deeply long
for resolution. So, as I've been praying
and thinking about this scenario, I've asked God why this leadership problem
continues to persist.
Why doesn't God just help us resolve it so we can more on?
What I've begun to realize is that by not taking shortcuts,
Amissi and Gamito are being more fully formed into disciples of Jesus. All this time of struggling and wrestling to figure
out how to live in community is maturing them.
I don't know how well I expressed it or how it made them feel, but I tried
to share my hunch with Amissi that it seems that God is using their difficult
situation to prepare and refine them into better agents of the Kingdom for
further service here in this life as well as preparing them for the age to
come.
In his book, The Idolatry
of God, Peter Rollins introduces the concept of the MacGuffin and describes
its use in the film industry this way:
"Hollywood has made billions of dollars playing into this human experience of the gap, providing myths in which the lost object we believe will make us whole is finally gained. Film theorists call this lost object the MacGuffin, a term popularized by Alfred Hitchcock in the 1930s. The MacGuffin is a name that is given to whatever object helps drive the narrative forward, providing the necessary tension to keep an audience interested. The MacGuffin is that X for which some or all of the main characters are willing to sacrifice everything. In this way the object they seek is more than something they want in order to make their lives a little better; it is something that evokes in them an obsessive form of desire. The object might take the form of money, fame, victory, power, a man, or a woman. The point is not what actually fills the role of the MacGuffin, but that there is something that has that role, something that people want in an excessive way. It is the object for which everything will be sacrificed, the object that seems to promise fulfillment, satisfaction, and lasting pleasure." (p. 17)"In life we find ourselves pursuing various MacGuffins - impotent things we falsely believe will make us whole. What we see in the structure of Hollywood movies is but a clear reflection of this structure. And just as Hollywood movies generally hide the importance of what we seek, so our dreams and fantasies do the same - ultimately covering over the fact that what we think will satisfy our souls is really powerless to do the same." (p. 19)
"What we see played out again and again is a situation in which the protagonist actually gets what he or she wants above all else - the kiss, the money, the bad guy, etc. However, we rarely see what happens after the hero grasps what is sought, for if we did, the impotence of the MacGuffin would be revealed and we would not get the feel-good fantasy of fulfillment that so much of popular cinema offers." (p. 34)
One obvious application of this concept to discipleship is
the need to identify MacGuffins (i.e. idols) that are keeping followers of
Jesus from their true quest and fulfillment in God. The painful truth is that humanity's longing
for meaning and purpose is so powerful that we will accept a counterfeit substitute
when a real one seems unavailable. While
in different cultures the specifics of those MacGuffins and the way they entrap
people may be different, their essence and power is still the same - these
false gods/ideals can cause us great harm.
(They can misshape our professional lives as well as our personal
lives. Let's be honest, mission work isn't
immune. It also has its share of potential
MacGuffins: holism, sustainability, publication,
efficiency, working alongside a "successful church-planting-movement"...
these are all good goals and potentially healthy pursuits, but they are not the
ultimate reality that will sustain us.)
Another potential MacGuffin in the life of a church, though,
maybe one we seldom consider, is that of "Artificial Peace." The process of real reconciliation is painful
and difficult. But, we must deal with
the termites chewing through the wood, otherwise slapping on a fresh coat of
paint only puts on a false front and serves to push our problems down the
road. Peeling back the thin layer of plastered-over-reconciliation
often reveals the emptiness beneath.
I am thankful that Amissi and others are willing to reject
the MacGuffin of insincere reconciliation and hold out for God's best. That's the quest that, no matter what the
results, should lead to a better end.
And along the way, rejecting that MacGuffin will help form him into a
person that fits the image of Jesus.
The good news of grace is that we are all offered mulligans
on our MacGuffins.
We have a chance to choose
anew the worthy quest we will devote ourselves to.
May we be a people who reject false substitutes both in our
personal lives and in our communities. May we chose to give ourselves to the One who
is real and life-giving.
Grace and Peace,
Alan
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