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Is everything Win or Lose?

Jenn and I took several sessions in martial counseling several years ago. It was in a time when I was transitioning out of a church into a seminary. We were worried that the stress could put problems into our marriage and open up conflict. With that knowledge we decided to go to marital counseling on order to strengthen our communication within our marriage among other issues. The times that we went were alright, besides the rather lame exercises we were told to do. But something arose out of it. MY COMPETITIVE NATURE. Your thinking that counseling is not a win or lose exercises, apparently you are not in my head. I often joked who would win or lose in the session. Did I look better than her or was she the better one in that session. I even joked that if I began to lose, I would use the scorched earth policy, which means that I would foul the waters so bad, no one would look good. “If I was going down, so was everyone else”. Needless to say this idea did not sit well with my wife.

As I was thinking of this tonight, I was thinking of the church. That we often look at many philosophies, ideas, or ministries as win or lose. And if we start to lose, everyone is going down with me. As I reflect on the previous couple of weeks it saddens me as individual churches and organizations square off against one another in attempt to get their point of view across. We do not need to live in a win or lose world on issues within our denomination, but most of all we do not need to create an atmosphere that is uninhabitable for everyone. Often we forget some of our theology, that has been in my head lately. The Kingdom of God is here but the full realization of it has yet to come. We, the church are the current embodiment the Kingdom, until Christ comes in full glory. Please do not destroy it.