I have been among you all this year, sinning as one who does not know the Lord.
I have been angry, and I have been unrepentant in it.
I have been unforgiving, and have not asked for the grace to forgive.
I have kept secrets and refused to trust, and have lived as one enslaved and in bondage to fear and darkness.
There has been no discipleship for me, nothing in me that would seek counsel as I have sat in my pit and watched its dark, moist walls close in upon me.
How many times do we find ourselves in a place of desperation, deep in a pit of despair, and as we seek a way out of the depths, we look at the dank walls which enclose us. We examine the walls for handholds and footholds, seeking a place where we can grab hold and begin to climb out. Sometimes we can begin to hoist ourselves up, but our climb only lasts until we realise that the walls are far too slippery and steep and that our strength is far too feeble to accomplish the deed. And so we sink back down to the bottom of our pit. Down into the puddles and the dampness and the cloying, rotten, chill and hopelessness of that which we’re trying to escape. And as we get more and more desperate, we begin to forget that we cannot climb out, and we scrutinize the walls more closely. And where there are no handholds, we try to make our own, sometimes clawing at the walls, breaking fingernails and bloodying fingertips, tearing sobs from our throats at the hopelessness or our own situation. Ever scrutinizing the walls, ever dwelling on the floor of the pit into which we have sunk.
And we forget that we do not find the way out of the pit by looking at the walls, but by looking up into the light. Sometimes it’s only when I take my own eyes off of the walls of my pit and the stinking floor on which I’ve been living and look up at the opening, the true way out, that I realise my Lord has been reaching His hand down for me the whole time, offering me a way out which would have cost me so much less pain and heartache.
So now I have taken His hand and am finding my way back out into the light. But in that, there are consequences that I must deal with, for I have been wrong in this place where I’ve been dwelling. I have been wrong and I have wronged others. Perhaps that’s what this is all about – learning how to deal with failure.
Or maybe, more to the point, learning how to fail without being a failure.
Now at the same time, I must be honest. There are those among my peers – those whom I care for deeply – whom I must call to task. And I do it because I care for you. I do it because I want to grow in Christ and have been hindered during this time because of things you have done. I do it because I want you to be able to grow in Christ and to know that the things that you do and say – by virtue of freedom and liberty – have a greater range of effect than ever you may know. I have searched myself in this matter and want you to know that I have not been without fault – perhaps you may never realise the depth of my sorrow over the sin that I have dwelt in in my own silence. It has not been forbearance that I have practiced. It has been the worst type of hypocrisy.
So now I will just say that you cause me to stumble. You are free to do things that I am not free to do. You are free to go to places that I cannot go. Every time you go there and leave me behind, try though I might, pray for the grace to forebear though I do, I stumble. I want to go with you, but I cannot. You see, God has delivered me from the very things that you do. To me they are a doorway to a Hell that I do not ever want to live in again. One that I do not even want to peek into.
I do not judge you for what you do – I cannot be the one to do this. I have fallen before, even since I have been a believer. But I cannot approve of the things that you do, and I cannot go to the places you go. When you do them, and when you go there, you look no different from the world. I know. I have both been in the world and of the world.
I beg of you, as ministry-minded Christians, to think very carefully of what you are doing. I know that you are free in Christ to do what you do. But I beg of you, I plead with you not to cause me to stumble. You know who I am. But how many more of me might there be on this campus who are afraid to tell you that you are causing them to stumble? Afraid even as I have been afraid to tell you all year.
I love you all so dearly. So dearly that it nearly breaks my heart to write this and feel that you may not like to hear it from me, that it may even anger you or cause hurt feelings. But I cannot keep from writing it. Please, please help me not to stumble any more. Please don’t leave me behind any longer.
For through your knowledge he who is weak is ruined, the brother for whose sake Christ died. And so, by sinning against the brethren and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if food causes my brother to stumble, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause my brother to stumble... All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things edify. Let no one seek his own good, but that of his neighbor.
(1 Corinthians 8:11-13, 10:23)
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