Sibling Rivalry

As a father of two boys which we intentionally had eighteen months apart (for some strange reason), I have had my fair share of experience with this topic.  Boys, by nature are, on a good day, always jockeying for position, seeing if they can outdo each other, looking for opportunities to distinguish themselves in some way to their mother and I.  To our dismay, on bad days they demonstrate some of the most disturbing of human behaviors.  Don’t get me wrong, they are great kids but they are just that kids, and by definition, immature in their relational and emotional development. 

When kids act immaturely it’s understandable.  When adults do so, it’s pretty ugly.  I know this from watching some of my own behavior. The problem of adults behaving badly has been going on from the beginning.  It’s appalling the amount of blood that’s been shed by people trying to get one up on someone else.  From early on the children of God have been engaging in sibling rivalry. The scriptures tell us of an instance between the first two brothers Cain and Able and the end result is murder.

We all have been in that place where we feel like someone else is making us look bad.  It may be nothing more than them doing something well that pushes our buttons, but regardless of the circumstances, sibling rivalry results in drama, pain, and ugly behavior.  I wish I had a dollar for every time that I sat my boys down and told them that I love them equally and that when one of them does something to hurt or make the other look bad that it hurts my heart. 

When it comes to the family of God things don’t get much better.  From the earliest days of Christianity, we see sibling rivalry rearing its’ ugly head.  The gospels tell a story of the disciples arguing amongst themselves about which of them was going to be the greatest in the kingdom.  In the presence of the Creator of the universe, whom they had witnessed raise the dead, heal the sick, and set those in bondage free, they are fighting over who is going to be Jesus’ right hand man.  Instead of making much of number one they are fighting to see who gets to be number two. 

I would like to say that 2000 years of church history would bring about more maturity on our part, but in my experience nothing could be further from the truth.  Unfortunately, sibling rivalry isn’t limited to relationships between individuals.  From the very time of Christ we see interactions like the one recorded in Mark, chapter nine.  Some of the disciples are telling Jesus that they had witnessed others doing good in His name, but they told them to stop it because they were not a part of “their group”.  Modern Christianity, at least the western style, is marked with division.  Whether Catholic or Protestant, Baptist,  Pentecostal, Methodist, Charismatic, or Lutheran, Christian organizations seem to feel the need to point out how they are different and therefore it is inferred, better, than those who do, or believe, otherwise.  One organization I have been involved with in the past has listed one of their beliefs as their “distinctive doctrine”.   Seems innocent enough but it basically means this where we get it right and everyone else gets it wrong.   Early on in my marriage, my wife and I discovered that both of us as children had either caught or been taught that if you were not part of our particular brand of Christianity, that chances are that you might not even make it to Heaven.  Well you might make it, but it would be some dumpy little corner of heaven that you would be relegated too.  Even between different local churches in most communities there seems to be a competition to see who can do this church thing best and therefore attract more of the Christians in a particular location to be a part of their particular organization.  I have a friend who is a local pastor and he shared a recent conversation with me.  One of the members of his worship team had asked to speak with him because he needed to let him know that he no longer was going to be a part of the church.  It seems that he had been recruited to play his instrument in the worship band at a church of over a thousand in the same town.  The larger church had actually sent someone to observe the man playing his instrument in the worship band at the smaller church to observe his talent and then recruited him to play in their worship band.  During my college years in a different city, I remember hearing frequent advertisements on a Christian Radio station for an up and coming new church talking about how they had the best children's ministry programs in the city.  While I’m not even able to judge my own motives accurately most of the time, it does seem logical that at least the subconscious motive for actions like these would be to get more people to attend your church so you can feel like you’re the best in a given community, or to improve the resumes of a particular leader, or at the worst, to bring more money into the church coffers for one reason or another.   

All of these things support my recent conclusion that much of Christianity has been made in our image, us-focused, consumer driven, and by doing so, understandably confusing to those who come to Christ, start attending a church, and see much of the world’s philosophies, attitudes, and policies on full display.  Don’t get me wrong I believe that the real church exists in every Christian congregation in the world.  That’s because the church is people, not doctrine, nor organizations, nor denominations or leadership structures.  We the people who are followers of Christ in relationship with God, via Christ’s sacrifice, we are the church.  

To all of this jockeying for position and competition for attenders, Jesus simply says, “He who wants to be the greatest must be the servant of all.”  In my opinion, we don’t see this demonstrated often enough.  The basis of the gospel requires all of us to lay aside our “right to be right” in exchange for doing what is in the best interest of others.  Oh, that we would stop fighting with and comparing ourselves to our brothers and sisters and start looking to serve them instead.  Check out Rediscover Hope inspirational sample.