Anyone who knows me (or even anyone who has read some of my articles) knows that I have a weird relationship with my dad. It's not that we have a bad relationship... it's more like we don't know how to communicate with each other. We respect each other and love each other, we just don't know how to talk, or what we should talk about. When we do break into "real conversation" territory, we generally find that we disagree about the subject; sometimes passionately so. It's not groundbreaking for me to point out that communication is key in any type of relationship; hence, I have a weird relationship with my dad.
I didn't grow up in what I'd call a Christian home. Sure, both of my parents identified as Christians, but we never went to church together. Actually, my parents didn't start attending church regularly until I had moved out of the house and into my freshman dorm. Throughout my childhood and high school years, I attended a few different churches with relatives and friends, but the only memories I have of either of my parents attending were when I was baptized and a few Mother's Day Sundays.
So I was really surprised to find myself 1) listening to my Dad preach at a church our whole family now belongs to and 2) feeling very emotionally connected to him because of it. Beyond the surreal event that was witnessing my father stand behind a pulpit and teach the Bible for 45 minutes, was the thread of common ground we've been searching for. It's not that I expected myself to disagree with his sermon (dude knows his Bible; who am I to argue?) but I definitely didn't expect to agree as whole-heartedly with everything he said as I did. In short, his lesson both gave me insight to how my dad sees the world and how we might find common ground to better our relationship.
I should explain. Sunday night, Dad taught from the book of Jonah. It's a story that most people, whether you attend church or not, identify as a Christian or not, are probably familiar with. God wants Jonah to go preach in Nineveh. Jonah is not about it. Jonah ends up swallowed by a whale and goes to Nineveh anyway. It's simple stuff. Except Dad took that story everyone knows and blew my freaking mind with it. He told how wretched the people of Nineveh were, and the atrocities that occurred by their hands. He told how Jonah was defiant and didn't want to preach God's mercy and salvation to these people because he thought they didn't deserve to be saved from Hell. When Jonah eventually goes to the city, and everyone there converts and is saved, he's mad about it. He's angry and upset that a city full of people were saved, because in Jonah's mind, they don't deserve it. The lesson could have been tied up with a simple "it's not our place to judge others." And that would have been fine. But that wasn't the point Dad was there to make.
It was when he started talking about ISIS, and the truly horrible ways they torture and kill people, that I started thinking he was maybe a little off the rails with this lesson. He got a little bit graphic with those descriptions, and I wondered where he was taking us. Then he said, "What if someone who belonged to that organization asked us about the gospel? Would we want to tell them about it? Would we want to share God's love and mercy with them? Or would we be angry and judgmental?"
There were more examples of people who commit heinous crimes. Would we be happy to see them accept Christ, or angry that there is forgiveness for the terrible things they've done? All in all, it was a truly wonderful lesson, not just about Christian judgement but about the ways we, as Christians, are supposed to view the world and the people in it. And with that, I got a glimpse of how my dad views the world and the people in it. And now I think, maybe, we might have something to talk about.
