Saturday, March 22, 2008
Choosing despite
Just to share an ongoing story of petty politics from my army camp. It's just a minor issue but I feel it has relevance:Z (a person) has, for the past few weeks/months, allegedly been behaving in a self-centered, self-serving, and inconsiderate manner, and all this in an environment that demands social cohesion by the nature of circumstances in order to function. It naturally follows that in so doing, he has offended a number of people (persons A-H, and W, X and Y). Reactions follow:
A-H decide that enough is enough, and decide to form an informal anti-Z alliance. This alliance aims to shake Z up into improving by means such as excluding Z from conversations, boycotting him from social pursuits, and generally marginalising him.
Person W, allegedly arguably the most severely manipulated by Z, doesn't seem to realise he's being taken advantage of at all, and gladly allows himself to be manipulated and gives Z whatever he asks. A-H observe this and take it upon themselves to 'defend' W from manipulation, adding it to the raison(s)-de-etre of the anti-Z alliance. They invite W, X and Y to join in the alliance.
W adopts a laissez-faire poise and refuses to commit.
X and Y feel uncomfotable about the whole issue and decide to hold a private discussion with A. After which, A decides to leave the anti-Z alliance and form an anti-'anti-whatever' alliance with X and Y, and that choosing to love people difficult to love is perhaps one of the highest callings as children of God.
In the above scenario, half of A-H, including A, and W, X and Y are Christians. I'm X, and myself and Y swayed A with the extract that:
'God uses the opposite situation of each fruit to allow us a choice. You can't claim to be good if you've never been tempted to be bad. You can't clain to be faithful if you've never had the opportunity to be unfaithful. Integrity is built by defeating the temptation to be dishonest; humility grows when we refuse to be prideful; and endurance develops every time you reject the temptation to give up. Every time you defeat a temptation, you become more like Jesus!'
- 'The Purpose Driven Life', Chapter 26: Growing through Temptation
We all fight battles within ourselves. When marginalised, the natural tendency is often to be vengeful, to fight fire with fire, which can lead to attempting to right wrongs with further wrongs. A admits to having lost the battle here, and to having seriously believed that joining the anti-Z alliance was the only way to go. The 3 of us, A, X, and Y, have since concluded that W has been most examplary in this scenario, having turned the other cheek when slapped on one, and having no loss of charity and innocence in the process. W has won his battle hands down, and in gaming terms, 'own'-ed the temptation to be vengeful.
The 3 of us believe that, with W, we can reason out with B-H individually, and with Z, in the coming week and resolve the entire issue amicably.
The larger battle may be won here already, but the war can only be won if all of us make the conscious choice to do what's right constantly, even, even when it's most difficult to do so.
God bless and regards
Charles
i posted this at 2:54 AM
and i have received 1 comments.
i knew it was charles when i saw the words army and laissez-faire!
janet
By 
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April 7, 2008 at 2:01 AM