Reconciliation

It’s February of 2018, and it is the middle of the winter Olympics.  Lindsey Vonn, the single most accomplished female alpine skier in American history, just won the bronze medal in downhill. Try as hard as she could to act pleased and excited, she could not hide her disappointment. For her, the bronze medal was chump change in comparison to gold.

There is a gold standard in restoring broken relationships, and it is almost always sold short, replaced by a cheap substitute. I dare say that most Christians, even most church leaders, have never ever experienced the process and rewards of pursuing reconciliation, all the way through to the finish line. That is why most Christians don’t even know the difference between reconciliation and the cheap substitute, resolution. Reconciliation is like gold. “Resolving the issue” should be reserved for technical concerns. When applied to mending broken relationships, resolution is worth ten cents – one thin dime – and that won’t even buy you a cup of coffee anymore.

I was in a recent meeting between elders of a church and a man who had been dismissed from his position in the church. After four months of letting the broken relationship fester, hoping the man would just disappear without a whimper, one of the elders reached out to the man, saying, I want to get this issue resolved in the next week or two. At a second meeting he began the conversation asking the man what he was going to do to bring the issue to closure. Then he proceeded to say, “I don’t even know about reconciliation, if that’s the right word… if that’s what we are looking for.” To those elders, reconciliation was chump change, whereas resolving the issue, making it go away, was worth everything.

Resolving an issue, relationally, usually involves arbitration of some sort, each side caving in to the other, and coming up with a workable, acceptable stalemate. In church politics it usually involves dealing with a church member behind closed doors, then expecting them to pack their bags and head down the road.  In marriage, resolution usually ends up in divorce, with a court order dividing the assets and determining child custody.

What is involved in reconciliation? For God, the high cost of reconciliation was the hideous, unmerited death of his only Son. That humble, sacrificial act of redeeming love on the part of Jesus reconciled the repentant sinner to our holy and loving God (Rom 5:10-11). Reconciliation does not come cheap, my friend. There is a high cost, but the rewards are like gold.

Reconciliation involves so much more than surface resolution. It goes deep, to the very core of spirit and soul, bringing healing and renewed trust like nothing else can accomplish. Each side must work hard to get to the bottom of the issue, to understand all offenses, otherwise the necessary repentance and forgiveness are baseless. Authenticity, honesty, humility, transparency, and true love are the underpinnings of real reconciliation. That is why resolution is so readily accepted in its place. Very few Christians want to be real and go deep. Everything is kept on the surface, posturing, and protecting our positions and reputations at all cost.

Reconciliation is true restoration, in what ever form that may take. That gold medal can only be won with true repentance, uncharted humility, deep forgiveness, and restored trust.  It cannot happen by putting a dime in the vending machine.

“First go and be reconciled to your brother, then come and offer your gift.” (Mt 5:24)