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All you want to do is something good

I suppose every church has this little fringe of dysfunctional people who sort of hang around the edges and try to get what they need and get really mad when they don't get it. It isn't like the people who just want food or money and will tell you what they need; these are the people who think we're obligated to be nice to them no matter how they behave.

Most of the time, it's a phone-based relationship for me, because they don't actually come to church all that often, they just call and want me to listen to them. The first call is usually ok, but then it works out that I don't give enough, and then they start getting angry on the subsequent calls. I just got bitched out by someone who didn't think I was responding to her appropriately when she started listing what was wrong with her life and the inadequacy of the church's response to that.

I put her on hold when another call came in, because one of the things that actually IS my job is to answer the phone here. So she hung up and called back on another line.

Clearly, this is going to have to be a big part of my formation over the next three years, because it pushes every single one of my buttons. Right now, I'm pissed off, while also feeling totally inadequate because part of me actually thinks I should have been able to do something for her.

The hardest thing for me to grasp is that the church can't fix everybody. We can't. We're not in the business of fixing, of propping things up so you can make it another day and keep doing the same old stuff. You want to be totally changed, we can do that, but it's gonna hurt and you have to be on board for it. We can't just make your kids call more often, or make your marriage better, or give you peace with a wave of the hand. Those things might happen eventually, but we can't just hand them out like candy.

It would be cool if that's what I was called to be, like one of Santa's favorite elves. But it's not. I'm called to...well, I'm not really sure, but I think part of it is that I have to point to God and to Jesus and say, look, here's the way to go. It's not always the easiest, and you're really going to hate it at least a couple of times, but you don't have to go alone. Here's your cross, let's go.

TheRev puts this as, it's not our job to be nice, it's our job to be good, and I think I'm going to get that as a tattoo. On my forehead. Backwards, so it's there when I look in the mirror.
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