Inside, the people were all shouting, some one thing and some another. Everything was in confusion. In fact, most of them didn’t even know why they were there. (Acts 19:32)Everybody is angry. One group is arguing with another group and there are fights that break out. The only real problem is that nobody knows exactly what they are fighting about.
Bar fights are like that. Somebody gets mad at somebody else and a fight breaks out for no real reason.
Politics is like that too. Sometimes people are arguing with each other and really don’t have any idea why.
Church is sure like that. People get ideas in their minds that are not necessarily based on reality and before long there are opposing camps. If somebody were to be able to stand athwart the whole group and say Stop! What are you fighting for? Chances are nobody would really be able to articulate a good reason.
Two sisters in a church get in an argument and become angry with each other. Since the argument has to be over something doctrinal to make it holy, they drum up some hare-brained reason. The church divides down the middle into two camps and before long, the church splits.
A year later, the two sisters are having lunch and one asks the other, What was it we were fighting about? The other says, I don’t remember. Oh, well.
But the church has been hurt and the people holding to the cause of Jesus look stupid.
It is amazing how often things come in my email and those who are sending them do not really understand what they are sending. Someone else that they liked told them it was important so they send it off and are ready to fight for it. But they don’t really understand what they are fighting over.
It may be something as small as an interpretation of a Greek phrase, or a small point of philosophy. But it has become, although vague in their own minds, important enough to fight over and to split the church over.
In Acts 19, they were ready to kill a guy but really didn’t know why. They had gotten worked up in that way that mobs do, but didn’t understand why they were there in the first place. Most didn’t even know who the guy was.
Before you go off on some tangent, understand what the tangent is. Before you get ready to fight, understand what you are fighting about. Some things are not worth fighting over when you get to looking at what is happening underneath or who is behind them.
The things that are worth fighting for, engage in those. Just make sure in your own mind that you know what you are doing.
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