Sharing

I'm not sure if I should publish this post. But here goes. It's not aimed at anyone in particular or with the intention of making anyone feel uncomfortable. It's just a metaphor for how I feel sometimes.

Imagine that you have discovered something- a piece of information, perhaps, or a book or a film or a place or an experience, which has made a big impact on you. You think it's amazing, and has made a difference to your life (OK that sounds like a big claim, but just imagine).

So naturally you want to tell your friends about this amazing thing. You try to talk to them about it and the effect it's had on you- maybe that's hard, but you try. Or you invite them to somewhere they can see or read it for themselves.

And they generally respond in one of three ways. Most often they're just not interested. They think it's nice that you like it, but it's not for them, it's not their cup of tea. Perhaps they can't understand what you see in it, they think you're a bit strange. Perhaps they're cynical about something that has those kind of effects.

Or they are interested, but they don't do anything about it, for any number of valid reasons. Perhaps they have too much on, or can't access it, or just don't feel they can cope. But for one reason or another it passes them by and they loose interest.

Or perhaps they take offence at what you're saying. They think that you feel that you're better than they are because of what you've seen, or read, or been to. They get annoyed, refuse to listen. Perhaps they treat you with suspicion, thinking you've been brainwashed.

So perhaps you give up for a while. But you can't keep quiet for long about something that's such a big part of your life, and some time later you try again to interest your friends in whatever it is you're so enthusiastic about. But you get a similar response. It's difficult, because you don't want to annoy your friends by harping on about something they don't care about, because you know that'll only put them off more. But this thing is really important to you, and you want to share it with your friends, so you keep trying, without much success. No one does anything about it; despite all your invitations, nobody comes.

This hurts. When you care deeply about something and, because of your love for your friends, you want them to understand and recognise that thing to be real, but they don't, it saddens you.

Some people react in an even worse way. They accuse you and people like you of being not just wrong, but acting in a way that is evil. They say you are trying to drag people into a dangerous cult, a group that destroys people by taking away their capacity for rational thought or freedom to do as they please. They think you should be stopped from talking about this thing that to you is so wonderful and liberating that you want everyone to know about it. They think that it is harmful, and that you are either sadly misguided or trying to harm other people mentally or even physically. Because some of the people who claim to agree with you have acted in ways that are wrong, they think you are all tarred with the same brush and lack credibility.

This hurts even more. Especially when you can see that your friends are more willing to accept this negative view of what you believe than they are to accept what you say about it.

Perhaps I shouldn't be so surprised. In the parable of the sower Jesus describes the different responses people would make to the message that he brought, a message of God's love for all humanity and of restoration for the world. Sometimes people would hear the message, but not understand, and it would just pass them by. Sometimes people would listen to the message, but not put down deep enough 'roots' to allow them to cope when tough times come. Sometimes people would listen to the message, but other things going on in their lives would drown it out and distract them from doing anything about it.

But sometimes people would listen, and would take the message of God's love on board and believe, going on to spread the 'seeds' of the message to many other people. I suppose the right response in the light of this is just to try and deal with the hurt- not to ignore it, because it can lead to prayer and crying out to God for my friends, which is a good thing- and not to give up. Because some of these 'seeds' will, I hope, be like the ones that fell on the good soil, and will be fruitful in their turn. I hope.