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The Dorian
Gray Complex
by Nosafehavenr |
There
are six things the Lord hates,
seven
that are detestable to him:
haughty
eyes,
a
lying tongue,
hands
that shed innocent blood,
a
heart that devises wicked schemes,
feet
that are quick to rush into evil,
a
false witness who pours out lies,
and
a person who stirs up conflict in the community.
Proverbs
informs us that a person who stirs up conflict in the community is
detestable to God. I am well aware that we often limit “community”
to “the church.” But it also has wider application. Let us think
of some troublemakers of note: Jesus was – his crucifixion was
testimony to that, and more recently we have Gandhi and Martin Luther
King – all can be seen as having stirred up conflict for a good
cause. Yet I would like to make a distinction between calls to
conscience and calls to conflict. I think in the heart of all three
mentioned was goodwill and love of enemy. In fact, they probably
would be reluctant to call their opposition “the enemy”– but
rather their real enemy was aspects of human nature that even they
were vulnerable to (could be tempted by). The common denominator
between the three examples was a determination not to return evil for
evil but rather to return in its place forgiveness and love—freeing
from hatred even those filled with it. If the opposition had shown
forgiveness and love there would have been no need for violent
conflict in the public square. Those who were responsible for
stirring up conflict were those out to harm rather than to heal. The
key thing done by these peacemakers was to throw light on existing
abuse. Since hatred cannot abide light, controversy is
inevitable....but the sources of light are neither the source nor
cause of the conflict.
I
think we have all witnessed people at one time or another
who were not happy unless a war was going on. Their primary objective
seemed to be to lift up, ignite, and inflame passions for its own
sake as sort of a sensational indulgence – much like a troubled
youth instigating a dogfight. I think it’s safe to say if we could
get a close-up of such an instigator’s face, there would be a
perverse delight arising from destructive hatred present–a meanness
expressed with a luridly gleeful anticipation of bloodletting—in
its finality a worship of death's disintegration itself. This I
think is what is detestable to God.
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