Daily Lesson for June 26, 2019

Today’s Daily Lesson comes from Acts chapter 6 verses 1 through 7:

Now during those days, when the disciples were increasing in number, the Hellenists complained against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution of food. 2And the twelve called together the whole community of the disciples and said, ‘It is not right that we should neglect the word of God in order to wait at tables. 3Therefore, friends, select from among yourselves seven men of good standing, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we may appoint to this task, 4while we, for our part, will devote ourselves to prayer and to serving the word.’5What they said pleased the whole community, and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit, together with Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolaus, a proselyte of Antioch. 6They had these men stand before the apostles, who prayed and laid their hands on them.

7 The word of God continued to spread; the number of the disciples increased greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith.

Just a quick Google search and we find tons of Complaint Department memes that all send basically the same message: complaints are totally unwanted and to be punished. I’m thinking of particularly the meme that shows the Complaint Department help button which is attached to the lethal end of a mouse trap. The message is pretty straightforward.

But in today’s Lesson the early Church took the complaints of a segment of its community very seriously. The Church leaders listened to the complaints with openness and without defense and then set about a plan for addressing the problem. The result was a thriving community which continued to expand and grow numerically. No doubt it also grew more deeply in authentic relationship, as the minority Greeks felt heard and taken seriously. 

When we receive complaints we have to resist defensiveness. We have to allow our anxieties about our own imperfections to not stand in the way of hearing and receiving the truth in what others say. We have to learn to listen with open minds and open hearts and then seek to find solutions — sometimes altogether systemic — to better care for the needs of all in the community.

The early Church did just that. They put down their defenses, listened to one another — especially to the minority members, and made adjustments to help better care for the needs of the whole community. And they flourished. They absolutely flourished. 

But that could never have happened if the complaint button had been on the mousetrap.