Fittingness
The beauty of fitting into God's story.
“Fittingness,” surprisingly, is in the dictionary. I learned the word five decades ago in Dr. Nicholas Wolsterstorff’s Aesthetics course. It was key to his definition of beauty.
Beauty and society are based on fittingness. We are defined by our relationships; our relationship to God, the world, and each other based on being in the image of God. It is not good for a human to be alone. I have led groups in spiritual calisthenics. First reaching up (to God), then reaching out to the side (to each other), and finally reaching out or down (to the world).
We experience ugliness in broken relationships or us/them tribalism, especially in politics. Some retreat into a lonely and selfish individualism. Others fight. These attitudes invade the church. Leaders fight “by heresies distressed,” without caring about “by schisms rent asunder” (“The Church’s One Foundation”).
On this Foundation
The world has been invaded by something, someone, else.
“But now in Christ Jesus . . . For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by setting aside in his flesh the law with its commands and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace . . .” (Eph. 2:13-16, NIV).
On this foundation all fit.
What should you do when you feel like you do not fit, or worse, when someone tells you that you do not? First, sorrow the brokenness, often in prayer. Name the ugliness: judgmentalism, hostility, arrogance, self-righteousness, sin.
Next, search for connections. Is there a Biblical character with whom I connect? Of course Jesus was told he didn’t fit, but maybe you connect with Ruth, the Moabite, the tribal outsider, or Naomi, the depressed and afflicted widow. There is Paul, the persecutor, and many others.
Then, be a Boaz or Barnabas. Help others fit. Let hospitality overcome hostility. Connect with another misfit.
Puzzling
Often brokenness is puzzling. Why are people choosing lonely individualism or exclusive tribalism over community? Like in puzzles, make connections: with God, others and the world. Not all pieces fit together right away, but all are part of the beautiful picture.
For half of the year, I am moving back to the community in which I grew up. Can one go home again? As one never steps in the same river twice, so, too, relationships and connections keep changing. This can be fearful or faithful. Those who fear divide. Those in faith connect. The hymn “The Church’s One Foundation” continues:
“Elect from every nation, Yet one over all the earth;
Her charter of salvation, One Lord, one faith, one birth;
One holy Name she blesses, Partakes one holy food,
And to one hope she presses, With every grace endued.”
“In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit” (Eph. 2:21-22, NIV).
We belong. This is God’s beautiful fittingness.
I am not at all sure what Tom is trying to say here, so will respond from my much less eloquent perspective.
The Ephesian verse, of course, refers to Jews and Gentiles. He will speak as well of male and female, slave and free. These, of course, were rather obvious ways of categorizing members of society.
The story as it was told, goes back, of course, to Eden. A couple of people back there decided they would trod a different path and the trend has continued. We separate from one another over matters great and small. The Jewish people have never been outwardly one, neither are the followers of Jesus. Note that I speak of “outwardly one.” We remain one “in the Spirit” via the very verse (both scripture and hymn) Tom quotes. The questions seem to be, “Can we affirm and celebrate that unity, that oneness even amidst the things that would and do cause us to differ and divide? Can we love and respect one another even midst our differences? Can we have a unity in Christ without having a uniformity in matters of belief and practice?”