An Open Letter about a Christmas Party

 Hey Eve,

    This could probably be an e-mail. I decided against texting because it's just going to be so long. But it's also not entirely for you, so it doesn't hurt to put it up as a blog either where it can be referenced by those who should read it.

    Thanks for the invite to the family Christmas party. I cannot come. There's no way to say why I can't come that will prevent it from being misinterpreted as bitterness, but hopefully any reader will have the presumption of grace. Maybe I don't have to explain why I'm not coming? I could just pass it off as an inconvenience. It's not; there's a time where I would have driven 14 hours 1 way just to be back for family Christmas if I could have gotten leave for a weekend. A two-hour drive with children can be more stressful, sure, but that's no excuse.

    I cannot come because "What fellowship does light have with darkness?" And now everyone rolls their eyes and says "Jeremiah just thinks he's too good for us." No: I'm the one who has been declared darkness. Unless Hannah and Josh want to repent of that, I will continue to force them to live consistent with what they believe.

    "But Hannah did apologize for what happened."

    She apologized for the consequences. She apologized because she wants to see my kids. She has never apologized for her part in standing by and letting me be excommunicated.

    "It wasn't an excommunication."

    In what world can being kicked out of the facebook group when it was the only means of communicating with the church as a whole (because it wasn't meeting during COVID) not be considered an excommunication? In what world is texting my wife (without saying a word to me) to say "Your husband is completely out of control" not considered an excommunication? In what world is being told "You are not allowed to ask questions after the sermon during question and answer time" (from a man who allows people to say "I think Paul was wrong") not be considered an excommunication? That man is an expert at wordsmithing his way out of any responsibility on his part, but he declared me an enemy of the faith and treated me as such; that much is certain to anyone who has eyes.

    But that's the point: everything that happened then has been downplayed like they weren't deliberate actions taken against someone declared to be "in sin." It was not a misunderstanding. I declared publicly that Pastor Cliff was wrong ("in sin") and was accussed of being "in sin" in return. I stand by everything I said at the time: you cannot apologize for the consequences of what happened when I knew the risk I was taking.

    Pastor Cliff was a jerk. That is without question: a Pastor should never text a man's wife in order for her to do his job of rebuking him. His behavior was utterly cowardly and reprehensible. I wish he'd repent, but he won't. I've accepted that. I've even accepted that most of my family still sits in that church despite knowing what happened because there are so few options with a reformed soteriology in the area. And I can prove that with more than just words: my wife's sister and her husband attended that church up until recently without even knowing what happened. Someone may think this is all I think about or talk about if this is all he/she ever sees me writing about, but that simply is not the case.

    The problem is not with Pastor Cliff. The problem is that Hannah and Josh either need to live consistent with what they said concerning me (and make sure I'm not invited to these events on the basis of a commonality that has been severed) or repent of their part in effectively declaring me to be an enemy of the faith. And they can't do that without admitting that Pastor Cliff was a jerk. Along the same lines, they might try to do that without acknowledging what I said concerning what he was doing/preaching at the time, but that would be keeping the proverbial cake after consuming it. The issue arose from a sermon where Pastor Cliff taught "the one who starts the fight is the one who is in sin." I deliberately started a fight because of it. He was wrong, and to repent to me is to admit that he was wrong. That doesn't even begin to deal with the gnostic heresy he spouted when he said "All those who are successful in business are a part of the Babylonian world system," knowing full well that his entire livelihood is dependent on the generosity of the people he's guilt-tripping into supporting him, the only person doing the real work that honors God. But we don't need to rehash every piece of garbage spouted that will all be brushed aside as "a simple mistake/misunderstanding," these two are enough.

    They cannot repent to me without admitting I was right or proving otherwise (which they cannot do, because I was not wrong). And if Pastor Cliff was just being an unrepentant jerk, there are further responsibilities required by them to mediate the conflict as ambassadors of the truth with an intention toward repentance and reconciliation (see Matthew 18: "When your brother sins, go and tell him his faults"). Sins do not go away or cease to be destructive with time: they can either lead to destruction or lead to the Cross. And Pastor Cliff cannot go to the Cross without meeting me there, no matter how much "positional forgiveness" he throws my way.

    Frankly, I'm not worth that effort. It would be easier to leave me as a scapegoat and act like I'm the one refusing to make things right.

    Ironic, isn't it? I should have the greatest fellowship with the fellow Christians in a family full of Agnostics and transgender Atheists, yet I get along with (most of them) better than I can with the Christians. I wish I could say the fault lies with me: the solution would be simple if that were the case. But I live according to what I believe, and I expect the ones I love to do the same.

    So I cannot come to the Christmas party. I will uphold my willing exile and go back to silence after this. And I'll continue to be just a phone call away, despite the years of silence that would suggest otherwise

...although, I think I blocked Pastor Cliff's number on our phones because he wouldn't respond to me, but then was texting her, even though he just ended up talking to me, yet he thought he was talking to her (and I let him think he was talking to her because he was 100% committed to giving me the silent treatment) because for some reason he thought she'd be on his side and that she wouldn't immediately tell me he was texting her?...

    Regardless, I'm still just a phone call away. And if anyone's really interested in the salvation of our family, maybe you should start with the reconciliation of your family in Christ? It'd be good practice and actually within your reach, regardless of how long you go on blaming me for the trouble. After all, I'd like to come to the Christmas party, but that's the place for a conversation like this and this is all I have to say to certain people there.

In Christ,

Jeremiah