There's a group of Intowners that meets every week before the service to discuss difficult, misunderstood, and misinterpreted passages of the Bible. It has been curiously resistant to being named but this group-with-no-name is one of the best tangible expressions of our guiding vision that Intown is a “safe place to explore, find, and grow in the faith.”
This group, like our church, operates off the assumption that it is indeed possible to discuss topics of great significance in such a way that the discussion fosters trust and intimacy rather than unhealthy debate and divisive posturing.
While "on paper" the church should be the safest and most welcoming place in the world, many people move to Portland in order to distance themselves from more religious parts of the country where Christianity felt divisive and judgmental. The sad truth is that churches often house some of the most self-assured, entrenched, and inflexible people you'll ever meet. While Jesus' teaching surely invites us to develop deep convictions, if we begin to believe that our perspectives are identical to God's we can become convinced that openness to new insight or changing our opinion is the same thing as moral compromise.
One of the passages that would be a candidate for discussion in the Sunday morning group-with-no-name would be Ephesians 4:15 because it often serves as biblical justification for a theological aggressiveness toward other people that we then rationalize as “speaking the truth in love.”
Another passage used in a similar way is our New Testament reading for tomorrow: Galatians 2:1-14. This is the one where Paul confronts Peter for withdrawing from fellowship with Gentiles. I've heard this passage used to justify rude, confrontational behavior countless times in my career. Typically, pointing out that Galatians isn't an instruction manual for confrontation doesn't deescalate the situation, and neither does mentioning that whatever is prompting a particular debate is more than likely not as important as that over which Paul was confronting Peter.
In other words, just because Paul got up in Peter’s business about his blatant denial of the gospel in practice doesn’t mean that any of us get to be a jerk in defense of our current theological hobby-horse.
Enneagram 8's are often considered to be confrontational in nature. They don't seem to mind being a little aggressive in conversation and can adopt this posture over things that are far less important than the integrity of the gospel.
They can also be among the most trustworthy advocates for justice and tireless defenders of the weak.
While 8's can often stand to have a little training in diplomacy, when they are operating out of a place of health they can make us feel safe like no one else in the world. Let's talk about 8's, and the 8's in all of us tomorrow.