"You’re Fired"

Most likely, if you are reading this and if you don’t live in a cave, the phrase, “You’re fired,” brings to mind images of The Apprentice. While this article can’t help but bring some political overtones with that reference, I hope you will read further as my point is not primarily about our politics but about the changes that our culture has gone through in the last couple of decades and the trend that I see has gone with it.

“You’re fired,” is actually a sign of weak leadership. I am not saying that sometimes people shouldn’t be fired – of course there are times when they must. But in general, reveling in the ability to fire someone comes from the desire to pick who we work with and who we don’t. People who we don’t want to – we simply get rid of. The images from The Apprentice can make all of us wish that we had the status and the power to simply take the people we don’t want to deal with and send them away – no more issues.

Sadly, this means that our society is gradually sliding toward wanting to pick our neighbors. Much of the anti-immigration stuff is grounded in the same thing: “I want to decide who gets to be in my life/world/country/neighborhood and who doesn’t.” Admiring someone who can simply say two words and make that happen can easily make me want to be able to do the same thing.

The church cannot allow itself to fall into this trap. Church shoppers and hoppers are grounded in this same kind of mentality. If I am in the body of Christ here and the people aren’t cutting it for me, I will simply shop and hop to a new one, stay there as long as it is easy and convenient, and then do it again if I need to. It is easy to view people as merely utilitarian pieces of our world. It is also contrary to everything Jesus and the incarnation are all about.

Church is a community of people who believe that we don’t get to pick and choose our neighbors and simply avoid or send away the ones we don’t want. We don’t get to fire people, at least not without a pretty serious cause and a more extensive and loving process. We are called to BE neighbors, not choose our neighbors. We are called to invest in people, not dispose of them.