Experience

 I struggle with the idea of calling out sins in others. It usually just makes me feel like a hypocrite. 

See I take the idea of taking the beam out of my eye before working on the mote in your brother's eye very seriously. I can't build people up or take them to where I am very effectively without being really really honest about where I am and where I've been.

Part of that may be some of the peer support training I have. The idea that being in recovery, having that experience can allow us the ability to be an example to others. Be a coach, a help, and at times a mentor. But it has to be based in experience. 

There's a reason most substance abuse programs want counselors who have the experience of addiction themselves. There are aspects of the process of recovery that are hard to explain if you haven’t faced the fire and hardship. There’s an authenticity missing.

I think similar principles can apply to the gospel. 

Now really important caveat here. One needs not pursue sin just to experience it. One needs not put themselves in situations where they have addiction, danger, etc just to be more empathetic. That’s not my point at all.

This is. That some of the roughest around the edges that are present. That they have a level of experience and a depth of understanding some of us never will. That they can reach people some of us never will. I’ve written in the past that these people are bridges and I’ve only grown to feel more strongly about it.

I think it’s ok to know who in our lives can speak to experiences we can’t. Whether it be someone who has experienced cancer. Someone who’s experienced drug or alcohol addiction. Someone who’s experienced mental health crises. Someone who’s lost a spouse or child. Someone who is part of the LGBTQ community. Or someone of a different race or minority. 

See once we know who these people are we need to listen to them. They are the authority on their experience. Not us.

There are aspects of the gospel I can speak to from experience authoritatively. There are aspects I can’t. That’s ok. That’s part of why it takes faith. It’s part of why it’s messy. 

It’s my fervent hope that reading this can address one thing I haven’t stated clearly yet. We can’t look down on experiences and struggles we don’t understand. Someone is not inferior for a struggle or experience different from our own. 

If we can keep that in mind. If we can learn with people. Learn from people where they are. We would be so much better off. 

We just have to remember. We can’t always understand or even articulate that struggle which we ourselves did not experience. So we find those who can.