Both will fall into the ditch

Can the blind lead the blind? shall they not both fall into the ditch? (Luke 6:39).

I once heard a man tell the story of the time he visited another congregation and found the people there to be extremely cold. "No one would speak to me!" he said indignantly. And off he went on a rant about Christians of other congregations, other denominations who are unpleasant and exclusive to outsiders. He ended with, "Does it really cost anything just to be pleasant to other people? We're all Christians, after all!" he lamented.

Today, the same man just about went through the roof when a minister from another church gave the sermon at his church. "I resent that man being in the pulpit today!" He sputtered. "If I wanted to hear an Anglican minister, I'd go to an Episcopalian church like the one where I was raised." And he stalked off in a huff.

Funny, being an outsider wasn't okay when it was someone else, but it was a good thing when he was the outsider.

A woman I know rather well frequently complains in shocked tones about how parents treat their children--things she sees on Dr. Phil and Oprah that about curl her toenails. And yet these very things are the kinds of things she did to her own children. How soon we forget!

The interesting thing to me is that we are all blind, every one of us. All of us have blind spots because of how we are and what our life experience has been. I know a woman who is bitterly opposed to her brother being married to a woman who is rude. Yet her husband is so rude that he is hard to be around for any length of time. I preach tolerance toward people who are not like me, yet I am bitterly intolerant of the intolerant people. As Luke said, both those who are blind and those with blind spots are liable to fall.

This is really discouraging to me. Some of us try so very hard to do what is right, to be open-minded, to earnestly do what we can to help others. Yet we are so tainted by our blindness and our inability to live above those things that we see in others that so vex our spirits.
We are so human.
I know.
I live in the ditch.
I have great company there.