Ministering Without Love

First off, I’ve had months to sit with this, so I’m not acting from a dysregulated nervous system or expressing a knee-jerk reaction. I share this experience as potential education because I think the perspective could be beneficial as we attempt to serve our fellowman.

Nearly every one of us, myself included, has done something we perceived as nice for someone else that ended up coming across in a completely different way than intended. We may not have known that it came across that way, or we may have personally witnessed the backlash of our failed attempt, but either way we’ve all done this. We’re human; we get things wrong.

One of those “wrong” things happened to me on Valentine’s Day this year. I returned home from a baby shower early in the afternoon to find a Book of Mormon on my front porch. It had a dog-eared page in 2 Nephi, the Isaiah chapters. There was no name, no card, no indication of who might have left it and I was quite bewildered. I reached out to the missionaries to ask if they had left it, but one of the biggest points of missionary work is to engage people in discussion, so why would they leave an anonymous book with no contact information? They didn’t. And they said as much.

This doorstep offering came a few days after I shared a song on Facebook that I wrote that processed some spiritual feelings about my faith crisis, and a few months after sharing an article about my faith journey. It may or may not have been connected to that music share, but regardless, someone knew about my journey and felt compelled to leave this offering on my doorstep. I can only conclude that their intentions were good, and that they probably have no idea how their offering came across–though I did share with a few people that this gesture bothered me.

And here’s why…

When we minister in love, there will always be a face, a name, a card—ownership of the intended act of caring. This makes the act meaningful. Failing to own your actions, through anonymity, actually communicates a lack of true concern, it expresses fear, and to me, came across more like judgement than anything else. Someone who truly cares starts a conversation that reveals whether or not their assumptions about the person they are trying to serve are actually valid. That conversation provides important information on how to minister, if necessary, in a way that will be helpful, not potentially injurious.

Fortunately, I am resilient and suffered no real injury, but think about it. Someone vulnerably shares that they’ve experienced a faith crisis and you’re going to leave a Book of Mormon on their doorstep? Without owning it? And not only that, you’re going to ambiguously mark a page (not even underline a verse) that covers a breadth of messages as wide as “there is no peace for the wicked” all the way to “Isreal will be gathered and the prisoners will be free”? What am I supposed to take away from that kind of ambiguity? Are they condemning me? Or trying to give me hope? Are they secretly telling me they get my journey? Or they think I’m a spiritual prisoner? Was it some strange attempt at commiseration? Assuming I needed to commiserate? Was the whole thing a joke? Who can tell!!

Ministering should never be done from a place fear. And unless you’re tacking little love-note hearts on a door, ambiguity and anonymity are usually fear-based. This person obviously didn’t want to vocalize their message with accountability. Maybe they were just trusting that the spirit would communicate for them??? You can see by all this why anonymity and ambiguity are problems.

To leave a Book of Mormon for a person who has actually read the Book of Mormon more times than she can count, who has an extremely active spiritual life, a deep desire to learn truth, and relishes a living relationship with Jesus Christ is pretty presumptuous. Clearly, this persons doesn’t really know me. But alas, I admit, I used to be the kind of member who made assumptions about people’s religious appearance based on superficial details too. We’re so defined by our checklists and traditions in the church that if someone looks like their struggling or doing things differently, we think we need to rescue them or save them somehow.

This is a problematic approach that is more fear-based than love-based.

Before I conclude, let’s talk for a minute about promptings because I’m sure this person thought they were acting on a prompting from God, and perhaps they were, who am I to say otherwise. Since our conversations at church are typically limited to the context of “if you follow a prompting, you bless others, and you get blessings in return”, we miss the more obvious purpose of promptings—growth. Anonymity dodges growth. It adds nothing to our character because there is no cost or sacrifice involved when we shrink from accountability in any way.

In addition, promptings, like all kinds of spiritual communication, are filtered through our perspectives, paradigms, experiences, opinions, and our human and fallible bodies, including mind and emotion, this makes receiving them with clarity a little muddy. Sometimes a prompting is simply a personal opinion or assumption masked as spiritual communication. And we all know that unauthorized “meddling” isn’t really appropriate or appreciated, so we readily let the spirit carry responsibility for actions that may be uncomfortable. That way, if it goes wrong, it’s not our fault.

I’m not saying there are no real impressions from the spirit. I’m also not criticizing this person. I’m sure they meant well. And if they were to admit this act to me now, I would give them a hug and ask them why they didn’t just talk to me. I am obviously more than willing to discuss what I’ve been through and how I feel or I wouldn’t have written about it.

In conclusion, we need to recognize that the mode of delivery when we serve may not always have the intended outcome, and members of the church could benefit from examining their motives behind a prompting before they act, and consider whether the intended action is the right fit for the recipient, and whether they are willing to own their actions or not. If we can’t own our actions, perhaps we’re better off not acting at all. I know this perspective flies in the face of those who say “if it’s a good thought, just do it“. To that I again say, if you can’t own it, then maybe it’s better not to do it, because real love and concern always have a name attached to them.

Keep doing good, but do it with ownership and wisdom.

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