This question concerns our walls, our guards that we put up against one another, the defensiveness that we build because of the many times we have been wounded. A prophecy about the Lord Jesus Christ in Zechariah 13:6 says, And one shall say unto him, What are these wounds in thine hands? Then he shall answer, Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends. In the house of our friends is generally where our wounds happen.
When we look at the problem of our being open to one another, and having no guard up against one another, we remember how the Lord Jesus approached it. John 2:23–25 reads, Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the Feast, many believed in His name, beholding His signs which He was doing. But Jesus, on His part, was not entrusting Himself to them, for He knew all men, and because He did not need any one to bear witness concerning man for He Himself knew what was in man.
We have all had an experience of trusting the wrong person. Of all men whom I know, I am the most guilty of being naive, simple, open, and childlike in telling people things, sometimes to my own hurt. At times enemies would talk to me, only to learn something that they could twist to my hurt. Christ did not do that. “He did not commit Himself to men, because He knew what was in man.”
This is a real problem. It seems that we never bare our souls to other people without also baring our guts to some sophisticated assassin who is set to destroy us. Yet we are taught in the Body of Christ and in His Kingdom to be open and to love one another (I Peter 1:22). We are facing a paradox: there is no Kingdom without an openness and a submission to one another, and yet there is no defeat without lowering our guard somewhere. When our guard is low, the enemy moves in. Is it possible that we can relate ourselves to one another and still not be vulnerable to the assault from the one we relate to?
Why is it that “a man’s enemies are those of his own household”? (Matthew 10:21, 34–39.) What caused even Christ’s brothers not to believe on Him until after His resurrection? (John 7:3–5.) How could they be so close to Him and not even know Him? This is often the case. We can be so close and still not know one another. Perhaps the key to it is that although we are close to one another, we may be without revelation of one another. We may see certain ones so often, and so totally in their human aspect, that we fail to see the miracle that God has created in them and what they have become in Him.
The Scripture warns us that we should “know no man after the flesh” (II Corinthians 5:16). To know one another after the flesh can be disastrous, because it can lead us to be critical, or lead us into a personality cult, which is equally as deadly to our spiritual life. During the Passover Feast which Christ attended at Jerusalem, “many believed in His name, beholding His signs, the miracles He was performing” (John 2:23). But He never trusted them; He never committed Himself into their hands. He never put Himself in a place where someone who was untried, unproven, and immature could have the potential of becoming overnight a Judas to betray the Word of God. How carefully Christ defended His life until the hour when He was to give it up. He said, “No man takes it from Me; I lay it down of Myself” (John 10:18).
We receive our wounds in the house of our friends. At our Passover feast do we eat the bitter herbs voluntarily? (Numbers 9:11.) Do we partake of them willingly? Are they inevitable, or could much of the bitterness which we experience be avoided? Can we eat the bitter herbs of life and still not become bitter ourselves? These are very important questions for us to answer. Is that old cycle inevitable, by which Naomi became embittered in Moab and called herself Mara, meaning “bitterness”? After she had been back in Bethlehem for awhile, she once again became Naomi, which means “pleasant” (Ruth 1:20; 4:14–17).
I am wondering if the mothering spirit, many times, is more repressively protective in what it produces by the mothering. A mother teaches her little child to be safe and to grow up happy. She tries to protect him. That in itself is a good thing. There was something of that guiding spirit in Hannah, but she quickly weaned Samuel and turned him over to the Lord, in the house of the Lord (I Samuel 1:24–28).
How can we bring forth in life what God wants? How can we be a blessing to one another? How can we take our walls down to people and not be hurt by them? How can we love someone without the danger of having a broken heart? What you produce is determined by what you are; you will produce after your own kind (Genesis 1:24). If there is love and compassion in your heart, then what you are is your best defense, and you do not need to hide behind a fortress or a wall. Do I hear someone muttering, “That sounds good, but what I am now is a result of what I have experienced. I have blisters! I have scars to show!” True—all faithful wounds of a friend, no doubt.
From all this we can make a very solemn conclusion, and also a very happy one. The solemn conclusion is that the scars we bear often came from those whom we love the most. We committed ourselves to them. We entrusted our lives in their hands, and they hurt us very deeply. The happy conclusion, the blessed side which causes us to rejoice, is that besides the scars, many blessed things were worked in our spirits through associations as we opened our hearts to others and they opened their hearts to us. And because there were such deep bonds in Christ in those relationships, we will carry the blessings from one another throughout all eternity. We survive because we give ourselves freely to one another.
For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. Matthew 16:25.