IT'S NOT FAIR!!

This week, no this month really, I have been disproportionately angry with someone in my circle of Christian family.   From here on we'll call him Fred (not his real name).  Seems I've been angry with Fred for a while and didn't realise how much until something came up and I vented a little too loudly for a little too long and more than once - past just needing to get it out of my system.   

So I took it to the Lord and asked Him why I was reacting so strongly to Fred and what Fred was doing or not doing.   I should have realised that was a dangerous question. He said to me, very quietly and gently, as He does, "This is not about Fred.  It's about Pete".      I wasn't sure what He meant or that I really wanted to know, but I knew who He meant.    I've known a lot of Petes in my life but the first Pete was my older brother.  

Turns out I needed to forgive Pete for a few things, and let go of my anger towards him.   I sat with my mentor after church and we prayed through it, cried through it, and I thought I was done.  

Nope.    Sunday night I crashed, compounded by a tense situation in our family circle.   Monday morning, I tried to get on with my day but realised something was stirring in my spirit and it needed to come out.     So I decided to take my anger for a drive and sit with it and journal.   Three times, as I was journalling, I heard the phrase 'write it out '.  I knew what He meant - to write down the story of my childhood with Pete and what went wrong.   But I didn't want to because it's hard to unpack stuff that you had in a nice neat little box.   But He was persistent.  

So here it is, in bits and pieces, not all of it of course, but some of the significant stuff. 

Pete and I were pretty tight as kids.  He was about two years older than me and we did just about everything together, outside of school hours.    We weren't overly well, because of asthma, and so we spent a lot of the colder seasons inside, playing board games.    Pete's favourite was Monopoly, which we often played for days, and he invented all sorts of variations.  

We did craft together, hung out with the cat together, watched TV together, shared a love of sport shooting.    Pete was quiet but strong, and quite protective.   My first memory is of him trying to protect me from the fighting.   I was 3 and he was 5 and we held onto each other while we sat on their bed and listened to them yelling at each other.    We both developed asthma at the same time, funnily enough, and that became a bond we shared as well.     In some circles, it's called a trauma bond.  

When we were well enough and weren't having to look after baby brother, we were out and about with Pete's friends, setting fire to things, nicking stuff, riding our bikes, and even running away from home.  

Whenever we got caught, Pete would cop it from Dad who would give him a good flogging.   Even when Dad knew I was behind the trouble, and I mostly was, he wouldn't lay a finger on me - he would take it out on Pete because he was the boy, the oldest, and he should have stopped me.  

Pete couldn't have stopped me.  He was far too gentle and quiet and accommodating for that, and loyal to a fault.   So he took a beating again and again.   

His relationship with Dad was pretty tense and he became quieter, and more and more withdrawn.  

When we moved to Dad's childhood home, I was 14, Pete was 16 and our little brother was 7.     Pete should have finished school that year but he'd repeated so he had to do another year.  The move to that house was the beginning of the downward spiral for our family.   Even now, all three of us call it the house of horrors.  And it was.  Not all the time but at times it was brutal.    Pete only lasted about 14 months in that house and then he was done.   

One of my main Pete memories of that time was both of us standing between our screaming parents, trying to stop them from killing each other.  Whether they would have done,  if we had left them to it, we'll never know because we got in the middle of it, every single time.  And instead of being adults and realising the damage they were doing, they happily drew us into it.  Then Pete would cop it from Dad afterwards  for 'interfering'.    I would cop it from Mum, verbally, and sometimes physically, when everyone was out. 

But I was copping it from Dad in another, more insidious way - sexual abuse.   Mum knew but wouldn't or couldn't bring herself to confront him.  To this day, I wonder if Pete knew.    I've never spoken to him about it.   I'm still not sure, even now, how we would react to that - disbelief, severe anger (he already hates Dad).   I often wonder to myself, "Would it make him finally snap?" (he lives the closest to Dad), so I haven't told him.    I also haven't wanted to because of the strain in our relationship since then.   

The week Pete finished school, he landed an apprenticeship and several weeks later, he moved out.  All these years I've carried anger and unforgiveness towards him for leaving me to it, for not protecting me from Dad, for not helping me manage their fighting and raise our little brother.   I was carrying that burden alone from 15 onwards.   Pete had been my backstop, my partner in crime and sickness, my steady, quiet rock in a chaotic house.     And now he was gone, living just down the road, but out of reach and out of touch.  

Of course, I can look at it now and realise that what my parents expected of either of us was too much, and what they were doing would have driven anyone away.   We were just teenagers trying to manage the unmanageable with no help from anyone.   

But back then, I just felt abandonment and anger.    But, like all the other stuff I didn't know how to process, I buried it.

So, on this Monday morning, what I found myself mumbling was 'it's not fair!' but I had no idea why.    It wasn't related to anything else going on in the present, as far as I could tell.  

Now that I've started writing it out, remembering it properly, I get it.   It wasn't fair.  What our parents were doing and asking of us wasn't fair.   And maybe Pete leaving wasn't fair on me, but him staying didn't stop it.    He'd tried that many times.  They were determined to attack each other and have their children take sides.  We didn't want to take sides, we just wanted it to stop.   

So, what to do with my 'it's not fair!'.  

I read recently that we need to face the harsh truth of how things were, rather than remembering the events through rose-coloured glasses or nicely dismissing it because people were in pain or too 'something' to know what they were doing.   They were in pain, but until I acknowledge the severity of the situation and the unfairnness of it, on all three of us, and the damage done, then I can't really forgive it, because I've minimised it and only dealt with it at a surface level.   

Last year the Lord told me to get angry about stuff that's wrong, because it is wrong. He told me to see it how He sees it.   He taught me to recognise that it's okay to be angry about stuff and it's not okay to NOT be angry, because apathy is wrong.    He also told me not to stay there, in the anger, nor let it fester into bitterness.   Apathy is often the result of suppressing emotions that we didn't know what to do with.   

One of the things I've found myself really angry about is how much my parents damaged the relationship between my brothers and I.   It's been strained ever since that time.   We have to distance ourselves from our parents and their efforts to divide us, even now, if we want to try and get along.    

To work through anger is hard.  It seems wrong to be angry.   But anger isn't sin.    What we're angry about and how we respond when we're angry is often the problem.   If we're angry because we're entitled or bitter, then yes, it's wrong.  If we give full vent to our anger, that is wrong.  If we do wrong because we're angry, that is wrong.   

But being angry about what was wrong, what is wrong, that's a good thing.   And if we won't let ourselves acknowledge the pain and the anger, we'll find ourselves angry about other stuff, in a later season, with people who push buttons that are still wired to that pain and injustice.   What I've learnt is that disproportionate anger is generally an indicator that there's a deep wound somewhere and that person currently in your circle, triggering it somehow, is not the original offender.     Yes, they may be acting like a jerk too, but if the anger is out of proportion to the offence, then something is off.   

So, having made the decision to forgive Pete, it's time to forgive Fred for not living up to my expectations of what a big brother 'should' do or be.  Letting Pete off the hook means I can let Fred out of my silent, unconscious expectations.  

Does that mean Fred is right?  Nope, it just means I can stop being angry with him because of what Pete did or didn't do.    Has Fred hurt me as a big brother?  Yep.  Intentionally?   Nope.   But I am going to acknowledge to myself that it's still painful and hurtful and not to bury it, so that it pops out as anger when I'd rather it didn't.    

Do I talk to Fred about it?  I doubt it.  I don't think he'll listen and that's part of the problem.    It doesn't bother him enough to want to sort it out.    So, it's back to dealing with MY heart and guarding MY heart and being aware of how I respond to things.     It's back to having good boundaries and giving restricted access, like Lysa Terkeurst says in her book, Good Boundaries and Goodbyes.   

It's been yet another lesson that we don't have to give full access to everyone with a Christian label.    We need to be careful and watch the fruit in someone's life.  Lysa explains that we wouldn't give just anyone the password to our bank account.  In the same way, we need to guard our hearts and limit the access to our hearts that we give other people.   It's learning to recognise your ability and responsibility in any given relationship, which is a hard thing to grasp when so much was expected of you too early and for too long.  

In the midst of all that, He has said to be thankful for the gold I CAN see and HAVE received from that person.    I can do that.   And we can just be people who do church together, overlap occasionally, but without any expectations other than the debt to care, from a healthy distance if need be.    I can do that.   And Fred seems more than happy to keep it at that, so I'll just keep an eye on my own heart attitudes from here on.   Finally understanding the why behind the simmering anger has been very liberating.  

I've heard it said that men and women in group settings, who are not married, can not and should not have platonic relationships with each other.  I disagree.    God made brothers and sisters.  It was His idea.    I think it is very possible and beneficial, if you are very careful not to be alone with that person, whether in person or via text or other forms of messaging or phone calls.   It's not wise to have too much emotional connection with anyone who is not your spouse, regardless of gender.  Friendship, beyond being just a brother or sister, is a whole other level.     A topic for another day, me thinks.  

I'm incredibly grateful for the brothers in my church.  They are men of integrity and honour that I have learned that I can trust.  I haven't found that all Christian men are, sadly.   Not all 'Christian' men have good intentions towards women.    These men in our church have proven themselves, over time, to be protective and wise and strong, in ways that men should be strong, not just for their families, but for our church family.    They teach and they pray and they protect and they support and they help.  All of that is really necessary, especially for those of us doing life alone.   And all of it is possible and healthy IF we stay within the God-given boundaries on relationships.   But, they're also human, so my responsibility in relationship is me recognising and letting go of my silent expectations, whether with my brothers, or my sisters.     Forgiving Pete is allowing me to do that.     

And as for my relationship with Pete, it's time to figure out what that's going to look like from here on, and be on my guard about silent expectations, from both of us.    It won't be easy, because he is very damaged, even now.    But, it's time to get on with it.   

And when you stand to pray, if you hold anything against another, forgive it, so that your Father in heaven will forgive your trespasses as well.   Mark 11:25

The Servant Song seems appropriate here.  

Brother, let me be your servant,

let me be as Christ to you

pray that I might have the grace

to let you be my servant too. 

We are pilgrims on a journey.

We are brothers on the road.

We are here to help each other. 

Walk the mile and bear the load.