What if Your Opinion Doesn’t Matter That Much?

The Circle of Hope Pastors were wondering about this question indirectly on the most recent episode of their videocast, “Someone Asked.” What if your opinion doesn’t matter that much? Or, maybe, what if your opinion shouldn’t matter as much as it does. My opinions matter to me a lot, or so it would seem. I have a lot of opinions. Opinions might be my favorite thing. I grew up around a dinner table of intelectual brothers who were well-read and very opinionated. Having urbane conversation might be my love language as a result.

So I surprised myself when I told my buddy as we were biking today that, at least in the church, unity needs to trump authenticity. Being correct about anything is not as important as being connected to other members of the body. This does not mean we don’t have opinions–remember I love opinions; t means that it’s better to hold your opinions loosely than to commit strongly to your own thoughts and instincts. What do we gain by being right, after all?

Our culture gains a lot of entrenched power systems that change little about the every day lives of regular folks. We get sold binary opinions as commodities. It seems like everything is pepsi vs. coke, red vs blue, left vs. right, black vs. white. The division serves its real purpose, to divide us against each other and ensure the status quo. But if we want to change anything it seems we must choose to throw our lot in with one side or the other. We must choose a side. The opinion that comes most naturally is to be against. Saying no is so easy. And then we are reduced to deconstructionists. We spend much of our energy in what passes as conversation telling the other side how they’re wrong.

Is Conversation War?

And if the supposed conversation gets heated enough, or loud enough or long enough, we become so invested in defending ourselves against the threat of being the wrong one, that our  choice becomes who we are. Our opinion about the available options becomes a central part of our identity. We carry the wounds of previous attacks into new conversations. Our defenses are up before the person we are listening to says anything at all. Opponents seem to pop up everywhere. Once we’ve been in war, our minds have trouble experiencing any safety. Hyper-vigilance exhausts us and we don’t function at our highest level anymore. Are we good for only one thing; for being against?

From a natural perspective, I would say yes. Our ancient ancestors survived out of fear, tribalism and suspicion. Our more recent ancestors have been dominated, duped and discarded enough to know the contemporary stakes. Choosing the better of two evils is as good as it’s going to get. It’s not going to get better but we better fight like hell so that it doesn’t get any worse. And yet it does. The current discourse in the United States seems worse than it has ever been. I believe this is because we have been sold our choice as our salvation. In general, we have been convinced that our opinion, our preference, our desire is who we are. And now being right is a matter of life and death.

What Happens When Jesus Blows It All Up?

Jesus said something that blows all this up. He said it a long time ago and we aren’t very practiced at hearing it or applying it. He said, ” Whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.” (Matthew 6) If most of our opinions are as linked to life and death as I think they are, than we need to lose our opinions to find our lives in Christ. Our opinions do not matter as much as we have been conditioned to think they do. Our safety is not built on our capacity to defend ourselves, or any righteousness we produce. It is built on Jesus Christ, his victory over death and his promise of a future. This applies to everything, not just what happens when we do. It means a lot for how we talk to one another and even how we think.

The benefits of the demotion of our opinions is unity and probably better solutions to the problems of the world, but definitely a better alternative to the problems of the world. As Christians, we break the binaries starting with the ultimate binary between life and death. Let’s break the ones that exist in our minds and conversations as well. Use your intellect, yes. Puzzle through the troubles of this world, yes. Have a debate too, yes. But do it with charity, generosity, deep empathy for your partners. This will build the presence of the future here and now. We will be the best thing the world has going for it, not by getting the right answers, and having the right opinion, but by being a people, united from many perspectives, loving across many boundaries and losing many lives to share a new one in Christ.