First of all, I haven’t taken the time to make sure, but I think the Noah-flattering comment came from Michigan. 🙂
Second, Anonymi (for that is the plural of anonymous, I’m pretty sure…), ya’ll are making my head hurt. And yes, I’m breaking out the southern accent I earned when I spent the summer in Atlanta five years ago. Can you at least call yourselves Anon 1, Anon 2, etc? Also, I’m curious, do I know you? Are you keeping anonymous so that you can speak more freely because you are afraid our friendship might be affected? Or are you a guest to my site from some other means. I would like to know how many of my readers only know me through my blog.
Third, I’ve been wondering the same thing as Anonymous as to how Noah’s interpretation applies to me and how I should respond. How have I been sinned against? Is forcing me to take down my clothesline (of which my lease says nothing) a sin? It would make my life a lot more inconvenient. Is making my life more inconvenient so that others can have their overly anal preferences concerning apartment “sightliness” catered to?
One thing is for sure. I have not been approached by any neighbor concerning my clothesline. I have not been approached by any management concerning my clothesline. A letter was left on my doorstep – a letter that was addressed, “Dear All Residents.” And that letter did not clearly state that anyone was offended. “It has been brought to our attention that you have been hanging inappropriate items such as laundry.” And that line alone makes it more a matter of rule-breaking than neighborly complaining. My husband and I were discussing this last night and were wondering – how do we show the love of Christ by non-resistance when we have yet to be approached? No one would see His example through our surrendering of our rights. So far everyone involved in this discussion (save “Theological Crap Guy”) has at least agreed that the Matthew 5 passage should have the end effect of us showing love to our enemies. My “enemy” won’t see the love of Christ because there was never a confrontation between us. Should I go to the office and ask if anyone was offended and if so, could I have their name so we could discuss this further? Or, since the correspondence concerning laundry seems to have dropped after my last letter, should I not press the issue?
We (my husband and I) also want to know, how far do you take Matthew 5? If an enemy asks for your child, do you say, “Sure, and take the other one, too!” And while I have had days where I would be tempted, it would break me completely to do this! What if an enemy asks for your kidney? Do you say, “Absolutely; take both! And the liver!” How far are we supposed to go to live out those words? And I’d like to hear from you not only theologically, but personally. How far would you go to live out Matthew 5?
As for my opinion on Noah vs. Joanna/Jeremy/Anon1, I honestly think you all have your points. I do believe that Jesus’ overall message was to show love. But what I think Noah is getting at is very similar to Romans 12:20 which says, “On the contrary: “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” And this verse comes after many others which urge us not take revenge. So what I think Noah might be saying is not to seek the end result of “heap[ing] burning coals” on anyone’s head, but that in walking the extra mile and giving all the clothes on your back, you cannot avoid the guilt that your enemy will feel in knowing they have robbed you and treated you wrongly. And that uneasy, guilty feeling you have given your enemy will hopefully be enough for them to realize they are not living as they should be (thus Noah’s point on giving them the chance to make a choice to live right).
But how does this apply to my clothesline? There never was and most likely never will be a face-to-face confrontation where I could use Jesus’ strategy of showing love to an overly anal neighbor (if there even is one) which would lead to the guilt that is necessary for change.
Put yourself in my shoes. You have no money for a dryer. You have four people dirtying clothes, towels, diapers (yes, we use cloth diapers), and more each and every day. If you hang the laundry inside, it takes 24 or more hours to dry, which restricts you to a mere one load a day, leading to a serious back-up – especially if you are, for whatever reason, unable to do a load one day. Not to mention if anyone spits up or has a diaper leak during naptime and sheets have to be washed as well! Hanging laundry inside also leads to other inconveniences such as toddlers taking socks off the rack and hiding them various places, and the missing half of our living room the racks take up. Hanging laundry outside dries faster, takes stains out of diapers, and gives us back our living room.
What would you do?
(And if this sounds disjointed, blame the toddler who was climbing on my lap and keyboard during the writing of this post!)
I think I would feel guilty for awahile each time I hung out laundry, but I would still hang it out anyway. (At least until someone approached me personally. Hiding behind the ‘management’ thing seems too convenient.) At least that way a real person might materialize to talk to about it.
I still say, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
-GMOM
So how far do you go? I don’t think i would give up one child let alone two. And definatly not both kidneys. I think the hidden eliment here is to treat others how you want to be treated. There is probably more cultural background information on this “give your neighbor this if he asks for that” that would be helpful to better understand why he’s asking for our tunic anyway right? But the bottom of the line for me is how do I want to be treated? When it comes to my neighbors smoke blowing in my front door how would I want them to react if it was me smoking? If someone approaches you about your laundry personally I would talk to them about it and find out why they don’t like it. If no agreement was made during that conversation I think the thing to do would be take it down Because if I didn’t like the laundry I would want someone to take it down. (however i don’t think i would ever be so selfish to ask someone to take down something they had on their property unless it was inappropriate). I guess that’s a question, is it inapropriate? Maybe someone can see your personal items and they have had an addiction to porn that they are trying to fight. Or maybe the person who has a deck below you is upset because water drips on their stuff? I don’t think that second one would be possible though seeing as the washer normally gets most the extra water out but it’s a question.
What other reasons would someone have for not wanting to see your laundry?
So if i were in your shoes I would continue to hang my clothes, probably feeling guilty like your mom for awhile, until either someone confronted me or I recieved another letter. But that made me think of a question… isn’t a guilty feeling the Holy Spirit convicting us? if that’s the case maybe it would be wrong to continue hanging clothes despite the fact that there really doesn’t seem to be any reason NOT to….
Guilt, like beauty, can be in the eye of the beholder, and relative to circumstances at the very least. Sometimes it is caused by misunderstood information.
I believe that guilt could be the Holy Spirit at work. So it is important to listen.
However, I don’t see what Beth would be guilty of in this case. We have overly hashed this thing to pieces. It is OK to go on living!! And that includes doing the laundry!!!
Love you Beth:)
-GMOM
Screw this clothes line stuff
I want to hear more about the cute things your kids are doing.
Anyone who can’t post their name is not worth listening to as far as I’m concerned.
HA HA. I like what Bon said. I second that! This blog is getting entirely too serious for someone with two children.
I think I would do just what you’re doing, Beth. I thinking these kinds of situations need to be taken on a case-by-case basis. Being inconvenienced for the sake of my Christian witness is one thing. (For example, my neighbors don’t like me to leave my dog tied to a stake outside. So I don’t, even though it would be nice to be able to do that.) However, when it’s more than inconvenience, I would have to heavily weigh the pros and cons. I would try to resolve things in a positive way, perhaps come to a compromise if possible. I don’t know how far you should take the “be a good Christian witness” thing. For example, if the cross on your front door bothers your neighbors, do you take it down? What if a restaurant asks you not to visibly pray before a meal? I don’t think I would back down on those situations – unless of course they had good reason to ask.
I don’t know what I am trying to say here, other than I would do the same as you, Beth. 🙂
We need more Benjamin and Olivia pictures!! STAT:) Or even another downy ball…
-GMOM
What the heck?! I posted a comment on here yesterday and it’s gone! What happened??? Sigh.
Well, what I said was basically what other people have said – that I would do the same thing, it’s not being a bad Christian as long as it’s not about your rights, in fact it’s being a good steward of your money and resources, etc.
I also said you should check with your downstairs neighbors about the dripping thing, because that’s a definite possibility. Also if there are other decks near yours on the same level, you could try to strategically place towels/sheets/etc on the sides of the “delicates” as well. I know you already do that in the front – good for you!
Hopefully this one will post. 🙂
this isn’t going to be interesting or relevant to anyone but beth…sorry, i don’t have time right now to write something cool. just wanted to say, thanks for saying y’all, cause im in georgia right now, and i thought it was funny. haha 😉
oops…i guess i meant “ya’ll.”
Ha! You were right! It’s supposed to be y’all. Funny that Word didn’t pick that up. It’s a contraction: you + all. The apostrophe takes the place of the missing “ou”, thus making it “y’all”. I guess that just wasn’t symmetrical enough for me.