Church Voices

I’m reading Malcolm Gladwell’s book Blink. Its all about the ability to make incredibly good decisions in the blink of an eye. Gottman, a mathematician from MIT that Gladwell interviewed for the book has analyzed marriages by categorizing positive and negative emotions of each couple and then predicting whether that couple stays together or not. By analyzing a 15 minute conversation he can predict with 90% accuracy whether that couple will stay together.

In fact, Gottman claims he can make those kinds of prediction simply from eavesdropping in a restaurant by narrowing his focus to a single emotion: contempt. Couples who display contempt for each other are likely to divorce. Gottman says, “If I speak from a superior plane, that’s far more damaging, and contempt is any statement made from a higher level…. It’s trying to put that person on a lower plane than you. It’s hierarchical.”

Now compare that observation of human interaction with commands from the scriptures:

Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves.
Phillipians 2.3

But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must become your slave. For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Matthew 20.26-38

Care for the flock that God has entrusted to you. Watch over it willingly, not grudgingly—not for what you will get out of it, but because you are eager to serve God.
1 Peter 5.2

The scriptures emphasize over and over again that the kingdom of God is not a hierarchical one in the sense that we attempt to speak and act down towards each other. Instead, it is a kingdom where the least and the servants are the greatest, and we are expected to place others on a higher plane than our selves.

What’s the opposite of contempt?
The kingdom of God.