TO INTERVENE OR IGNORE: RESPONDING TO APPARENTLY IRRESPONSIBLE BEHAVIOR OF OTHERS

The following "conversation" happened on-line over a few days following a walk in a National Park with a friend:

ME:

Per our discussion in the park regarding responsible intervention - I am still pondering what you had to say, wondering whether it is ever right to ignore apparently irresponsible behavior. Acting to intervene is always risky, depending on one's relationship to the other. It often is a question of power and authority, is it not? Is one ever wise enough to determine how responsible another one might be?

March 23

• • MY FRIEND:
    What's apparently irresponsible behavior? Every action is risky. It tramples on human dignity to take responsibility for their actions, unless they have given you that authority. By entering the park we gave the guards that authority. Were I a guard, I would prefer to warn instead of command and help people learn their limits rather than dictate limits.
    
    I think there's more dignity for us in that.

    March 24
  • ME:
    

    How would "warning" be preferable to "commanding," especially if one is in a position of command? Helping people learn their limits is laudable, but is it possible without some determinative dication that is decisive in defining limitation? How can one be helpful if one's decisions are merely ideally-based opinons unrelated to real limits? The law of gravity is not subject to opinion; one falling from some height may get hurt.
    
    Help is related to humility. One humbles oneself in order to accept help. On the other hand, pride goeth before a fall.

    March 24
    
  • ME:
    

    Pun intended.

    March 24
    
  • MY FRIEND:
    

    Right. So I would accept the help after I broke my arm from the fall. The limit is defined by my mental and physical ability, which he does not know.
    
    He should have told me to put my shoes on too. I might have hurt my feet.

    March
  • ME:
    

    I suppose it really is a matter of trusting those in positions of authority. Judgment is the duty of one trusted with authority. You seem to have found the judgment of this Park "person of authority" to be faulty in that he failed to judge us responsible enough to continue our apparently irresponsible behavior without some authoritative intervention. One wonders why he made that judgment, but more the wonder is why we should be so quick to second guess his authoritative judgement?
    
    Might the fault be more in our arrogant conceit than his authoritative command? Believe me, Lord knows I am no mild-mannered milquetoast always ready to be subject to those in authority - but meekness can be a virtue when one's heart is truly humble. To be able to submit to authority is something to which Christians are all called. To everything there is a season - a time to submit, a time to resist subjection.
    

    March 24
  • ME:
    

    I suppose it is just frustrating to consider oneself fully responsible, then have to confront someone else who seems to not share that same consideration. My father taught me the following statement that may be relevant to this discussion: "Evil is the tertium quid of two autonomous minds." What good can come of a conflict of wills? How is compromise with integrity possible?

    March 24
  • MY FRIEND:
    

    Is meekness submitting to authority?

    March 24
  • ME:
    

    Meekness is being wise is one's action, considering well one's strength and weakness. The one who is strong must take care in how to exercise one's strength; the one who is weak must take care in exerting oneself. For example, just because one can act with great strength, does not mean one must - I have a loud voice, but I can control my volume so that I do not speak too loud (anyone who knows me is aware of how I continue to struggle with this - getting older doesn't mean I've matured as much as I've aged!). The more mature one becomes, the more one can control one's capabilities, constraining one's actions in accordance to one's conscience. Meekness is a sign of maturity.
    
    Our model for meekness, of course, is Christ Jesus himself. "He could have called ten thousand angels, but He died alone to set us free." Constrained by His great love for us, God in Christ considered death by crucifixion over conquest by human might. Philippians 2:8 tells us: "Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross."
    
    Imitating His example, we die to self so that we may love the other. Meekness helps us be wise in how we might heed the Word in Romans 13:1-5, which tells us:
    "Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God. Therefore whoever resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God; and they who have opposed will receive condemnation upon themselves.
    
    "For rulers are not a cause of fear for good behavior, but for evil. Do you want to have no fear of authority? Do what is good and you will have praise from the same; for it is a minister of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil.
    
    "Therefore it is necessary to be in subjection, not only because of wrath, but also for conscience' sake."
    
    The chapter ends with these words:
    "Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts."
    
    Following the flesh is folly for we, created in the image of God and re-created according to the character of Christ, are more than flesh. By grace we can overcome the furor of the flesh to act responsibly toward others who provoke us, especially those in authority. That is what it means to be meek.

    March 25
  • ME:
    

    Pray for me that I may learn meekness myself.

    March 25