This morning I sat by the window and watched robins fly across the fence with little pieces of something in their mouths.
Grass.
Twigs.
Whatever a bird uses when it is building a home.
They were not doomscrolling.
They were not forming a committee.
They were not waiting around for the next body to fall so they could call it discernment.
They were just doing what God made them to do.
Building.
Singing.
Trusting the morning.
And I thought about what Jesus said.
“Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them.”
Matthew 6:26
Then I thought about another verse.
“Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted.”
Galatians 6:1
Restore.
That word has been haunting me.
Not expose.
Not parade.
Not corner.
Not threaten.
Not build a little public scaffold and call it accountability.
Restore.
That does not mean sin is ignored. It does not mean wrong is renamed. It does not mean consequences vanish because a man is tired, sick, or sorry.
But it does mean there is supposed to be a spirit in the thing.
A spirit of meekness.
A trembling awareness that the man on the ground could have been you. Could still be you. Might be you next week if the Lord takes His hand off you for ten minutes.
I have had to learn that from the floor.
I have made mistakes. Real ones. Public ones. Painful ones. I have addressed this past week. I removed what needed to be removed. I reached out where I needed to reach out. I said plainly where I was wrong. I have taken steps to make sure the same thing does not happen again.
The man I wronged matters.
The truth matters.
The people who actually live in this house matter.
The readers who have walked with us through births, hospital scares, bills, breakdowns, Sunday school lessons, late nights, hard confessions, and the strange mercy of God matter.
But I have also learned something ugly this week.
There are people who do not want restoration.
They want leverage.
They come with soft words at first. Brother. Concern. Matthew 18. Private correction. Prayerful burden. Then, when you do not perform the exact script they wrote in their own head, the hand changes shape.
Now there is a deadline.
Now there is a threat.
Now there is public escalation.
Now the “brother” language starts sounding less like Galatians 6 and more like an accuser looking for a balcony.
That is not restoration.
That is spiritual coercion wearing church clothes.
And we should be honest enough to say so.
Paul did not tell the church at Corinth to pretend sin was fine. He told them to deal with it. Strongly. Publicly. Clearly.
But when the man repented, Paul did not tell them to keep the mob warm.
He wrote:
“Sufficient to such a man is this punishment, which was inflicted of many. So that contrariwise ye ought rather to forgive him, and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow.”
2 Corinthians 2:6-7
That verse is in the Bible, too.
The same Bible that says rebuke.
The same Bible that says judge righteous judgment.
The same Bible that says teachers will receive the greater condemnation.
It also says restore.
Forgive.
Comfort.
Do not let a man be swallowed.
This morning, I read a thread from a woman who had died of breast cancer. Her last words online were simple. She had loved her children. Loved her husband. Loved her life. She told people to be good to themselves because nobody knows how long they have.
Millions of people read that.
A woman facing death somehow managed to leave behind tenderness.
And here we are, alive, healthy enough to type, with Bibles in our bios, sharpening knives over one another like the Lord is impressed by how long we can make a wounded man bleed.
We have strayed so far.
The robins were still outside my window while I thought about all of this.
One of them landed on the fence with something in its beak.
Building again.
That is what I want to do.
I want to build.
I want to write.
I want to feed the people who came here for Scripture, not spectacle.
I want to take care of my wife.
I want to be faithful to my children.
I want to keep serving the readers who have actually invested in this work, this ministry, and this strange little community God has allowed us to build.
So here is where I am.
I am not going to live under private deadlines from strangers.
I am not going to hand my household over to public tribunals run by people who have no authority here.
I am not going to keep feeding a room that does not want restoration.
I have owned what I needed to own.
I will keep making things right where they need to be made right.
And I am going back to the work.
Comments will be paid only on this because the people who have skin in this house deserve the room more than spectators with matches.
If you are here to restore, pray.
If you are here to watch blood hit the water, there are other places online for that.
As for me, I saw the robins this morning.
They were still singing.
They were still building.
And I think I need to do the same.
