Allegiant: when relationships get tough

Tris and Tobias.  I like them so much more than Katniss, Peta, and Gale.  They have a great chemistry

 and, for the most part, they really seem to care about each other.

Then comes Allegiant.  Things get much dice-ier for them in this book.  That’s pretty realistic actually.  All long-term relationships eventually go through an arc.  At the beginning, things often are great.  Excitement, mystery, newness, all these things make us feel alive to life in a way we weren’t before. 

The myth is that this goes on forever.  The truth, however, is not that love is doomed to failure or boredom.  That too is a myth, although one that can, and often does, come sadly true for those who don’t realize the first myth. 

Tris and Tobias are no exception.  Like in real life relationships, the challenges of life hit them individually, like a barrage of baseballs, and it takes a toll first on them individually and then on their relationship. 

So far, I see a trend that continues to harm their connection when it could be an opportunity to draw them together:

They are very understanding of their own pain, but don’t sympathize with the other’s. 

Two examples.  Both Tobias and Tris go through genetic testing and discover that something is supposedly “wrong” with Tobias’ genes, but not Tris’.

Tris quickly comments, “It’s not that big a deal.”

Now I actually think she has a valid point here and that she’s trying to love and validate that “This doesn’t change anything.”

But here’s the problem, she doesn’t give Tobias a chance to simply struggle to his conclusion with her.  Tris dismisses the hurt he feels.  He then walks out to struggle on his own (and get lured to Nita).

Another example.  Tobias finds out that his father, for whom he has contempt, was not sentenced to execution, but to being banished.  Again Tris dismisses the effect this has on her boyfriend.  She outright says, “You can be upset about whatever you want….But…it doesn’t seem like there’s much to be upset about.”

And, like any good story, their chance to follow up the conversation is interrupted.

Relationships, friendship, family, or romantic, are blessings from Father.  Blessings must be held gently.  Heavy-handedness usually harms, not heals.  The beauty of Jesus was God coming into our world and fully experiencing the joy, pain, grief, fun, laughter, hurt, and death that we feel.  Hebrews 4 says, “We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses.”

Tris is a great character, but we can learn from her mistakes.  Healthy relationships involve sympathizing with someone else’s weaknesses and feelings, even if they seem ridiculous from our perspective.  If you want to feel close to someone and, also if you want to see them move on from something, the first step is to ask, listen, and bear the feelings of the other person.

Allegiant: Is Christianity a fix-it religion?

[Spoiler alert]
Everybody is living inside an experiment. 

Creepy, eh? 

That's what Tris finds out in Allegiant, the third book of the Divergent series.  All of her life up to this point has been lived inside an experiment at gene manipulation.  A long time ago people decided to alter the genetics of a select group of people so that negative qualities would be erased.

However, "when the genetic manipulation began to take effect, the alterations had disastrous consequences....Take away someone's fear, or low intelligence, or dishonesty...and you take away their compassion.  Take away someone's aggression and you take away their motivation, or their ability to assert themselves. Take away their selfishness and you take away their sense of self-preservation."

So they ultimately damaged people's genes and, as a result, had to set up false, monitored societies, like the faction-led world of Tris and Tobias, to slowly fix people.

Have you ever heard someone say of Christianity, "it's not a religion, it's a relationship"?  It's become something of a cliche, but there is truth in it. 

Christianity, when lived as a religion, is a lot like the world of the Divergent series.  We want people to be better so we manipulate them by using lots of rules and fear.  We read about rules, preach about rules, and quote the rules.  We try to take human nature and fix it by external means. 

Here is the common problem with this method.  Like the situations mentioned in Allegiant, enforcement of standards leads to a whole host of internal damage.  We create a culture where certain feelings are unacceptable, so people hide their true struggles and stuff them, instead of sharing with others.  Be a good role model and be happy, yet we are cutting in our bedroom at night.

We tell each other what to do and not to do and subsequently create hidden cultures where people act out these forbidden behaviors in secret. 

Religion gets to play a fix-it role again when we go to church on Sunday and confess our sins in the service.  We feel some relief and turn around and do all the same things again the following week.

At the worst, religiosity can make us cocky and lead to lots of bickering, much like the Purity wars mentioned in Allegiant.

Scripture gives us a different picture.  "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me."  Galatians 2:20

"When someone is joined to Christ, he is a new creation.  The old has gone and the new has come."  2 Corinthians 5:17

I was a good kid, according to the rules, when I was in junior high.  My teachers saw me as a responsible, well-behaved young man.  Still, I was just doing what was expected of me.  I was a manipulated gene, manipulated by the approval I received.    Really, there was a very different me going on inside that I kept hidden from others.  I began to truly change, to become a "new creation," though, when I surrendered my life to Father. 

My heart began to change naturally as the Holy Spirit showed me my issues.  I found myself growing compassion for people I had once hated, developing patience for people that bothered me, finding out the joy of opening up about my honest feelings, and growing in desire to learn and know Jesus.

Lasting change, I'm finding, comes not from monitoring or manipulation, but from meaningful relationship with Father.