I find myself wanting to advocate justice for the hurting and pronouncing judgment on the religious. in this, i have become the very thing i despise… I am quick to offer grace to the rebellious and wayward. but i am slow in offering to the religious, if i offer it at all. yet i must.

I see this… in me.

We are never going to be friends or hang out with everyone we come across… some people just shouldn’t be together – whether because of past history, wrongs committed against each other, just can’t get along, or whatever else; there are people in my life that I just needed to leave behind and break relationship with and vice versa for one reason or another, and I would imagine that is the case in almost everyone’s life…

… but if you are a Christian, how do we still go in Christ’s commands to love God, your neighbor, your enemy, your brothers and sisters in Christ?

As much as I have tried to orient myself to live a life of grace and love towards people, I have had very little tolerance for those who are judgmental, or those who spend hours upon hours writing or speaking about how the culture around us is the biggest problem in life, how America should be changed back to a Christian nation (whatever that means) or what movies/TV shows/books Christians should see/read, or what author/pastor/church member are heretics, who put their trust in changing people and the culture around them through politics and laws – or who inevitably link Christianity to being an American/being a Republican, etc…

So, I just aired my “crap” list and nullified my whole message, huh? :)

And there’s the point… we all do this. That list is still probably a short list of those I judge or have judged with an un-Christlike heart and mind… and I am wrong - I am the very thing that I dislike! “We” are wrong. It’s not that we shouldn’t discern against things we shouldn’t watch, or desire to see a Nation (or every Nation if we are to take the “Great Commandment“) of people seek and respond to Christ’s love and in turn with His help, change those things that are not best for us in our lives (as Penn said – “If you think you have the Truth and don’t share it, how much do you hate me” to paraphrase).

As Christians…

… Isn’t our passion for pro-life because we value and love (or should) the unborn life, and the born life, and believe the other options and issues involved (and not just the faith part, but the scientific data behind how hard it is on a mom to go through that procedure both physically and mentally) have the most potential damage to all – not because we don’t believe in choice or that “I” have a right to tell “you” how to live or “we” are better than “you”?

… and don’t we care that God’s message is not hijacked or distorted into heresy from what God intended and what Jesus lived and taught – because we love others and desire to keep God’s word pure and what it was intended to be, not because we pridefully think we have exegeted the Scriptures perfectly and if “I” don’t agree than the other person must be teaching heresy?

… Do we stand for truth because we believe it leads to true life and leads to the giver and sustainer of true joy, love and life – not because we feel better about ourselves by pointing out the wrongs of someone else because “they” are wrong and “I” am living right (there’s a story about “a sliver, a plank and an eye…” that might talk a little about that.)

… What is our motivation in how we deal with people who walk and talk like we do, and those who are different from us?

Do we see them as God sees them (which could be a very different answer depending on how you think God sees people – but my belief and theology is that God truly loves and desires for everyone in return to love Him back and have a relationship with Him)? Do we truly think about how we respond to and what we think of others? Does love enter you hearts and minds for others (not perfectly, but as an overall way you live) – or is it an afterthought or something you don’t think everyone deserves?

The Greatest Commandment

34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

37 Jesus replied: ” ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ [a] 38This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ [b] 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.“

Matthew 22:34-40 (Today’s New International Version)

Do we take this verse literally? If so, how does it affect how we treat people, how we “share” the truth,what causes we get involved with, how much trust we put in politics to fix things or to put into law, what attitude we have towards sinners (which we all are according to our beliefs) or those different from us or those we don’t like, how we respond to the poor, the broken, the hurting, the wanderers….?

I wonder for many of us if It might be all too easy to leave the expressions of our faith to how we vote, to tell people from a distance how wrong they live, to hunker down and keep ourselves isolated from “the world”, to build fancy Christian communities that supply all our wants and help keep us from running into those who are different, who live “wrong”, or who make us uncomfortable – as much as i hate to admit it, I like comfort and ease in my Christian life too…

But what does it mean to take Jesus’ words of love for God and others seriously…?

What would it be like to be charged with being “a friend of sinners”… not a tolerator, not just a judge, not an enabler, not an excuser, not a hater, not just a truth dispenser…

… a friend?

a person who truly goes about everyday… Loving God and loving others in words and in actions – regardless of who they are or where they’ve been. Who’s sole motivation in what they do (whether telling the truth to others, social action, preaching, dumping trash, etc…)

… is love. True love. Truth in Love.

God Is Love.

His people should be about love.

… true life changing love.

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