I'm pouring out my heart today on behalf of Christians.
Yes those
Christians.
The Christians
everyone loves to hate.
The ones,
who sit in the same pew every Sunday with their perfect hair and perfect
clothes and their hands folded neatly in their laps, while their eyes seemingly
searching out every fault in the lives of their fellow Christians and the world
around them.
The
religious-minded Christians who have become modern Pharisees. Every church has a few.
Why would
I stand up on behalf of these Christians, who most would argue rightly deserve
every bit of hate that comes their way?
Because in
our zeal to follow Christ's example of unconditional love toward the world
around us, so many of us seem to have forgotten that these brothers and sisters
in Christ, flawed though they may be, need that unconditional love poured out
on them as well.
We have taken
the easy path of love.
We zealously proclaim love for all mankind, but fail to love these
brothers and sisters in Christ.
In truth,
loving a stranger is easy. When we haven’t seen a person’s faults, up close and
personal, love flows naturally from the heart of a Christ-follower.
Maintaining
a loving relationship, on the other hand, with someone, who is sometimes
hateful, irrational, or judgmental, is extremely difficult to do.
But, as
members of the body of Christ, His church -- whether you want to be identified
with these Christians or not -- that is exactly what we’re called to do.
Love.
Beyond
faults.
Beyond
sins.
Beyond
religious and judgmental attitudes.
We are
called to be members of a unified church.
And yet,
with an uprising of proclaimed love for the world around us, the church, itself,
seems to be falling apart at the seams.
Lovers of
Christ seem to be leaving in droves.
Walking away in disgust of deeply
ingrained religious practices that, no doubt, need to be addressed, but never
will be if those of us who see through the lens of love leave congregations in
a mass exodus.
If we give
up on the church how are we any better than the religious-minded Christians who
seem to have given up on the world around them?
We’re not.
Is our
stance of loving Christ but hating
Christians really any different than their failed stance of hating the sin but not the sinner?
No. It’s
not.
I read
recently that the church, as a whole, should change that phrase to read love the sinner, not the sin.
I whole-heartedly
agree.
And while
we’re at it, perhaps we could attempt to love
the Christian, not their religion.
Perhaps we
could attempt to love even our judgmental and harsh Christian brothers and sisters
with the same passionate love that we so desire to see poured out by them on the
downtrodden world around us.
Love is
certainly the answer, as we all love to proclaim.
But love
isn't really love if it doesn't extend to all humanity.
That
includes the church. The whole church.
In our
efforts to love the world around us, let’s not forget the Christians that
everyone loves to hate.
You never
know. We just
might warm some cold hearts.
After all,
even some of the Pharisees, were changed by the love of Christ.
