Good and Evil

For the past two weeks, I have been thinking about good and evil.   I was recently rereading a statement by St. Augustine that evil is not a creation in itself, but the absence of creation.

I know this sounds nerdy and philosophical but bear with me.  It has profound implications on how we view the world.  The way we understand good and evil affects the way we view ourselves and the world around us. 

Evil is a gap,  an absence in God's good creation.  Let's look at a couple of illustrations.

Imagine a new sweater with a prominent hole in the front.  It is a good sweater--the right color, the right material, and well assembled--except for the hole.  Most people would agree that the hole ruins the sweater, making it a "bad"  sweater not worthy of keeping.  Yet the sweater is a "good" sweater.  Only the hole makes it bad, and the hole is literally nothing.

Or imagine a car without working brakes.  It is a "good" car-- the engine works, the steering works, the air conditioning works.  Even so, it is a dangerous car, because of the absence of one part.  The fact that the rest of the car works is no help at all,  but  in fact makes the more dangerous.  Working engines and accelerators actually make it more dangerous, not less.  This is a "bad" car.  But the manufacturer did not make a bad car--they only left something "good" out.

People are the same.  God did not create "evil" people.  Only  the absence of something--a moral compass, perhaps, or clear senses or a sense of conscience--renders people evil or dangerous.  When people lack these things,  they are not redeemed by having intelligence, perseverance, or courage,  in fact those things only serve to make them more dangerous. They can be happy, healthy, and satisfied with life, and still lack these things. They can be good fathers,  kind friends,  and deeply religious. Yet if the wrong part of us is missing,  then we can and will do evil.  Our goodness only makes us more dangerous. 

I read in the papers about a man in his eighties who plowed his car into a school bus stop, killing several children.  He did not intend to do it, but he did it, nevertheless.  Was he evil?  Not  really.   He probably never did anything seriously bad in his life.  He may have lived an exemplary moral life. But was missing something--an accurate view of his own diminished capacity. He knew who he used to be, but lost sight of who he was. He was a good man, but because of this lack of self-awareness, innocent children died.

You don't have to be evil to do evil. You just have to have one small piece of you missing. In fact, it is easier for a man who is essentially good to do more damage when he is lacking one thing that it is for a man who was thoroughly evil. Our good qualities contribute to the evil we can do. 

Jesus said, "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven."  Jesus is not saying that rich people are evil. Far from it--most of the Bible heroes were rich.  Jesus himself was greatly helped by people like Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus and other rich people.  When he entered a town, it was only the rich people who could afford to have him and His entourage for dinner!  No,  what Jesus was saying were that in general, the rich were missing something--a knowledge of their own spiritual poverty. They lacked humility, and that's what kept them out of heaven.

All this has some far-reaching implications.

First,  that God is not the author of evil.  God did not create evil, because evil is not created.  God temporarily allows these gaps in the creation to exist.  Free choice needs the possibility of such holes in goodness to exist. But God did not create it.

My son-in-law works at a donut shop.  Over the years, he has made thousands of donuts.  He has however not made a single hole. He cannot make a hole, only make the donut around the hole. God can only create good things--things that are valuable, useful, and beautiful.

Second, all that is, is good.  From the tiny simplicity of the virus to the vast complexity of stars and planets,  everything is valuable, useful, and enjoyable.  Some ancient mystics believed that we live in a world that was created evil. What a wretched, terrible thought!  If we believe, however that everything God created is good, then the possibility of beauty and delight exists in everything and every one.  We can appreciate the beauty of the sunset and the hurricane. We can admire the mosquito and the shark, along with the lamb and the butterfly.  All things in their place are good. Only the flawed state of fallen creation that makes things appear ugly.  Yet there is nothing ugly in the world--only the gaps are bad.

Third, there are no evil people.  There are only flawed people.  The essential nature of us--the image of God--still exists.  This does not deliver us from the guilt associated with our free choices, but is does keep us from  discounting the value of our lives and others.

This explains two puzzles. First, how can a good man do evil? We do evil things, because there is a flaw in us.   We are still good generally, but our flaws render us dangerous. 

This causes problems for character witnesses in court.  If we think that because a man is generally good,  he could not perform an evil act,  then we fail to understand that evil is simply the condition of being flawed.  Anyone who is not absolutely perfect is capable of performing an act of evil.

Secondly, how can bad people do good things? This perplexed the Bible writers more than the first.

Al Capone ran soup kitchens.  Mussolini built a church in Israel, which is still used.  Hitler built the Volkswagon.  Bad men donate to charity,  act kindly at times to their neighbors because they are not bad. The stuff they are made of is goodness.  Nevertheless,  goodness becomes the instrument of evil, when pointed in the wrong direction. 

The thought of evil as something missing is actually an optimistic thought. It means that everything I see, and everyone I see, every day of my life is good. Satan cannot take the good out of anything. He can only twist it.  But if we look , in everything, every circumstance, and in every person,  there is the indelible stamp of God's love and beauty.  All of life is good, and worth rejoicing.  Instead of complaining about what is wrong with the world, we should be enjoying what is right with it.  When we enjoy what God has created, we are after all enjoying Him.  

How to Pray for Another Person

In every church there's a prayer list people with special needs, who we are to pray for daily.  This is harder than it sounds.  If all we do is recite to God a list of names, prayer seems a monotonous and futile chore.  After all,  God knows these people better than we do! While I would never suggest we not pray for them,  I have to ask--how effective can such an mechanical approach to prayer be?  Praying for someone is more than reading off a list.  It has to be something deeper.
 Praying for people is more than praying for their problems.  Frankly, we can never be sure that we know the real problem, because it is often not what it appears to be. Real prayer implies special interest in individuals.  Don't just pray for the lost, pray for your lost neighbor next door. Don't just pray for the poor--pray for the beggar you met on the street. Prayer is an empathic process in which we become acquainted and involved with real people as we pray.The Lord's prayer in Matthew 6 gives us a pattern for prayer not only for overall needs, but also for individuals.  

 "Our Father in Heaven"

Don't rush into in prayer for others.  Take time to praise God first.  Prayer is not just wishing someone well, but bringing them to the throne of God.  Before we do this we need to get to the throne of God ourselves, through praise and worship.  Do not pray for an individual need until you have first settled your heart in thoughts on God.  Our impatience wants to be done with prayer, to rush in, leave our concerns, and get out.  But effective prayer lingers in the mind on the nature and thoughts of God.
 "Hallowed be Thy name"  

Spend time in graceful contemplation of the person we are remembering.  The name of God is His nature, His divine attributes. As we pray for an individual, we need to see them as an expression of God's divine nature.   

Sin affects us all, and we are thorough sinners, but we are also made in the image of God.  God's forgiveness in Christ makes it possible for us to overlook the sins of individuals and focus on their God-like qualities.
This is empathy, the ability we have to see the world though others' eyes.  Empathy is an essential part of a true ministry of intercessory prayer. 
Before we pray for needs,  seek to understand the world from that person's perspective. Respect the things about that person which are good,  holy and truthful.  Try to imagine what it is like to feel what they feel, see what they see, and do what they do.  Celebrate the things about them which celebrate God.  Youth reflects the power of God, Age reflects the wisdom of God.  Creativity celebrates the creativity and diversity of God.  Learn to appreciate the things which are like Him in all people. 
This can be done for our enemies as well as our friends. It is good to remember that even the worst person on earth still bears something of the name of God in them.  For that reason, they are deserving of our love and appreciation.
"Thy Kingdom Come"   

Though we all are possessed of a portion of divine qualities, we are all fallen short of it.  Imagine what the person who is the object of your prayer might be, if he or she were fully in line with what God had for them.  Then, turn those thoughts to God. 
"Thy will be done"

 In this fallen world, we are all both sinners and victims.  Some of what happens to us in this world was not God's perfect will for us, but the result of our interaction with fallen people and fallen creation.  Pray that God's perfect will be done in their lives, so they can have the potential to realize their best and most perfect lives.
"Give us Thy daily bread" 

  Here is where we get into the physical and emotional needs which this person has, whether it be for healing, food,  a job,  etc.  We are praying not just for providence, but for them to have enough, so they can fully realize the life that can be theirs, if they live in submission to Him, and His kingdom.
"Forgive us our debts"  

 Unforgiveness holds us back from God's promises in our lives,  both our own unforgiveness, and not being forgiven.  It is impossible to pray for a person with all our hearts if we do not forgive them from the heart.  Pray that God will free them from the bondage of past sins,  both their own and others.
"Lead us not into temptation"  

 A person cannot realize theif full potential in God's kingdom if he or she falls into temptation. Pray that the person will have the strength to resist the false trails along the way to a full and meaningful life in submission to God.

"Deliver us from the Evil (one)"   

This is a recognition that there is an enemy--Satan--who is trying his hardest to get us off the path.  All prayer is warfare, since it is our own direct defense against Satan. Pray for protection, and thank God for the authority against the evil one that was given to us through the blood of Christ. 

Prayer for one person is not as easy as a short prayer lifted up now and then. To truly and fully pray for God's blessing takes time effort, involving the mind, will, feelings, and imagination.  To pray for others is not something we should take on lightly. But as we practice, it gets easier. 

My prayer is that I might have someone--anyone--who would take on the burden of prayer on my behalf, and that God would use me to take on that burden for some others.  Then I can start to think of them the way God sees them, as His children who need His help to be fully what He called them to be. 

Welcome to Esalvation.com

I was a counselor at a Billy Graham crusade when I was seventeen.  That was when I first learned to share the Gospel.  Later I learned to use the Four Spiritual Laws, that famous little mustard yellow booklet with the illustrations that has led millions to a commitment to Christ. I also learned the Roman Road, the Bridge,  Evangelism Explosion, and the Gospel glove.  All of them are ways of telling people the plan of Salvation, the road to God through Christ.   I still believe them all.  I have not changed in this one little bit.

Nevertheless, there is something has always bothered me.  Receiving Jesus is the most important decision in life, yet it seems so formal, so mechanical when we present it.  Christianity is not a hell insurance policy. It is an encounter with the living Christ. 

To illustrate,  think about the second most important decision we make in life--who we are going to marry.

Imagine logging onto an online dating site and seeing this profile:

"Hello, I'm(blank) and I have wonderful news for you!

"I love you and have a wonderful plan for your life!    

Until now, your separation from me has made that plan impossible. You distance has separated you from me.

"Fortunately, there is a solution!  You can reach me through this web site.  All you have to do is email me, and I am yours for life!

"Here is a sample email you can send:

"'(Blank), I recognize that I'm lonely.   This is wrong. I confess that you are my best hope for matrimony.   I want you as my husband.  From now on, I will be your loyal and obedient life. Thank you for taking me as your bride. Amen."

Check this box to indicate your agreement."

Sounds crazy, right?  If it is crazy for our second greatest decision, then why do we think it sufficient for our first great decision?   We assume in marriage that we should actually personally meet the person we are marrying, before we commit.  Sd do not enter into a lifetime partnership lightly. If we did,  then it is unlikely that we would last very long.

Yet somehow  we think that a trip down the church aisle or a prayer at the back of the book is sufficient to secure an eternal relationship with the Father.

Christianity cannot be this casual. It is a permanent, serious relationship we ought to take  seriously. We should encourage people to get to know Christ before they commit to Him. We should be encouraging caution to the altar, not speed.  People should fall in love with Jesus, not come to Him in moment of fear or desperation. Maybe this is why we see so many people fall away after initial  decisions. 

The facts of quick evangelism is correct--the feelings are not . We need to be overwhelmed by Jesus, dazzled by His presence and awestruck by His authority.  Then we will come to Him changed in heart and ready to begin a new life.  We will treat evangelism of the lost with more seriousness than liking His Facebook page. 

Here's the catch. If we are to help others experience Jesus, we have to be experiencing Him ourselves, not as a legal loophole for hell, but as a living,  loving ,  overwhelming Presence in our lives. 

Are we experiencing Jesus, is He truly the center of our lives?  He is more than a decision, He is a friend, a companion, and a Lord. 

Practicing the Presence of People

One writer who has greatly blessed me in his writings is Peter Scazzero.  Some time back I discovered his book The Emotionally Healthy Church, and thought it was the best thing I read on the importance of emotions in church life.  His follow up, Emotionally Healthy Spirituality,  though is much, much better. Scazzero relates our emotions to the spiritual disciplines.  In it he approaches the spiritual life in a practical and moving way.

One phrase Scazzero uses in discussing the disciplines of love stands out in my mind -- practicing the presence of people.  

I am well familiar with Brother Lawrence's devotional classic, The Practice of the Presence of God.  If you aren't, get it and read it immediately!  Brother Lawrence makes the point that we should strive at all times in all places to have an awareness of God with us,  whether we are washing dishes, raking leaves, or in prayer. 

Scazzero makes the same point about people.  We should also strive to have a constant ,immediate awareness of the people who surround us.  Modern urban society, with the necessary crowding of strangers together,  tends to make us defensive of strangers. We close off our minds so we look though them, not at them.  As a result,  people become less than human.

We need to always be aware that the people who inhabit our space are people like ourselves, having the same sins, hopes, dreams,  joys, comforts, and loves that we do.  They are made in God's image, just as we are.  They are also broken, fallible, frightened,  hurt,  happy,  and loved by God just as we are.

The opposite of practicing the presence of people  is the political mindset.  The political world view is seeing the world in terms of power--either power to help us or to hurt us.  We  either see others as votes, influences, or obstacles in our way, which must be manipulated,  maintained, or removed.

We see that view in the church all the time.  In our recent problems, we have reduced the other side to a political, not a human entity, allowing us the illusion that we can be a complete Body of Christ without them.  We can push them out of our circle without remorse, because we do not recognize their humanity.

But we are called to love our enemies, not destroy them.  We are called to love our brothers and sisters in Christ, not influence or dominate them.  We have to quit looking at one another as objects to help or oppose our side, and simply see them as people, for whom Jesus died.

Sit in a crowded room. Close your eyes. Listen to the conversations around you, without judging or prying, just listen. You will hear the hopes, dreams,  unhappiness, and happiness of everyone there.  Talk to people and let them carry the conversation. You will hear what Henri Nouwen once said, that there is infinite depth in a single human soul.  But when we see them only as means to an end,  we dehumanize them.

I have always felt this way about the church--it isn't new.  People who look to the past with nostalgia often forget that other people do not share their warm feelings about their personal past.  They will fight to keep things as they are, even if it means driving newcomers away. The newcomers don't count, in their opinion.  Contemporary churches, who insist that people who cherish the past are unimportant, do the same things. Others feelings don't matter.  Both sides think of their own comfort as more important than the comfort and well being of others.

Doctrinal and church disputes should not be trivialized. But neither should they be an excuse for  callousness.  People count and their opinions count--even those with whom we disagree. 

We can't stop disagreeing, nor can we stop defending what we think to be right.  But even then, we can still learn to practice the presence of people. 

Maundy Thursday Message

I became an ordained minister 31 years ago.  Since then, I have led or assisted in almost two hundred communion services. In most of them I read the “words of institution,” as they are found in 1 Corinthians 11:23-32.  Not until a couple of years ago, did I come to question what I thought was it meant, 27-32

 Therefore, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord.  A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup.  For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep. But if we judged ourselves, we would not come under judgment.  When we are judged by the Lord, we are being disciplined so that we will not be condemned with the world.

Let’s face it--how many people have you known who have gotten sick or died because of communion? How can communion make you sick?

Yet here it is in the Bible. According to Paul, communion caused some to be sick and others to “fall asleep” that is, to die. 

One interpretation is that if we take communion with a guilty conscience we are cursed by it. But I have known many unrepentant sinners to take communion, yet none of them have gotten sick by it.  Besides, if sinlessness were required for communion, none of us should take it.

Another explanation is that if we take it without understanding we are guilty. But again, there are ignorant people in every church. Some whole denominations misinterpret communion, in my opinion yet you don’t see them getting sick because of it. 

Here’s where I think we have it wrong. The ritual of communion was in Paul’s day very different from what it is today. In the early church, communion was the culmination of the agapae or love feast that came after the formal service. The church fathers, such as Ignatius of Antioch, Pliny the Younger, Hyppolitus of Rome, Tertullian, and many others.  Everyone shared a full meal together.  It was what we call today a covered dish dinner, eaten as a symbol of unity and love.

Anyone who has ever attended a church social knows what a great time it can be.  But we also know what headaches they can cause, as Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 11: 17-23.

In the following directives I have no praise for you, for your meetings do more harm than good. (In other words, Paul was really ticked off.)

18-19 In the first place, I hear that when you come together as a church, there are divisions among you, and to some extent I believe it. No doubt, there have to be differences among you to show which of you have God's approval.

Have you ever been to a covered dish in a church where people were not getting along?  The fellowship hall becomes a war room, full of whispered conversations and angry looks.  One group sits together at one table, while another group sits at another. 

Disagreements don’t bother Paul.  On the contrary, disagreements in the church are a healthy way of arriving at the truth. What bothered him was how they expressed their disagreement. Instead of seeing disagreements as opportunities for the common edification and growth, they were an occasion for pride, jealousy, even violence.

I once heard an elder threaten to lay a tire tool to the skull of another over a “theological disagreement.”

Some disagreements were over doctrine or practice. Some were over racial or ethnic differences. Many had to do with the way the church should relate to the world around them. Some were divisions between rich and poor.  All were harmful to the peace of the church.

But these divisions were not the only problems--they weren’t even the worst problem.

20-21 When you come together, it is not the Lord's Supper you eat, for as you eat, each of you goes ahead without waiting for anybody else. One remains hungry, another gets drunk.

People seemed to have forgotten that this was a “love” feast. In their minds, it was just another covered dish. They were not asking the question “How can I used this as an opportunity to show my brothers and sisters how much I care for them?”  Instead they were saying “How do I keep Peter from eating all the biscuits?”

The result of this was that those who were slower got nothing, while those who were faster got too much. So instead of it being a love feast, it was a gluttony festival—an all-you-can-eat night at Shoneys.

But even that was not the worst.

Don't you have homes to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you for this? Certainly not!

People watched what the others brought. Those who brought a lot thought they were getting cheated.  Those who brought nothing resented those who did, because they were not bringing more.  If people did not contribute to the meal they sent them home or made them get to the back of the line. Those who brought a lot got to go first. 

Paul contrasted their attitude with Jesus’ at the Last Supper

23-26  For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread,  and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me."   In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me."   For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

Paul begins. “The Lord Jesus On the same night he was betrayed.’

Why betrayed? Why not on the same night he was arrested?  On the same night he prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane? Why not on the same night he washed his disciples feet?

Jesus knew Judas was betraying him, but he washed his feet anyway. He made sure the Judas got a good meal before he went out to betray him. He loved him and continued to love him whether he betrayed him or not.  Jesus gave Judas a sop from his own hand, which meant that Judas had to be near Him in a place of honor.  Love people regardless of what they do to you.  Love your enemies and care for those with whom you disagree. 

He broke bread and said, “this is My body.” Jesus was saying he is going to have His body broken for us just like that bread.  He took the wine and said, “this is My blood.”  He would bleed for us, because He loved us. If Jesus can be broken and bleed for us, maybe we can be a little bit nicer to each other. 

For whenever you eat this bread or drink this cup, you show forth the Lord’s death until He comes.

Whenever you sit down to eat together, remember who you are. You are Christ’s Body, held together by the sacred sacrifice of Christ on the Cross. He bled and died for each one of us.  When you sit at the table, we show ourselves to be His family.

In this context, verses 27 through 32 finally sense.  I have never seen anyone get sick of die because he or she did not understand the mysteries of communion, but I have seen people get sick and even die because of bitterness, jealousy, and unforgiveness.  I have not seen people get sick and die from grape juice and crackers, but I have seen churches get sick and die because they were forgotten by the people in the pew next to them, who regarded them not a sister or brother, but as a set decoration for the drama that is their more important lives.

When we have communion, where is the Body of Christ?  The answer is easy--we are it.  The Body of Christ are the people with whom we share this feast.  When we don’t see Him there, and instead  see them as merely human, then we miss the reason for communion and might as well eat juice and crackers alone in our rooms. 

I urge you to look around this room, and see the Body of Christ, not just eating juice and crackers together, but  humbling ourselves before the Lord in repentance and sorrow. Then we discern the Body together. This is the body that should concern us, not food and drink, but flesh and blood.   

For God So Liked the World

One of the first religious books I remember reading was CS Lewis' The Four Loves. Lewis describes four kinds of love based on four Greek words for love--Sturge, Eros, Phileos, and Agape.


Here they are in grossly oversimplified terms.

Sturge is a passing enjoyment, such as "I love baseball" or "I love chocolate."

Eros, is a sensual, consuming passion, obsession, or addiction.

Phleos is friendship love, the love in commonly shared relationship or experiences.

Then there is agape love. This divine love is only possible fully through Divine intervention. It is a sacrificial love, as Christ loved on the cross. It is not a love because of liking anything about a person, but liking in spite of everything unlikeable about a person. This love is the blessed, chaste love of a true saint.

When I read that book, I wanted to be a true saint. (I still do, though I have never achieved it.) This was the love I longed to have--a love that does not depend about liking anything about people, but only depends on the love God has for poor lost sinners such as ourselves.

Agape love is not so much an act of he heart as of the will. It is, as Finney put it, a "decision to seek the highest good of another." I can decide to love my enemy, and seek his highest good without having to like him. Agape love is sacrificial, giving ourselves to others.

That was my understanding in my days of youthful idealism.

Since I have grown older, though, I have come to realize that agape love, though it may be the highest, is not the only kind of love God wants us to have for others. Agape allows us to love people we do not like. But it does not settle the issue of whether or how we should also like them.

We need to be careful about "sloppy agape." That is a general and ideal love, but not personal and specific. It is not enough tolerate the lost, but to welcome them. We may claim we love a person in Jesus, while detesting everything about them. This kind of love is not love at all, but paternalism and condescension--a misuse of the doctrine of Christian charity.

A purely ideal concept of love lacks both passion and staying power. We may be able to love those we do not like, but we cannot keep it up for long. Sooner or later, no matter how pious we may act, our love needs to grow into real, honest affection or it will not last.

Think about broccoli for a moment. Many people hate broccoli. (Not me, I actually like it.) Those who hate broccoli may be determined to eat healthy, and they know broccoli is good for them, so they force it down their throats. But how long can they keep doing this without either developing a taste for it, or dropping it from their menus?

Or take marriage. A person may marry another as a result of prearranged marriage or out of a sense of duty. But unless that person develops a geniune liking for their spouse, that marriage will be unsatisfying for both. This is not to suggest that people should divorce if they do not feel love, but rather that we find something likeable about our spouses if we do not already have it. If ideal love does not turn into honest affection, then that marriage is doomed.

We can suppress our feelings, but it will wear us out in the end. No one can work at something they do not like to do forever without respite. We will not stay with people we honestly do not care for, without making them and us miserable. At some time, our feelings will conquer us.

This idea of liking as well as loving is absolutely essential for the spreading of the Gospel. For hundreds of years we have been preaching evangelism. Also for hundreds of years, the majority of Christians have simply ignored the call. They love the world, in a spiritual sense, and do not want to see others go to hell. But they do not like the world. Many Christians find the current age so abhorent that they want nothing to do with it. They move into fortresses of their own making, isolating themselves from "sinners" so they will not be contaminated by the things of the world, whether or not that world has anything to do with the gospel itself. We make excuses for hating the world around us, condemning aspects of music, dress and language that do not fit our cultural, non-spiritual norms. We do this to further emphasize our differences with the culture around us. We do this for the same reason teenagers of my generation wore their hair long or dressed in miniskirts--because we wanted to be different from our parents' generation. It's not that we didn't love our parents and grandparents. We just didn't like them, or anything about them. As we grew up, we learned better, when our children did the same to us.

John 3:16 begins "For God so loved the world." God does not just love the world, he honestly likes it. God may not like what the world does or what it believes, but God, like the parent of a rebellious teenager, sees something of Himself in them. He experiences genuine affection for us, as well as loving us in an esoteric sense.

Many Christians cannot grasp this. That is because many of us have an "all or nothing" mentality regarding our likes and dislikes. If we do not like a man's politics or religious opinions, we drop him in a bin in our mind that is labeled "Don't like." If we agree with a person, we drop him in the "like" bin. I don't believe God thinks this way. He recognizes the fact that there is very little difference between those we like and don't like. We have the same DNA. We were created in God's image. We are affected by the same sinful nature. There are actions, ideas, and attitudes which we should not like, that's true. But it up to God to decide who is or is not condemned in their sin. Even in the worst of us, there is something to like and admire.

Phileos love, that is friendship love, is built on commonalities. Our common interest, passions, and failures make us far more like each other than different.

We share similar interests. Among men, it may be more effective evangelism goes on at the lake or on the golf course than in the church. Christians who golf with non-Christians forge a friendship which provides a bridge for the Gospel to get to their hearts. Those places where we share neutral activities with others--the gym, the mall, or the marketplace, become those places where we come to like unbelievers, which leads to loving them. Some Christians are more afraid of unbelievers affecting them than they are excited about affecting unbelievers themselves. We share the same passions. Not long ago, I was asked to hold a funeral for a relative of someone in my church who had been a lesbian. The grief of her "significant other" was no less real than our grief for a spouse. Pain is pain no matter who has it. A sensitive, caring believer will recognize the pain in others, whether or not that pain is theologically justified. Jesus wept over Lazarus, even though He was about to raise him for the dead. He did not chide Mary and Martha for their lack of faith. Our own pains enable us to understand the pains of others.

We also share the same sins. We once lived in the same apartment building with an unmarried couple who were addicted to drugs. We got to know them and talked to them about their problem, even though we never used drugs. But I found that my own struggles with food were not that different in form from their struggles with drugs. It differed only in consequence and intensity.

We believers are comfortable with the fact that we are sinners. We just don't like to admit we have sinned, or have anything in common with those we consider to be really bad sinners. Our sins are small, but their sins are big. We regard ourselves as sinners in a general, esoteric sense, but do not like to admit to any particular sin. Yet it is our admission of our fallenness and failures which helps the unbeliever believe that God means it when he says "I forgive." It is our failure, not our successes that give us the ability to befriend the lost. We were lost, and now are found. We still sin, but we still find grace.

God doesn't just love the world. He likes it. He enjoys the enjoyable things about it, even though he hates the things that are broken. If we follow in His footsteps, then we ought to do the same.

The Chrietmas Bell

It was a rainy day about a week before Christmas in Atlanta, when the world was swathed in soggy shades of gray.  I was in the middle of my Christmas funk.  It's not that I don't like the season, but after a while, the season doesn't seem to like me.  I was in a round of church parties and school events. It had been a week since I had a single night off. 
I had always hoped for a Norman Rockwell Christmas,  with snow, carolers, festive people and glowing smiles. But no Christmas in my entire life has fully lived up to my expectations.  I have never seen a snowy Christmas.  Instead, they are always cold and soggy like this one or dry and sunny, witih a dry, brown winter landscape.  That momnt of quiet we all seeom to yearn for at the end of the year, escapes us.  Replaced instead by social pressures and frantic shopping.  It's business in high gear at the end of the year, which makes us think that the whole world is one giant treadmill.  Sometimes, I feel I am like the guy at the gym who turns up the treadmill too high, and has to run as hard as he can to keep brom being slung off.  One day, the Christmas machine, and the whole society t supports will come crashing down on our ears.  We cannot keep this up foreve.
this particular day, I was trying to finish my last bit of shopping with my last bit of money.  I awas at K-Mart walking the aisles of the Christmas section. 
Have you ever heard the word kitsch? It refers to the kind of cheap junk which is neither valueaboe, useful, or even tasteful. Chrstmas is kitchy season, to be sure.  The aisle of K Mart Christmas department are covered with it.  It thought about all those people whose livelihood depends upon selling junk we neither need nor want. 
One particular kitschy ornament caught my eye.  It was a plastic Christmas bell, made in Hong Kong.  There was a plastic ball attached to a white string.  It was mostly white with red and green paint badly painted on the top part.  I pulled the string on it, and it began to pay "Silent Night" as badly as I had ever heard it play.
The tone was off, the timing was off,  and it was barely recognizable. But you could hear the tune, nevertheless.  They words came back to me.
Silent Night Holy Night All is celm, all is bright
Round yon virgin mother nd child. Holy Infant so tender and mild.
Sleep in heavenly peace. Sleep in heavenly peace.
Tears welled up in my eyes.  I don't know why.  I had heard th song so many times before in this frantic season, but somehow I had not heard it. 
You wonder where Christmas is, in the middle of the hectic holidays/  Its right there, in the core of our souls. In It's never left, but hides underneath all the glitter and junk of the season. Secular holiday songs ad parties can never fully wipe it out.  Commericalism cannot hide it forever. It's there, buried under the pile like a seed ready to spout.
Heavenly peace. It's there.  You may not see it or feel it but it's there, deep down underneath it all.  God's love in human form. All it takes is a little imagination and a change of attitude to see it. If we look at the outer Christmas, it's a wasteful, commercial mess. But if we look behind it, we see the love of the Father, the sacrifice of he Son, and the touch of the Holy Spirit. 
Christmas is what we make it. It's We shoose the Christmas we will have, just as we choose the lives we live all year.  We can focus on love or we can focus on obligation and anxiety.  Love prevails under the weight of the world, in the silent night of love. 

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is more than just an act of love. Thanksgiving is love. It is the fabric of the communal experience that holds us together.

Think about a football game. When a quarterback makes a touchdown, one side stands up and cheers. They are giving thanks. True, they are led by girls in short skirts instead of ministers in robes, but the action is the same. Those who are fans of one side rejoice. Their affection for one side, expressed in gratitude for their successes, is the common experience that makes them one. This support of one side might be the only thing that holds them together, but that is enough.

Think about a family saying grace in a restaurant. What distinguishes them from the other diners? Simply that they gave public thanks for the meal. The act of giving thanks in sincerity is enough to make them all one.

Unity comes about through common experience experienced with the same emotions. We are held together by love, hate, lust, or desire, but in this we are one. Mostly, though it is what we are thankful for that makes us one.

I think we could make a case for saying that the act of giving thanks to each other brings us together. AS we express thanks for another, we are accepting them as one. Together we become one family, one circle of friends, or one people. The more thankful we are, the more we will express it. The more we express it, the more thankful we become.

Thankfulness to god is especially important. When we give thanks to God, we acknowledge the rightness of the world. We declare ourselves in harmony with the Creator. We cannot grumble or complain that the world is not to our liking when we thank God for what he is done.

So this next week, let's thank God for our blessing. But let's also give thanks to one another for the blessings we have received. This will strengthen our bonds with each other, and make us more truly a family, a nation, and a harmonious society.

The Witnessing Life

Let’s talk about lostness. Lostness means that people are lost without Jesus. Paul said “There is just one name on heaven and on earth by which we must be saved—Christ Jesus.” Jesus said “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” If we believe that these verses, then we must also believe there is something wrong with this world. It’s spinning out of control. It’s like a flock without a shepherd, But we don’t see it because in our hearts we just don’t see the world as lost. John Eldridge writes in his book Desire, “Something awful has happened, something terrible. Something worse, even than the fall of Man. For in that greatest of all tragedies, we merely lost Paradise—and with it, everything that made life worth living. What has happened since is unthinkable. We’ve gotten used to it. We’re broken in to the idea that this is just the way things are. The people who walk in great darkness have adjusted their eyes. The only thing worse than the fall of Man is the failure of man to see that he has fallen. We have entered a dangerous realm—the realm of the uncaring, and of despair. When people are in peril, others rise to be heroes. In the recent crash of a jet in the New York harbor, the Staten Island ferries headed for the downed plane. Ordinary passengers hauled up those stranded in the water. They literally took the shirts off their backs to cover the soaked survivors. They understood the lostness of those passengers. Without help, those people would be dead. But every day, we go to the store, sit in theaters next to people who are under the threat of eternal lostness, and we do nothing. True, death is not written on their faces. But underneath their lives are broken, their hopes are broken, and their hearts are broken. We see the evidence of that in divorce rates, in the drug trade and the flesh trade and all that is going on around us. It is in the greed of corporations and the violence of street crime. The world is lost, and we do nothing. Christians have a curious relationship to the world. We know it is temporary. We know that not to concern ourselves with worldly things. Even so we have to live in this world. So we compromise. We give space to our fears of losing prestige. We snuggle up to the world’s temptations losing ourselves along the way. Paul writes in Romans 10:1-4 Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved. For I can testify about them that they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge. Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness. Christ is the end of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes. Paul said this not of the Greco-Roman world, but the world of his Jewish heritage. He could have compared his God-fearing relatives to the pagans, and missed their lostness. After all, they were so much better! Just because they didn’t know Jesus didn’t make them bad people. But Paul saw through their religiosity and realized that these people knew nothing. Paul’s Jewish friends were sincere, but that didn’t matter. Sincerity only counts if you are sincerely right. Nowhere but religion would anyone dare to suggest sincerity was enough. If a jury convicts and innocent man, does sincerity count? If a doctor amputates the wrong leg, does sincerity count? So why should sincerity count when it comes to souls? The Jewish misunderstanding of God was hurting people and sending them to hell. Sincerity made no difference. Can we be content to see the world go to hell, and do nothing? Can we take a “live and let live” attitude, and let the rest of the world perish? Magician Penn Jillett --no friend of Christians—had an interesting reaction when a Christian offered him a Bible. He took it. Later he said, “How much do you have to hate somebody not to proselytize? How much do you have to hate someone to believe that everlasting life is possible and not tell them?” For once, he was right. When we do not tell others, we are not being polite. We do not care whether they go to hell. How much do we have to hate a person to do that? Many wonder how a God of love could ever make such a place as hell. Honestly, I don’t know. It’s not my job to understand God’s mysteries. Our question needs to be how we can claim to love others, and not care if they know Jesus? Leave it to God to determine their ultimate fate--just love them enough to tell them about Jesus. So here’s our challenge for the week--“Make sharing our faith a natural and normal part of our lives.” When we talk about witnessing, most Christians get weak in the knees. It’s frightening to us! But what does Paul say? (vs14) How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?” Sharing our faith is scary. But whenever we are afraid to do something there is only one cure—do it! If we’re afraid of sharing, then do it daily. Plan it in your schedule. “Pick up groceries. Wash the dog. Spend time with the neighbor.” My challenge to you is to do just that. And I will tell you how. First, pray for our neighbors. Put your neighbors specifically on your prayer list. I believe that God will honor your prayers. Even if you don’t get a chance to share, someone else will, if we pray for them repeatedly. Second, meet our neighbors. Many Christians are allergic to nonbelievers. We’re afraid they embarrass us. Of course they will! But if they were members of our own family, I’m sure we would find a way to overlook their rude behavior, for he sake of love. Sometimes we have to overlook minor faults to achieve major results. Third, reach for our neighbors. Look for ways to show our neighbors that we care. It is important to earn the respect others before we share with them. That is people must first welcome the messenger before we can receive the message. Finally, share with our neighbors. Build a bridge to their souls. Then we can authentically offer what Jesus means to us. Let them know what Jesus can do for them. Bishop Stephen Neill is famous for defining witnessing as “one beggar telling another beggar where to get bread.” If you have eaten the bread of life, then don’t keep it to yourselves. Share it. Ask God for opportunities to share with others. Or not, if you choose. But if you choose the latter--ask yourself Paul’s question “How can they hear without a preacher?”