Saturday, March 11

Will we ever get it right?


Jesus summarized the all of the scriptures in just four sentences. When he was asked what the greated commandment was, he answered, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All of the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." Matthew 22:37-40.

So, if we can do two things, love God and love everyone, everything will work itself out. Theoretically, it should be simple. Show love to everyone all the time. If people don't like you, or don't like what you stand for, you love them. If people are for something you are against, you love them. We aren't supposed to hate our enemies, we're supposed to love them. Why do Christians seem to have so much trouble getting this right?

Far too often, it seems like the first instinct of a Christian is to punish those we disagree with. A secular company doesn't act, or require everyone to act, like you think a Christian should? Boycott them. You can find boycott lists all over the internet. Sometimes it's no wonder that all the world sees in the church is hypocrites. We preach love, but often don't practice it. We claim that Jesus came to save sinners, but it seems like what we really want is for them to be punished.

Followers of Christ should be a light to the world. We should show the way, and draw everyone to Christ. Everything we do should be based in love. Of course, this leads to its own set of issues. How can we try to impact our world for the better, but still make sure that in trying to make change we are really acting in love?

4 comments:

TheBGRT said...

Bravo!!! I often think of this myself when I am thinking about Youth Ministry. Tim, I sometimes think that you are in the wrong profession, that maybe you should have been a Pastor. However I am thankful that you are not, for you would not be the Tim that thinks like you do if you were a Pastor. Sometimes the greatest and purest views of the Faith comes from those that are not "trained" to be teachers or preachers, but those that think outside the box, just like Jesus.

Unknown said...

Well said Tim. Well said. As a confession of sin; I find myself in the "punishing mode" far too often. Finding the heartspace of grace and compassion dose not come naturally to me.

No matter how long we've been christians. No matter how veteran we think we are in this faith thing. We need constant reminding that WE NEED JESUS.

Thanks for the reminder,

Scott

Tigpan said...

Ash_Loren...you would have been so much fun in my business ethics class! :-)

In response to the posting....
How do we "love the sinner, but hate the sin"...we don't. No where in the word of God does it say that, God's commandment says "Love God, Love each other". No where in there does it say, oh but hate each other's sin. I don't know about you, but I have my own sin to hate/mourn (Matt 5:4). So where does the porn industry, or the sweatshops, or the use of God's creatures for testing, etc etc etc..come in.
I don't know....
What I do know is that God spent his time here on earth in bars and places "unfit" for the "church" of his day to be seen, and was called out by them for it. He did not come into the world to condemn it (John 3:17)...but to free it, and in freeing it he gave us two commands. "Love God, love others".
The second can be the hardest thing ever on the planet...EVER...yet that is what we have been called to do. Period. Full stop.
Does this make sense?

Tim Gleason said...

I've always wondered if boycotting for issues like sweat shops (which is not something I was thinking about when I originally wrote this post) is whether or not boycotting will really get the results we're looking for.

Retailers like Wal-Mart use smaller companies for their soft goods like clothing. It's not the major labels. Even if we are successful with boycotting these smaller companies, will the result be that they change their working conditions in the plants they currently have? Or will they just close their doors? Or, if they do agree to provide better conditions, will they move to a place that requires a lower base salary, so that improving conditions will have a smaller impact on their bottom line? If they shut down or move their plants (which I think is at least as likely as providing improved conditions in existing plants), have we really helped the people working there? Sure, they don't have to work in sweat-shop conditions, but they don't have jobs any more.

Bigger brand names can command higher prices, just because they are perceived as "better." Nike is making such a big profit on their shoes, just because they are Nike, that they can afford to provide better working conditions. Plus, the negative publicity regarding sweat shops is something that they don't want. So a boycott has a chance of working against a company like Nike.

I'm just not sure that there will be the same effect on a small, lesser known company, like those used by Wal-Mart. Plus, there is the issue of how much of the fault is due to the retailer and how much is due to the manufacturer.

Now, I'm certainly not trying to say that we should support sweat shops, or that we should just shrug our shoulders and say "oh well, that's just how things are." But I find myself wondering if there isn't a better way...