Greetings Dear Reader,
Some years ago, my friend Meghan challenged me on my use of
the word evil. She proposed that I used
it too liberally. Her thought made me
question my use of this word and it impacted me to the point that I greatly
reduced what I call evil.
Ponder something you actually hate. Note that I said something and not someone. We will get to that. For example, I hate lima beans. You can do anything you wish to try and make
them palatable but I hate them. In truth,
however, I should not hold hatred in my heart for a bean. It is an overuse of the word hate. I do dislike them more than most foods in the
world. They have value whether I like
them or not and many people enjoy them.
They have nutrition and fiber that are valuable. Were I starving, I would still eat them. It is not proper for me to hate something
that has genuine value.
To move our exercise in thinking along, ponder someone you
hate. It does not matter who it is. Think about his or her name and ponder your
hatred. Hating a person is not like disliking
a thing. We immediately summon a list of
offenses that justify our hatred. We
ponder all the wrong things that a person does, stands for, or is. We recount the wrongs they do that are worse
than the wrongs we do and declare them unworthy of love.
We even grow to hate someone we once proclaimed to
love. Sometimes it is even someone we
vowed to love for life. You see, hating
anyone is intrinsically wrong. In the eyes
of the Father, there are two things that are absolutely true. The first is that we are commanded to love everyone
to the degree that the Father loves us. This
is the essence of the second commandment.
We cannot obey the first command, to love God with all of our heart, mind,
soul, and strength if we do not love other humans in every circumstance.
Instead, we store up offenses that others commit to feeding the
hunger of our hatred and still, that hatred is never satisfied. Since we are to love everyone and love and hate
cannot abide in the same space, we cannot afford to hate anyone. When we give space to hatred, we must
constantly feed it to keep it alive. We
must relive the wrongs done to us and make them superior in our minds to the
love that Christ has for the person we hate.
In short, we must declare our judgment of the individual superior to
Christ’s judgment of him or her.
The only honest conclusion that I can draw, Dear Reader, is
that there is very little room in following Christ for hatred of any kind. There is room to hate evil. However, it is vital that we only call evil
what God calls evil. A person may commit
evil deeds and we are allowed to hate those deeds. We are not, however, given permission to hate
the person. When Jesus confronts the
issue of people who refuse to own their wrongdoing, he makes it clear how we
are to treat them. After trying to lovingly
get them to see and abandon their wrongs, he says if it is unsuccessful, treat
them like tax collectors and pagans.
This begs a very important question. How did Jesus treat tax collectors
and pagans? He had dinner with
them. He loved them and invited them to
follow him.
You see, Dear Reader, the reason that hatred has to be constantly
fed is that we are never supposed to dine on it. It does not satisfy. The only thing we are to hate is evil and we are
to show that hatred by loving those who do evil things beyond their actions in
hope that they can be reclaimed. It is
not avoiding hatred that matters here.
It is loving everyone to the degree that there is no room for
hatred. It may be that all evil is
rooted in failing to love others, including the Father, as we should.
Wishing you joy in the journey,
Aramis Thorn
Mat 13:52 So Jesus said to them, "That is why every
writer who has become a disciple of Christ’s rule of the universe is like a
homeowner. He liberally hands out new and old things from his great treasure
store.”
(͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Contacts for Aramis
Thorn:
#aramisthorn
Bookings: aramisthorn@aramisthorn.com
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