loving the person

We all have issues. Sadly sometimes we lose fellowship with someone over them. It might be over a sin, or not, but our attitude because of it can become a sin. Perhaps it's over something we don't like about someone, an annoyance. It may or may not involve sin, but it gets to us, just the same.

I had one such problem recently and it came to me somehow, that I need to make a clear distinction between the person, and what I perceived to be a wrong attitude coming from them. After that thought came to me and I sought to do it, almost immediately, as God would have it, this person and I had a friendly conversation and it just seemed like a cloud had been lifted so that the sun was shining down on us and our relationship.

I find that I need to keep putting this in practice with something like the axiom in mind, "Hate the sin, but love the sinner." Or simply look over their faults and shortcomings, and see the person, as one like myself. One loved greatly by God. Having flaws and sins. But a person with whom relationship with, should be sacred, since we are made in God's image. And hopefully they will learn to cut for me the same slack.

What would you like to share here on this?

the gospel and relationships

The gospel is more about relationships than it is about law. In other words at the heart of the gospel is the restoration of broken relationships between God and humans, and between humans with each other, as well as with God's creation. Sin breaks relationships, and the gospel restores them.

God in Christ did this by becoming one of us in the Incarnation. God became flesh or human to restore us humans into a relationship with himself. The heart of the law is love to God and love to our neighbor. When we break God's law by our sin, we're violating relationships. So it's more than just disobeying a command, but it's breaking or diminishing a relationship.

We as Christians should be known for our love for God, our love for each other, our love for all people including even our enemies, and our love for God's creation. We should be known for that, that is what should mark us.

I'm again rereading Scot McKnight's fine book, Embracing Grace: A Gospel for All of Us, and it's a good and (always) timely reminder of just how big the gospel is, and its aim. Its aim is nothing less than love, which of course is the heart of God in the gospel as we know in probably the most beloved Bible verse of all.

As we work on understanding and more importantly living out the gospel, we need to live out this love which Jesus carried out to the full, and by which God has reconciled the world to himself in Jesus, so that all sinners might find their true home and be at home with God and others and look forward to the completion of this beginning of the new creation in Jesus.