Over the past decade, it has been refreshing to see Christians have a greater awareness of people’s thoughts and feelings. Rather than quickly judging and labeling people, they take time to listen to their stories and consider their hurts and desires. This is a good thing. In so doing, however, many have made a damning mistake: they have lost sight of God’s thoughts and desires. In their compassion for people, they have ignored the holiness of God. They have forgotten that what God feels about an issue dwarfs what any human feels. Or every human.
“Let God be true though every one were a liar.” (Rom. 3:4)
In an effort to be sensitive to others, we often lose sight of truth. When we do this, we no longer help people but damn them. True compassion takes into account far more than what a person feels today; it takes into account what he or she will feel on judgment day. What some do in the name of being open-minded and compassionate is actually done out of self-love and cowardice. We want to be accepted, so we listen and coddle but refused to rebuke. If that is love, then the prophets, apostles, and Jesus were the most unloving people to ever walk the planet.
On the contrary, Jesus loved so deeply that He was willing to suffer a lifetime of rejection, even rejection from His Father on the cross. Jesus never lost sight of God’s holiness and the offensiveness of sin. He suffered for speaking truth, showing us that true love is often rejected. This was the way of Jesus. This is the way of love.
Francis Chan appears this Monday on LIFE TODAY. This is an excerpt from Letters To The Church by Francis Chan. Copyright ©2018 Crazy Love Ministries. Published by David C Cook. Used by permission.
