Learning to Love, Learning to Release
“If it were easy, everybody would be doing it”
The line above twins us of the importance of dedication and perseverance. Most significant achievements require repetition, sacrifice and patience. The sixth chapter of “Giving Up Something Bad for Lent” by James Moore challenges us to “give up pettiness.” Returning to the Gospel of Luke, Moore focuses upon the words of Jesus “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them” (6:23). It seems to be so common to match or escalate emotions, especially when the emotions are negative.
Moore provides an interesting definition of pettiness — harboring “feelings that are out of proportion to the events or circumstances that provoke them.” Nursing hatred sometimes seems as natural as feeding. Much of the love that we embrace are carefully taught. Many of the hates that we embrace are carefully taught or passively learned.
Moore includes a poignant example of the ways that children can learn to hate church because of the statements and actions of adults. A couple had become angry with the church because of a position the church had taken in the 1990s on a social issue. After five years of complaining, “the couple decided to come back to the church. But they ran into something they hadn’t counted on. Their children didn’t want to have anything to do with the church now.” Moore noted that the couple had “taught their children to hate the church and its people.”
Loving those who love us and being nice to those who are nice to us seems axiomatic. Loving our enemies and loving those who hate us seems unnatural, unwise and unhealthy. However, loving our enemies and doing good are exactly what we are instructed to do by Jesus. The instructions are not intended to encourage humiliation or abuse. Instead, these instructions remind us of several basic realities—some who hate are motivated by fear, ignorance and a paucity of options. Some hate because they have nothing else to offer.
As disciples, we have the privilege of demonstrating a type of compassionate accountability not only to those who may hate us, but also to those who look to us to learn the loving ways of Christ. The irony of Palm Sunday is the realization that sims of the same people who hailed Jesus as he entered Jerusalem were the same angry hate-filled mob who demanded his crucifixion. In these remaining days of Lent, invite someone to help you choose to love even when anger and hatred seem so much easier.
Together we grow. Together we share. Together we serve. We’ll see you in worship and in class.
In Christ,
Jon McCoy
