I love people but sometimes they frustrate me. I was having a conversation with a woman from church who said she was thinking about changing Sunday School classes. Why, you ask? Apparently, a conversation in class turned to people of different ethnicities and the comments that were made were preceded with the phrase "Those people......." This kind of thing breaks my heart. How is it that fellow believers, those who understand that we are all sinners and that God made and loves us all, could have these attitudes?
It is hard to step into church, a place that should be safe and filled with love, and find that there are those within those walls who put up barriers that separate us from each other. It is understandable that we all have attitudes or feelings about individuals. We are human after all. Those who have hurt us or offended in any way challenge us. Yet, if a purple person hurts me, I am to forgive. Jesus calls us to forgiveness. We receive forgiveness from him every single day when we ask him. To lump all purple people into the same group and let negative attitudes about that group develop within us is sin, plain and simple.
I believe that it is within our human nature to want to feel better than others, to judge others, and to think less of others. It is a part of our sin nature that we are always comparing ourselves and condemning each other.
God saves us and calls us to be something other than just human. As believers in Christ, we become so much more than human and we have the power, through Him, to reject that human, sin nature. I struggle myself with judging those who have racist views. I have to force myself to remember that I, too, have sinned and will sin. I ask the Lord to help me to forgive them and pray for them. Sometimes, it takes me a little while to get to that place as He gently reminds me that "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God."
I know that we live in an imperfect place but God's house, his place of worship should be a place where all should feel welcome and all remember how valuable each and every one of us is to God. White, brown, purple - it matters not the color of the skin. What matters is remembering to love each other. We are not those people - we are His people.
When I am confronted with these wrong attitudes it angers me, it breaks my heart and it causes me to pray. I take a deep breath and I ask the Lord to have mercy on us all as we seek to become children that please him. God help me, help us to look beyond the exterior and see what you see -- your beloved children who you died for in order to make a way for us to have relationship with You.
Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. ~~ 1 John 4:7-8
