The Dreaded Laugh Track

Leave it to good ol' Roger to stir up all kinds of trouble! If you know Roger, you know that when he leads a bible study, it is like seeing a whole meal in front of you, yet only getting one piece of meat at a time to chew on, and chew on, and chew on. While some like to gobble down their food, I love to eat this way. Well at least in bible study...see me at the Round Table Buffet and it is gobble gobble gobble, (but I'll save gluttony for another time).

So Rog ask the question: can you be a Christian and not love other Christians? It comes from Ephesians 1:15For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints. After some discussion about what love is, we generally said love is a choice we make and that we don't have to like others, but we must love them (specifically believers). So I left feeling pretty good, nice and warm inside (could have been the Starbucks). Wouldn't you just know it. No sooner had I got a few blocks down the road when that weird Jesus guy starts stirring things up. "Love huh? That's a tough one." Heard Him clear as day. "Lord, you know, I don't have it down pat. But I choose to love, but I don't like everyone". Don't you hate laugh tracks on TV? Kind of what I heard right then. Yep, the sound I'm getting pretty familiar with...God's laugh. "Yeah, about that..." He said. Know I know enough that when God says 'Yeah, about that...." that there is a whole lot more He is going to be saying in the coming days. And this was no exception. I knew right away what I was supposed to do: go straight to the Word and look up the verses on love. And there are a ton. So I'll just jot down a few choice ones God laid out for me:

1. 1John3:16This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. Put that together with Romans 5:6-8 and you have the truest action ever of love. "So you don't like someone, but you love them enough to lay down your life for them? Tell me how that is working out for you?"
2. 17If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Then for good measure, God has me read Mathew 25:31-46, the sheep and the goats. Go ahead, take a look at that one...I dare you...I double dog dare you. "About those assets of yours you count....how important are those for you to hang on to when others have needs? Not important? Than why do you still hold onto them so tightly?"
3. 18Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. "Tell me how you love when you gossip, when you talk negative about someone in the name of 'caring', when you say 'how are you' and don't really care enough to hear the answer or see the hurt in their eyes. Tell me how you don't like someone but can overcome that to love them with actions? And do it with total love, not begrudgingly...."
4. 1 Cor 13:1 If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don't love, I'm nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. The Message translation."So how is that christianese working for you? Are your actions matching your words? " And I can see Jesus reaching to hand me a can of WD-40!
5. Col 3:12-14 So, chosen by God for this new life of love, dress in the wardrobe God picked out for you: compassion, kindness, humility, quiet strength, discipline. Be even-tempered, content with second place, quick to forgive an offense. Forgive as quickly and completely as the Master forgave you. And regardless of what else you put on, wear love. It's your basic, all-purpose garment. Never be without it (Message). "How's that wardrobe of yours doing? Want to talk about 'quiet strength? (uh no, I don't said I). How about forgiving quickly? How about forgiving completely? How about forgiving as I forgave you? Not when you want to, but all the time. Did you see my word? It said all-purpose garment. Never be without it.".

Well that was all that God said I needed to work on. He said I had all the other lover verses down pat. Opps, there is that laugh track again! Okay, maybe after the five above, God decided to have mercy and stop me from reading more. It was plenty to think about and work on.

Bottom line? I fool myself by thinking I love people but don't like them. I disguise my judgemental attitude by calling it 'dislike'. I don't have patience for people 'not like me' and say 'we just have our differences' when in fact I think the differences make them 'strange'. I have issues against people that have hurt me and I shove it down in my spirit and say 'not a big deal', when in reality it is unforgiveness...a huge deal. I am so often clothed in my own thoughts, desires, lusts and hurts that I never even bother consider putting on my all purpose garment. And off I go to church, work, family gatherings, etc...And I wonder why my life so often yields no fruit. Why my witness for Christ is so unpowerful. Why my prayers go unanswered.

I can remember singing 'and they will know we are Christians by our love'. And I have to ask myself: will they?