Loving Others Is Easy… Until It Isn’t
“Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.”
— Romans 15:7
I love this verse.
I also struggle with it.
It sounds so simple: Accept one another as Christ accepted you.
But then people get involved.
People who disagree with me. People who irritate me. People who disappoint me. People who interrupt me at exactly the wrong time. People who say something they probably didn’t mean the way I took it—but I take it that way anyway.
And suddenly, accepting one another doesn’t seem quite so simple.
God has accepted me as I am. He knows every flaw, every bad decision, every selfish thought, every time I’ve failed Him—and He loves me anyway.
That is an amazing thing when you really think about it. I can be pretty annoying.
God knows me completely. There is nothing hidden from Him. He knows the parts of me I happily show the world and the parts I would rather keep tucked away. And still, He loves me.
So why is it sometimes so hard for me to extend that same grace to someone else?
Who Am I to Decide?
If I’m truthful, it can be much easier to find fault than to extend grace.
I can criticize. I can cast blame. I can compare myself to someone else and decide I’m doing a little better than they are. Sometimes I even create an imaginary list of qualifications people must meet before I decide they deserve my acceptance.
Of course, I would never actually write the list down.
That would look terrible.
But in my mind? Oh, the list can be there.
Then I think about Jesus.
Can you imagine Jesus picking and choosing who is worthy of His love the way we sometimes do?
“This one is acceptable.”
“That one has messed up too much.”
“She annoys Me.”
“He doesn’t think the way I think.”
“They aren’t My kind of people.”
It sounds ridiculous when we put those words in the mouth of Jesus, doesn’t it?
Yet sometimes I live as though I have been given the authority to make those decisions myself.
Who am I to decide who is worthy when Jesus already settled the question at the cross?
All are worthy of love. All are invited. All are welcome.
Not because any of us have earned it, but because of what Christ has done for us.
And that includes me.
The Easy People
Some people are easy to love.
You know who they are.
They encourage us. They laugh at our jokes. They check on us when we’re struggling. They agree with us most of the time. They remember our birthdays. They say thank you. They appreciate the things we do for them.
I can love those people all day long!
But Jesus never said, “Love the people who make loving them easy.”
He said:
“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”
— John 13:34
There’s the difficult part.
As I have loved you.
That changes everything.
Jesus’ love isn’t based on whether I’m pleasant today. His love doesn’t disappear when I disappoint Him. He doesn’t love me more when I’m behaving well and less when I’m struggling.
His love is deeper than that.
And He asks me to love others from that same place.
Swimming in an Ocean of Love
There are moments when God’s love feels so enormous that I could get lost in it.
I picture it like standing at the edge of an ocean. You look out and can’t see where it ends. You know there are depths you cannot possibly measure.
That’s how I think about God’s love.
His grace is deeper than my failures. His mercy reaches farther than my mistakes. His forgiveness covers things I still have trouble forgiving myself for.
And when I’m resting in that love, loving other people seems easy.
Then reality hits.
Someone interrupts me.
Someone hurts my feelings.
Someone doesn’t appreciate something I’ve done.
Someone says the wrong thing.
Someone is inconsiderate.
Someone has an opinion I absolutely cannot understand.
And suddenly, I’ve climbed out of God’s enormous ocean of grace and I’m standing ankle-deep in my own little puddle of self-righteousness.
It’s amazing how quickly I can get there.
I start thinking about what they did. What they said. Why they were wrong. Why I have every right to be offended.
And if I stay in that puddle long enough, I can become very comfortable there.
Meanwhile, Jesus is calling me back into deeper water.
Love Is More Than a Feeling
Jesus said:
“If you love me, keep my commands.”
— John 14:15
I love Jesus.
How could I not after everything He has done for me?
But loving Jesus isn’t simply something I say. Eventually, my love for Him has to show up in the choices I make.
And often, those choices involve other people.
Sometimes loving Jesus looks like forgiving someone when I would rather hold onto the hurt.
Sometimes it means helping when it isn’t convenient.
Sometimes it means sacrificing my time.
Sometimes it means listening instead of talking.
Sometimes it means keeping my mouth shut when I have the perfect comeback ready to go.
Sometimes it means refusing to participate in gossip.
And sometimes it simply means giving another person the same grace I desperately want God to give me.
Those moments may not feel particularly spiritual.
There’s no worship music playing in the background. No one is applauding. There probably won’t be a dramatic moment when I realize I have just done something wonderful for God.
It might simply be a moment when I choose kindness instead of criticism.
But maybe those small moments matter more than I realize.
Because every time I’m given one of those opportunities, I have a choice.
Will I protect my pride?
Will I insist on being right?
Will I stay in my puddle?
Or will I love?
Pull Me Out of the Puddle
I wish I could say I always choose love.
I don’t.
I still get irritated. I still judge. I still keep score when I shouldn’t. I still have moments when my feelings become much more important to me than showing someone else the love of Christ.
And I suspect I’m not alone.
Maybe that’s why we need to keep returning to the ocean.
Again and again.
We need to remember how much we have been forgiven before deciding someone else doesn’t deserve forgiveness.
We need to remember how much patience God has shown us before losing patience with someone else.
We need to remember how many times God has picked us up after we’ve fallen before deciding someone else has fallen one time too many.
Most of all, we need to remember how completely we have been loved.
Because I think the more deeply I understand God’s love for me, the easier it becomes to give some of that love away.
So this is my prayer:
Father, pull me out of my little puddle of self-righteousness.
Remind me how deeply You love me. When I am tempted to criticize, help me extend grace. When I want to hold onto an offense, help me forgive. When I am quick to judge, remind me of the patience You have shown me.
And when I start deciding who deserves my love and who doesn’t, remind me that You never gave me that job.
You simply asked me to love.
Plunge me back into the sea of Your love as often as necessary, until loving others becomes less about who they are and more about who You are.
Because maybe one of the greatest ways I can show Jesus how much I love Him is by loving the people He puts in front of me.
Not just the easy ones.
Not just the ones who agree with me.
Not just the ones who love me back.
But all of them.
Even when it isn’t easy.
Especially when it isn’t easy.
For God and you,
Deb Bostwick
Singles Blogger