Skip to main content

Kind to God?


                Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. (I Corinthians 13:4-8)

            We may as well keep going. Love is...kind. It has or shows a friendly, generous and considerate nature. It is affectionate and loving. It treats the other as one of our own. Those are the things the dictionary says. I have a problem with these definitions because it seems to me that kindness can hurt. It can do for someone else what they can and should do for themselves. It can lie in order to let someone feel good about being bad. True kindness requires wisdom and does not ignore justice.
            So, what do we do about being kind to God? If we love God, we must be kind to God. Kind to God? Does He need us to be kind to Him? He doesn't need doors opened for Him, He's already on the other side. And isn't He the one who is supposed ti be kind to us? He's all those omnis and I'm so incredibly limited. He's the Lord of the universe and I don't even control my own home. He has infinite riches and I... well, let's just say that there are people who make in an hour what I make in a year. If someone needs kindness, it's not God, it's I.
            That last paragraph contains at least two flaws that I find in my own thinking, and that I suspect are in the thinking of others. The first error is that kindness is something that flows from those who have to those who need. God doesn't need anything from anyone so why should we give to Him? The second error is related. Because we see kindness as something that goes from greater to lesser, we tend to think it's not reciprocal. God is supposed to be kind to us, but we are less able and therefore not expected to be kind to Him.  The reason these are flaws in our thinking is because we think of kindness in terms of the one to whom we are being kind. We are kind because they are less fortunate. We are kind because they can't _________. 
            The reality is that kindness isn't just about the recipient. It is about character. Kindness requires that we pay attention to others. That makes it a challenge for me, because my thoughts tend to be elsewhere most of the time. It requires that we give without requiring repayment. I think the best sort of kindness is the kindness that is so much a habit that we don't notice. It should be something we are, not something we commit. Kin

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The List

              Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,   through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance;   perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. (Romans 5:1-5)           Think about it. We have been justified. At least, we could be justified if we stopped insisting that our justification be based on our merits. We have peace with God, or could have peace if we stopped throwing temper tantrums. We have gained access into grace i...
Post a Comment
Read more

Meditations of the Heart

  May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. (Psalm19:14)           As I started writing this post, I noted that the meditations of my heart are all over the mental landscape, from a hub where eight superhighways come together to a lunar or nuclear landscape. Do you see my error? The moment I read the word meditation , I think about thoughts. But what’s described here is the meditations of our hearts ; our wills.           While the meditations of our minds may be all over the place, the meditations of our wills tend to be a little more stable by the time we are adults. We no longer tend to want to pursue the ten separate careers we did in any given day as children. Part of this is humble acceptance of reality. We come to understand that we can’t do it all. I think another part of it is disappointmen...
Post a Comment
Read more

Listen To Him

              The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him . (Deuteronomy 18:15)           Today, we switch from Jesus’ claims of “I am” to prophecies made about Him. My Bible platform is starting in Deuteronomy. I’d start in Genesis, where we would learn that the one who would save us would be a descendant of Eve (Genesis 3:15), of Noah (by default), Abram and Sara(Genesis 12:1-3). Isaac (Genesis 17:19), Jacob (Genesis 25:23), Judah (Genesis 29:8), and David (II Samuel 7:12-16). There were also references to a new covenant (Jer. 31:31-34; Ezek. 36:22-32). In addition, there were prophecies about when and where the prophet/Messiah would be born and what would happen to him.           Of course, naysayers will claim that Jesus’ life was retrofitted or reverse enginee...
Post a Comment
Read more