February 27, 2014

On Extending Grace

Last night, I encountered something that once would have made me angry, but now it just makes me really sad. It was during a Bible study, and the discussion was on why "Love the sinner, hate the sin" isn't what we should be practicing as Christians. The explanation was great (and from a perspective that I hadn't yet considered), but during the discussion, the proposed Arizona law allowing religious principles as an affirmative defense for discrimination by a business came up. What I heard sounded a lot like "Those sinners are attacking us! We have to be judgmental to protect ourselves!" to me. A need for a new volley of arrows in the Great American Culture War.

Now, typically, my response would be to start angrily railing about them being bigoted hypocrites. But since the Holy Spirit has started softening my heart, and scrubbing the crustiness off of my soul, I was just saddened. The only response I had was about the contradiction of being asked to practice love and practice hate by the same cliche. I wanted to write last night, but couldn't manage to do anything until this morning.

"Love the sinner, hate the sin." I have yet to meet anyone that can effectively keep the 'sinner/sin' paradigm in a proper perspective. If we can't properly keep sinner separate from sin, then as we try to practice love and hate at the same time, both love and hate will wind up being directed at the wrong object.