Grace and Truth
Most of my family members would not consider themselves Christians.
At one point or another, I think I’ve heard all of them profess belief in a higher power, but have left behind the “Jesus of it all.”
And I quite honestly understand all their experiences. I’ve watched the church hurt them, I’ve watched other Christians hurt them, and I myself am not innocent of inflicting my own tactless words in times when I was less wise.
But I also know my God. I know that He is not the one who hurt them, and that He only wants to know them more intimately. I know in my bones what it would mean for them to accept His love, what beautiful identities they’d discover, what kind of hurts would be healed, and what kind of peace they could experience.
My main question these days, is how to love my family—and the world—at their varying levels of belief and unbelief, while also maintaining those things I hold to be “truth.”
You see, I’ve recently moved back to the States, from Sydney, Australia. I’ve traded a deep spiritual family, for the richness of my blood family. There have been both challenges and blessings to this. First off, I’m relearning the importance of belonging to a blood-family. I believe God shaped us together like puzzle pieces and when one of us is broken it affects every other piece, like a warped edge of cardboard, refusing to line up.
But I’ve also been challenged in how I present my faith, this side of pastoring for nearly thirteen years. I often find myself needing to explain things carefully, in a way that is free from “Christianese” and free from judgement, things that used to be assumed in the baseline of conversation among my like-minded Spiritual family.
It’s obviously a season that will grow and shape me but thankfully the Word of God also has plenty to say in how to love the world.
GRACE and TRUTH
We are called to be in the world not of it. But that doesn’t mean we ignore the world, or keep our lips sealed when someone speaks from the world’s perspective. But nor are we to bash others with the perspective of the Word every chance we get. We tread a grey line.
Truth without Grace is damaging. Grace without Truth helps no one.
So how do we walk this thin line between Grace and Truth, and keep Jesus over it all?
James 3:17 has some advice on how to follow the pattern of God’s wisdom in these circumstances.
“But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy, and good fruits, impartial and sincere.” James 3:17
The wisdom from above is pure:
What are our motives when speaking to the unsaved? Do we want them changed because it validates our beliefs? Because it will gain us honor in our Christian communities? Or even because we can’t abide someone disagreeing with us? If we are motivated by any of the above, we will ultimately end up serving up TRUTH without GRACE.
Similarly, do we remain silent because the world honors us when we just accept things as they say we should? Do we placate and agree rather than correct gently, or add wisdom and Godly perspective? If we do, we’ll surely end up showing GRACE without TRUTH.
Our motives need to be pure. Our focus on their heart, their healing, their salvation. There should be no ego involved in these conversations, no anger, and no judgment.
The wisdom from above is peaceable and gentle:
Like above, are we fighting with people, spitting angry and divisive words without regard for the unique journey of the individual? Are we “bible thumping” when our brethren mess up? It’s easy to write a post, a blog, a comment, from behind a screen with our black and whites, our rights and wrongs, our prescriptions for humanity. But when we’re in conversations with real human beings, there is so much more to take into account.
Conversations around God’s mercy and salvation should never be an argument to be won.
The wisdom from above is open to reason:
I love how Paul was known to go to the center of town, where all the greatest philosophers debated the most current topics. He went with the knowledge of the day and spoke in defense of Jesus. He was Jewish by birth, Roman by citizenship, and educated in the Greek schools of thought. He was open to questions, to challenges, to every different viewpoint, and he handled them reasonably, speaking the language of the challenger.
It means a lot to a person when we understand where they’re coming from. This particular verse is talking about humility, openness and the ability to listen when things might be different than we thought. This is a must in any conversation.
It’s full of mercy and good fruits:
What are the fruits of the Spirit? Peace, gentleness, self-control, faithfulness, goodness, kindness, patience, meekness. I love how a mere mention of the fruits of the spirit saturates the wisdom of our conversation with grace.If these are not in our conversations – no, if these are not in our RELATIONSHIPS—to begin with, we need to change tact.
It’s Impartial and Sincere:
Obviously it’s hard to be impartial when speaking of the love of Jesus. So desperately do we want others to know this Hope that we struggle saying “ we don’t care either way.” We do care. But once again, the end result can’t be about our ego.
We need to be ok leaving our friends and family to their choices, and to the Lord.
And no matter what we do, we must be sincere in our love. I don’t love my family to win them to Jesus. I love them because they’re worthy of love. Even in their wayward paths, God considered them worth his life.
Grace AND Truth.