Hating the Hated

I'm sure those of you who are parents of multiple children have heard one of your children at some time or another say the following words to a sibling ... "I hate you." I know those words were spoken a time or two in their younger years to one another by my own children. And ... believe it or not ... even once or twice, one of the kiddos uttered that phrase to me as well. Suffice it to say that the times my children chose to use the "hate" word toward a member of our family never precipitated a happy ending for them. More often than not, their punishment included the dreaded newspaper "apology, love and forgiveness" square. I would make them stand on a square of newspaper face-to-face until the offending sibling could apologize to the one who was word-wounded, say the words "I love you," and ask to be forgiven. The little wounded-heart warrior would in turn have to apologize for their part in whatever behavior had sparked the hate word being played, and say "I love and forgive you." Yep ... I was a terribly mean old mom back in those days ... I won't even tell you what their punishment was when they said "I hate you" to me.

I can think of a lot of things that I dislike a great deal ... the color green, swallowing pills, bumper-to-bumper traffic, stepping in gum, having blood drawn, wearing dresses, unsweetened tea, misspelled words, double-sided tape, high humidity, cooked spinach, and on and on. But when I try to come up with a list of things I really and truly hate, I find that the word hate is simply too strong to describe my dislike, even my extreme dislike, of certain things ... except, of course, severe weather thunderstorms ... I do really and truly hate those. And as I think about it and type about it and ponder about it, the things I strongly dislike or even hate are just that ... things. I can't honestly think of one person on this earth whom I hate ... there are some I really, really, really don't like very much, but no one whom I hate.

In my previous post on Sunday, I wrote about the sermon the minister preached ... the one about Jonah trying to run away from God's call to go to the city of Nineveh and warn them of God's impending judgment. I'm still thinking about the three points of his sermon that I listed at the end of that post, and I'll be writing a post soon concerning those thoughts. The preacher made another observation, however, that was separate from his three main points ... an observation that I haven't been able to get off of my mind or out of my heart. I guess I always thought Jonah didn't want to go to Nineveh because he was afraid the people wouldn't listen or perhaps he feared they would hurt or even kill him when he delivered God's message. But the minister talked about how Jonah truly hated the people of Nineveh ... really and truly hated them. He was raised to hate them ... the culture he lived in dictated that he must hate the Nineveh people. All of Jonah's people hated the people from Nineveh ... he was just hating those who were already hated. The preacher had some great insight into a part of Jonah that I had never before considered ... not only did he try to run from God, he hated the people of Nineveh, he got very angry with God and even told Him he'd rather be dead. That's pretty intense stuff, friends, pretty intense indeed. You can view the sermon online at olathechristian.org, and I would encourage you to not only watch it but to listen with your heart.

For the last two days, I've been thinking about what the minister said about Jonah and his hatred for the folks in Nineveh. Jonah didn't think those people deserved to be saved, and he was beyond mad when they repented and God spared them from destruction. And here's the thing ... so many of us are just like Jonah ... we say we love God and are willing to follow him completely, but then when He puts someone from Nineveh in front of us, we run like the wind with hearts full of hate for the already hated. I think sometimes it's easier for some people to hate rather than love, especially when a culture or friends or society or family or even religion teaches them to hate. The truth is that sometimes it takes a lot of work to love ... sometimes it means going against the flow to love ... sometimes it involves staying and standing by someone  who's hated rather than jumping on a boat and sailing away. Look at the people around you, friends ... people who are facing hatred, people who are experiencing judgment, people who are sitting at the edge of destruction ... people who need to know they are loved  ... by God and by you. I'm pretty sure that God isn't about hate at all ... I'm pretty sure He is about mercy and grace and forgiveness and compassion ... I'm pretty sure He is about love.

Most of the time when I list Scripture at the end of a post, I use the New American Standard translation. But tonight, I'm going to use The Message ... I'm pretty sure that no matter what version you read them from, these verses say, "Don't hate. Don't run. Do love."

"If anyone boasts, 'I love God,' and goes right on hating his brother or sister, thinking nothing of it, he is a liar. If he won't love the person he can see, how can he love the God he can't see? The command we have from Christ is blunt: Loving God includes loving people. You've got to love both." 1 John 4:20-21