I've been around people who were robbers and liars; folks who nearly became killers. Fortunately, I met them after they had encountered the Lord Jesus and were transformed. One such man had robbed a convenience store in the town where I pastored. He met the Lord and was saved. Two Christian college girls talked to him about Jesus at a coffee house. He turned himself in to police. In jail, as he read the Bible and prayed, the hate was stripped out of his heart. At one point he was in a cell next to Charles Manson. He told me, "That dude was crazy!"
People who are anti-god or anti-Christian, such as Jesus-haters, atheists, or communists, deny that God's power is real or that it can change a person. But I've seen it happen. Haters can become lovers. Criminals can become good citizens. Unfaithful reprobates can become reliable husbands, caring fathers, and good friends. Sinners can become godly.
While philosophers debate beliefs, one thing remains unchangeable. God is love. He doesn't change. He proved his love once for all when he showed it off in the person of Jesus Christ. Read the Bible. People who encounter God were forever changed by his love. I call this, experiential Christianity. It is much more than a doctrine or mere intellectual assent. In fact, it's "better felt than telt," since it's supernatural, or rather, supra-rational, which means beyond being able to be figured it out scientifically. God is a spirit. Therefore, meeting God is a spiritual experience, a new birth.
Secular social engineers and political libertarians cast off moral restraint, reject old-fashioned religion, deny biblical principles, and say anything goes. Yet they still want people to be good neighbors. They want schools to be free of Bibles. They don't want any mention of God or Christ. They think America can educate kids into being better, even without the role of fathers in the family or the traditional place of the church. The state replacing God? It won't work.
Do you know what you get when you educate an evil person? A smarter devil. I've read about college presidents who were moral pygmies and billionaires who were sexual predators. Education by itself doesn't touch the heart. People need to be delivered from evil. People need to be saved from sin. The only antidote to violence in society is for people to become citizens of a new realm, one that commands us and empowers us to walk in love.
The apostle John writes this in his letter, "The one who says he is in the Light yet hates his brother is in the darkness until now. The one who loves his brother abides in the Light and there is no cause for stumbling in him." (1 John 1:9-10)
Let's be clear, you can't live in hatred and be a Christian. If you claim to be a Christian but have hate in your heart, you need to go back and encounter the real Jesus. Carrying resentment, unforgiveness, or hatred in your heart is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. Hatred is a self-afflicting curse. Get it out of your system, quickly.
Hating a person because they speak a different language, are a different race, or not your religion, is a sin. Hating someone is the first step toward murdering them. Hate causes killing. "Thou shalt not kill" is still one of the Ten Commandments. Murder is an evil act. Its motivation begins invisibly, concealed in an unrepentant heart. May the Lord deliver us from evil.
-- Ron Wood is a writer and minister. Email him at [email protected] or visit www.touchedbygrace.org. The opinions expressed are those of the author.
Editorial on 08/14/2019