The Second Greatest Commandment

Christian's are known as judgmental to many people. I don't need to give statistics to show Christian's or non-Christians that this is how American Christianity is viewed, it's become common knowledge. But there is more to Christianity's Judgmental attitude than meets the eye. Now before I make my point,  I don't want people thinking I agree with the way arrogant and prideful false-Christians pursue making everyone feel as though they are worthless and always in the wrong. As I talk about this subject, I want to make clear that when I say Christian, I'm talking about genuine Christian's; Christian's who have the fruit of the spirit: "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control". I'm talking about Christian's who desire to make a difference, Christian's who are truly children of God and still sin and are thankful for the grace God has given.

Keeping that definition of Christian in mind, let me now tell you something: All these Christians are trying to love other Christians and unbelievers. All of these Christians truly are trying to follow Jesus' commandment to love others. The problem isn't in the Christian's motive (again, remember the strict definition of Christian), it is in how the Christian perceives love. The problem isn't with who the Christian is, but what the Christian knows. For that reason, I want to humbly do my best to create a more correct view of how we are to treat others.

Some Christians go about loving others by being judgmental and blunt about telling them the truth, so to them, that is love. This view though, taken too far, can become destructive. Some Christians go about loving others by being tolerant. In other words, they don't disagree or really even tell people about their faith, they just "love" people. However, this view can be equally destructive to the Christian faith.

Christians have taken up some pretty destructive views that were arrived at on a road with good intentions. Fortunately, Jesus said more than just "love your neighbor"; that would have allowed for different definitions of love to be applied. He said "love your neighbor as yourself". This is what must be examined when the Christian is looking at how to love others.

Christians are not to only love others with their own petty definition of love, but to love others as they love themselves. So in order to arrive at a conclusion of how to love others, we must first figure out how we love ourselves. When you make a mistake, do you still love and forgive yourself? After you told your parents that lie, did you still love and forgive yourself? After you looked at that pornographic site, did you still love and forgive yourself? After, for a short while, you became numb to sin, did you still love and forgive yourself? When you were overweight and insecure, did you still love yourself? Humans in general have a tendency to have an easier time forgiving themselves for sins committed than forgiving others, but Jesus calls us to be equally forgiving. Here is another question for the Christian: when you sin, do you try to gently correct your sin? I know I do. And that is how we should love others; we should not be tolerant of their sin, but we should not be hateful towards them either. We should tell them the truth, but we should listen to what they have to say. We should correct their sin, but with gentleness and respect. We should tell them of their depravity while realizing our own. We should tell them of Jesus remembering we don't change people, God does.

The point is not to become too tolerant, nor too judgmental, but to find a healthy balance. But why correct at all if God changes people? Because God tells us to change, and as Christians, let's do our best.  We will fall, and when we do, may we be humble enough to apologize and help others realize that what was done was not a Christian action, but rather a poor mis-representation of Christ. The Christian must start and continue correcting his/her life for the sake of Christ. After-all, that is the evidence of a Christian's salvation.