Uninformed / Uniformed

The other day a writer I enjoy named Bob Lefsetz said, “Most of what people say is uninformed crap.” He was referring to the fact that this world now offers unlimited media access to nearly everyone and that you no longer have to be an expert to voice an opinion. At first I mistakenly thought Bob said, “Uniformed crap” at which I was pretty thrilled to find someone that felt as adversely as I do about uniformity.

Each day we get closer and closer to becoming a society with only two opinions. We’re taking all of the world’s issues, bundling them up in two packages and forcing folks to choose one. Compassion for those that are different than we are is becoming increasingly rare. And often our opposition is based on distain for a person rather than the issue at hand. Unfortunately the church is leading the way on this. Becoming an enemy is as easy as asking a question or exploring a different approach. Does this reflect God’s heart towards us as individuals? Does this communicate to the world that we love them despite our differences? Does The Lord want us thinking, acting or being just like everyone else that carries a particular label? The only way to know for sure is to ask Him. It’s essential that we know Him personally and individually, that we allow Him to help our opinions form from hearts like His, not because that’s what everyone else says.

Alas, Mr. Lefsetz didn’t say uniformed, he said uninformed but the more you think about it they’re not that dissimilar.

Sameness

God’s highest hope for each of us is to find and stay in an intimate, unique, and completely fulfilling relationship with Him. It’s not His idea for us to walk the path of everyone else. Different is good.

The world is countering God’s plan with sameness. We’re becoming franchise humanity with no tolerance for anyone unlike ourselves and will soon be herded into one of only two crowds; it’ll be them and us. Much of the church today is playing right along with this plan.

Our answer has to be personal. Our intimacy with the Lord will result in an outpouring of love on individuals, persons that are different than we are and our goal can’t be to make them just like us.

Persons

We’re all called to the ministry of persons, individuals, families and small groups of folks we can know intimately, care deeply for and do life with, that’s the great commandment. We really mess things up when we decide to minister to people, large groups that we can plug into the system or run through our programs. Too often the great commission of going into the entire world subverts the commandment to love because we assume the enormity of the world is on our shoulders, so we must do it big, when all God’s asking for, is us to help Him one person at a time.

Misconception

A common misconception about Jesus is that He wants to control us. Few things could be further from the truth, if that were true He would have set it up that way in the beginning. What’s sad about this fallacy for one is that it’s a big reason many choose not to know Him and secondly that many others, though well intentioned believe they are being Christ like by trying to control. That’s not who He is or what He wants from us, in fact what He wants is nothing more than to love us as the individuals He made us to be, to be loved in return and to literally walk through each and every day with us, good times and bad.

Layers

More from yesterday: The Grand Canyon is so much more than the most amazing natural beauty you can possibly see. It’s also a view like no other into the process God used to form the earth, each step formed upon the other until its perfect completion, not unlike ourselves. He’s in the process of perfecting each of us step by step and layer upon layer. No two identical each with our rough edges to be worn, cut or sanded down in His timing.

 

It’s Personal

Love is always personal. We’re not called to love people; we’re called to love persons. It’s much easier to love this group or that nation without really getting into the mess that we are as individuals. When we disregard the uniqueness of individuals and diminish them by lumping them into one big pot, we miss the opportunity to share how special they are to The Father. It’s one thing to vote for this issue or contribute to that cause but it’s a God thing to get into the muck with someone and see them through to Him.