When I run across a tragic post on Face Book about man’s inhumanity to man, instead of responding with the anger emoji I always go with sad. Why do I do that? It is because I sincerely feel sadness for the victim and their loved ones and it also saddens me to think that another human being is capable of such a cruel act. Anger is much closer to hate than I am comfortable with. Does that make me soft or weak? I think it takes much more strength and courage to avoid hatred than to embrace it. These are two of my favorite quotes from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. “Let no man pull you low enough to hate him.” “I choose love because hate is too heavy a burden to bear.” Even though he was the target of others’ hatred, Dr. King refused to fight back with hate in return. That is a Christ-like attitude. Jesus encourages us to love our neighbors and even love our enemies. Then he demonstrated it for us in the most painful, stressful situation when from the cross he asked his heavenly Father to forgive those who were torturing and killing him. He could have called a legion of angels to kill them all and set him free, but it wasn’t their hatred that nailed him to the cross; it was his love for mankind – for us.
You don’t have to look far to find hate in today’s world. As in Jesus’ day, the haters and sinners are quick to blame others for their own sins and evil. They are rightly frightened by the thought of God’s judgement, so they blame Christians for offending them with God’s word and making them uncomfortable. Because I am an old, white, prolife, evangelical Christian man; I have been called a hater of women, a racist, a homophobe, an Islamophobe and other harsher names in hateful rants on social media; none of which are true. The Holy Spirit will not allow me to take the accusations personally or return even a little of that undeserved hatred. They aren’t attacking me, they are rebelling against God. I am instructed to love them as Christ loves me.
Men and women aren’t born with hate in their heart. They are taught to hate by the enemy and by those who stand to gain from inciting hatred. Sadly, once hate for a person or group of people sinks deep in the heart of a man or woman, it is very hard for them to see and accept the truth and real source of evil.
It isn’t always easy to love those who hate and abuse us. Corrie Ten Boom wrote about her struggle to forgive and love some of the German guards at the prison camp where she and her sister awaited execution for aiding Jews. She admitted she could not forgive one of them no matter how hard she tried. Then she asked the Holy Spirit inside of her to forgive him in her place and that set her free from hatred. Hatred sometimes causes harm to those hated (Corrie’s sister died in that prison camp), but it always eats away at the hater and eventually destroys them. So when God tells us not to hate He is protecting us – not them.