Do you understand that you should not be envious of others? This is being resentful of their blessings and wishing that you could have them for yourself. Is there a virtue that corresponds to envy? You could express vicarious joy at the blessings that others receive without being resentful that they are not yours. This requires you to take a perspective larger than your own self-interest, but doing so provides you with so many benefits in life.
Do you prefer to judge yourself and your friends by your beliefs, and others by their behavior? This makes it easy for you, but it is an apples-to-oranges comparison. Intellectual and spiritual rigor demands that you use the same criteria for both. Since you aren’t likely to agree on doctrine, conduct becomes the default means of comparison for all. Do you avoid such a comparison? Every faith tradition produces some bad examples, but comparing the worst with the worst will not give valid results. You should evaluate the influence of faith practices on the group as a whole.
I describe love as hoping, bearing, and believing all things. Does this mean that love is naïve? If you applied the same terms to a person would you say that they are loving or gullible? You say that love is blind, but true love is not unaware. How do you look through loving eyes? Can you look at love not as naïve, but rather as a powerful influence that can bring into being that which is not yet visible? Love doesn’t see less than what is visible; it sees more. It sees potential and trusts in the ultimate and transcendent forces to realize it, and so brings it about.
Mass shootings are big stories that generate outrage. This is an appropriate response to the death of innocent people. How could someone be so alienated from humanity to take the lives of strangers? Yet more people die by suicide, and this does not generate such a strong response. How could someone be so alienated from humanity as to take their own life? These questions are more similar than different. No organ can survive apart from the body that gives it life, and the same principle applies to people that I describe as members of a body.
When people of differing faith traditions get together they like to argue about whose version of doctrine is correct. How often do you see anyone change their mind as the result of such a discussion? Perhaps a better approach is to compare practical, visible measures of the beneficial effects of adopting a particular faith. Are the people who convert to this faith more loving and kind, more generous and less violent than they were before? This is a stronger argument for the validity of a faith than one based on doctrinal correctness. Transformed lives are irrefutable evidence.
Everyone who seeks the truth hears my voice, and he who seeks will find. Do you know people who seem to be honestly seeking something, even if they don’t know what it is? Let your light shine before them to help them to see the truth. Someone else’s path may be different from yours, and this is OK. You don’t have to force them on a path that is not theirs. Based on the promises above you can be confident that their search will lead to me. Does this seem like a strong statement for a universal rule? But I have powerful forces at my disposal to guide honest seekers to me.
Are you familiar with narcissism? Even before this term was in common usage you knew people who were selfish, self-absorbed, and ‘all about them’. You know that this is a diminished expression of humanity, and such people are avoided for good reason. Is anyone entirely free from this? It seems to be a common human affliction to some degree, but you also know people who are at the other end of the spectrum and admire them and wish to emulate them for good reason. What qualities should you seek to overcome selfishness?
Have you heard of grateful alcoholics? Alcohol has devastated the lives of many, and recovery from the effects of this addiction is a long and painful process. So is there anything here to be grateful for? Those who describe themselves this way would say that this path, even with the pain and suffering it involves, has brought them to a greater expression of humanity and spirituality than they would have had without it. And so they are grateful in spite of the pain and suffering. How do you view the difficult aspects of your own life? Do you resent them?
Have you heard that the safest place in the world is in my will? If you are to accept this proposition, you may have to rethink your definition of safety. Consider how many people have paid the ultimate price and lost their lives because they were obedient to me. You remember them and honor them as martyrs. How strong is your desire to live a life of destiny, full of meaning and purpose? Is this greater than your fear of death? For there are values even higher than safety, and you will die whether you lead a meaningful life or not.
For many of us, it is time to listen to a Spirit-led leader in the black community express his thoughts about the racial tension that has erupted around us. We need to hear what the concerns are so we can be active participants in promoting a solution. It is impossible for us to be part of the solution if we have not first listened.
He who gives an answer before he hears, it is folly and shame to him. (Prov. 18:13 NASB)
