The only words I can think of in these dark days of hate
These days of hate. Religious factions warring against others, blinded by narrow, distorted interpretations of what is superficially hailed as the worship of a loving God.
Where is the unity? When, Lord, will all Your children love and worship as one?
The only words that come to my mind are found in the First Book of Corinthians.
God's children have forgotten something. We've forgotten that we are temples - holy, consecrated vessels - and that the Holy Spirit lives within those vessels. How, then, can we hate each other? How can we hate something that bears the presence of our loving, living God? How can we terrorize or hurt or swear at or make threats to something so sacred, so holy?
All of us have been touched by the very hand of God. Many don't realize it. Clearly, many have forgotten it.
It's funny. We can show so much reverence for relics and holy reminders. We keep shrouds, crumbling scraps of papyrus, and old bones in climate-controlled vaults, under glass, and in golden boxes under lock and key. We bring them out only on the holiest of holy days. We make pilgrimages halfway across the globe and crawl on our knees to approach holy places.
We've forgotten that we encounter the sacred every day. Every person you meet is a consecrated vessel.
Every person you encounter is your brother.
And if you want to help bring people back to the knowledge that they, too, are holy... words of hate and acts of terror aren't the way to do it. Nobody was ever brought to the Lord by killing them.
As the song goes, "They'll know we are Christians by our love."
We would do well every day to remember this passage:
1 Corinthians 3 (NRSV)
3 And so, brothers and sisters,[a] I could not speak to you as spiritual people, but rather as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. 2 I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for solid food. Even now you are still not ready, 3 for you are still of the flesh. For as long as there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not of the flesh, and behaving according to human inclinations? 4 For when one says, “I belong to Paul,” and another, “I belong to Apollos,” are you not merely human?
5 What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you came to believe, as the Lord assigned to each. 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. 7 So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. 8 The one who plants and the one who waters have a common purpose, and each will receive wages according to the labor of each. 9 For we are God’s servants, working together; you are God’s field, God’s building.
10 According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building on it. Each builder must choose with care how to build on it. 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one that has been laid; that foundation is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— 13 the work of each builder will become visible, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each has done. 14 If what has been built on the foundation survives, the builder will receive a reward. 15 If the work is burned up, the builder will suffer loss; the builder will be saved, but only as through fire.
16 Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?[b] 17 If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy that person. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.
18 Do not deceive yourselves. If you think that you are wise in this age, you should become fools so that you may become wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written,
“He catches the wise in their craftiness,”
20 and again,
“The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise,
that they are futile.”
that they are futile.”
21 So let no one boast about human leaders. For all things are yours, 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all belong to you, 23 and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.
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