As the singer/songwriter John Lennon once said, “All you need is love.”
I don’t want to disagree with a popular and iconic man like John Lennon, but I have to.
Right now, love isn’t all we need. There are a lot of things we need right now and as much as I would like to say love will fix the world, it won’t. It won’t even come close.
Understanding- that’s a gift needed right now. You can say you love someone even though they are different, but do you show understanding? Do you try and understand their side or are you just nodding along, looking as if you agree? Knowing your stance will not change and they are still wrong.
Justice. There is a lot of frustration and anger lunging through the streets of big cities, brandishing their own waves of justice as they see fit. Do we seek justice for everyone or just for the ones WE find deserving? Is our justice based on anything other than right or wrong? Or are we choosing which justice fits each crime based on who the victim/assailant is?
Grace. To have grace toward one another is a hard gift to give. To give someone their time to speak, their time to allow their views to be heard even if you don’t really agree with them can be frustrating. How can we do that when the growing voices behind us are saying to ignore them, move on, they’re wrong?
Forgiveness. Ah, the hardest gift of all. Who are we to forgive? And why should we? After all, if they are not on our side, they are against everyone, right? We are on the side of right, they are on the side of wrong. Forgiveness is not an option. If we forgive, we are weak, we are silencing our voices when we need to be heard. We allow those that are wrong to prevail.
So, what’s the answer? Can we find a cause, movement, demographic that puts all these into play?
Of course not. We’re sin filled humans living in a sin filled world. We’d like to think we can rise above such things like hate and greed, but we can’t.
However, there is an answer.
Jesus understands. He came to this earth to experience what humans experience. He observed our flaws, our weakness, our anger and deceit. He was pulled into traps of human lies and even the devil tried to pull him into the pit we dug for ourselves. But he didn’t fall for any of it. He saw our trials and met us where we live, in a world full of sin and filthy rags.
Jesus spoke of salvation and justice for those that chose to follow him, justice for those that found themselves above the law. The great men of that time used Christians as entertainment, as bait for the Roman circus and set them on fire as human torches to light the cities at night. Do they get justice? Yes, yes they did. According to the law of God, they did receive their justice, no matter how powerful, no matter how poor the victim or the perpetrator. Everyone receives justice according to God’s law. Which, by the way, is the only right or wrong.
Jesus’s grace covers us daily. We try to pick the right side and sin, we pick the wrong side and sin, we walk each day with the hopes of being better, to represent him better, and we fail. How could anyone forgive us? How could anyone sit and listen to our pleas of help and need when we are so undeserving? We wouldn’t listen to the same person asking for another try once they’ve disappointed us.
But Jesus does. And he heaps the grace over us like rushing water, still, time and again.
Then, he forgives.
Jesus forgives us over and over, allowing us one more day to live our best life and try and do the right thing. To stand up for his word without sinning, to be angry and not sin. It’s a hard thing to do and I fail every day. But with Jesus’s forgiveness, I can try again.
So, sorry John, I can’t accept the premise that love is all you need in this life. I’ve got higher standards than love and it seems there’s only one answer.
Jesus.
The riots won’t make it right, the police won’t make it right, the government won’t make it right, the church won’t make it right, the justice system won’t make it right. Only Jesus can make it right. And those of us following him will have to do the best we can each day to look to him first, to what he wants first before we go out and lend our voices to be heard.
