Acceptance

Being human. According to the Bible, its an esteemed place to be (Gen. 1:27-28). God created man in HIS image. But, most of the time, we fall VERY short in emulating God. I call myself a follower of Christ, but so often, I cannot set aside my own selfish desires to do as He would do in any given situation. What's been getting to me lately (in case you haven't been reading this blog and my rants about Christianity in America) is that even though I am a sinner, God loves me. Even though I don't hold up to Christ's example of perfection, God accepts me as His daughter. And it occurred to me that, of all the other things we fall short in our aspirations (as Christians) to be Christlike, this is where we miss it the most. We don't accept each other. If we did, there would be no name calling or hatred. There wouldn't be so much discord and lack of unity. We might truly be able to have peace on earth if we accepted each other for who we are.

But, we are human. And we let our emotions and our insecurities drive our actions sometimes. I hate to admit that much of the time, my actions are not driven out of love the way they ought to be if I want to be a follower of Christ. I act out of fear, out of anger, out of helplessness, and out of lack of acceptance for people/circumstances. And a lot of times, the results aren't pretty. I wonder why accepting each other is such a hard thing to do? We always like to point the finger and think that its "that person's" issue, but perhaps we need to take a closer look at ourselves. Perhaps, its our attitude that needs changing. I believe this to be true most of the time. Because, after all, we can only change ourselves. We can't expect people to change to meet our definitions of what makes a person "good" or "bad" or whatever. And we certainly cannot (and should not) try to change someone else. Could you imagine where we would be if that is what Jesus had done?