Unchanging Love

Deuteronomy 10:15-19

He shows love to the foreigners living among you and gives them food and clothing. (Deuteronomy 10:18)

MANY RELIGIOUS GROUPS, including Christians, have been known throughout history to be kind and hospitable in places where they are the minority, and exclusive and intolerant in places where they are the majority. In a Christian context, that sadly reflects nothing about having a changed heart. Instead, it communicates a need to accommodate in minority situations and assumes cultural superiority in majority situations. The dynamic doesn’t apply to every individual believer, of course, but it does apply to society as a whole. We have not always been loving to the strangers among us.

We lament no losses when this is the case with other religious groups; we have no stake in their image. But we have to wonder how history might have been different if Christians had always been the exception to this dynamic. Rather than pushing for state- or culture-enforced compliance with Christian morals and doctrines, what if we were known for voluntary love and hospitality? What if the “strangers” among us always got the same compassion and support from us, regardless of our demographic status? Or to put it more pointedly, what if we looked like Jesus rather than the scribes and Pharisees who shunned him?

We are clearly told to be hospitable (Romans 12:13), but the theme goes back much further than Christian times. God chose the Israelites “as the objects of his love” yet showed no partiality, telling his people to love the alien among them because the Israelites themselves had once been aliens in Egypt (Deuteronomy 10:15-19). He commanded them to leave enough food for outsiders and the poor (Leviticus 19:10). The prophets repeated the message often. God’s people are to demonstrate not his severity but his kindness. We are to be revelations of his heart.

Live with that purpose. You may live in a Christian-majority neighborhood or town, or you may be vastly outnumbered. Either way, your love must be the same. You are called to reflect not the trends of your culture but the image of your God.

{Lord, on behalf of Christians throughout history, I join in confessing and repenting for tragic misrepresentations of your name. May you restore the true image of your nature in your people today, and may we reflect it widely and clearly. Amen.