Do You Really Love People?

The COVID-19 pandemic, or plandemic as some friends are calling it, and the recent racial issues have really broken my heart. I’ve watched long-time friends become bitter enemies. I’ve seen family members disown other family members.

It’s sad. There’s so much hurt and bitterness over the issues at hand.

Yet it is not just COVID-19 that has brought this about. We’ve seen angry rants on Facebook about everything from vaccines to at-home childbirths to working for the man.

Everyone has an opinion. Everyone believes they’re right.

We can’t all be right. Someone will be wrong, especially when viewpoints collide.

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, one of the biggest arguments has been whether or not to wear a mask. One side will tell you masks make you sick. The other side will tell you they help prevent the spread of disease.

At the beginning, I fell on the side of “I don’t need to wear a mask. I am healthy. The mask won’t help or hurt me.”

Over time, my opinion has changed. Not of whether or not a mask during the COVID-19 pandemic works. But my feelings of wearing a mask has.

I’m not concerned about catching COVID-19. What I am concerned about is loving my brothers and sisters. This means I have to think less of me and more of them.

What does loving my brothers and sisters look like? It looks like putting aside my “God-given American” freedoms and picking up the cross of Christ. It means I suffer to help the least of these.

Loving your neighbor isn’t easy. It requires sacrifice and death to self. It requires saying “I love you enough to set aside my own rights to make you comfortable.”

Loving your neighbor isn’t throwing up fists and screaming at them. It is not telling them they’re an idiot for wearing (or not wearing) a mask. It is not telling them they need to repent for the sins of generations past.

Loving your neighbors looks a lot like death to self.

Are you willing to love your neighbors even when loving them infringes upon your rights? Are you willing to lay down your life to show someone else you care about them?

This is what love looks like. It looks like saying “I don’t know if masks work but I love you so I will wear one” or “I know people did bad things in the past. You weren’t around for those actions. I won’t hold you accountable for the sins of your grandparents.”

Love isn’t easy. Love is hard.

Are you willing to do the hard thing and truly love people? Or are you going to love people only when it aligns with what benefits you?

Ask yourself this question today. Look at your heart. Figure out if you love people or if you love people.

Do you really love people???

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