In the last two or three years I've struggled a lot over the division of conservative Christians vs. the liberal Christians. Personally, I grew up in a pretty religiously conservative environment. Pro-life and anti-LGBT were accepted truths. One of the pastors in my Christian circles has declared that "loving" LGBT people equates to telling them that they're going to hell for "living in sin."
These are things that have never sat particularly well with me.
Coming from a church that pushed "grace" and "love" to definitions of near-militaristic levels of control led me to question just about everything I always took for granted as Truth. While God is a God of Love, what did love actually mean? We are saved by grace, but what did that actually mean?
Today, three years later, I still struggle with what is the best means of addressing controversial topics. But I finally realized the core of what was missing to both sides of many arguments in Christian spheres: compassion, kindness, value.
Early Sunday morning, June 12, 2016, almost 50 people were killed due to a terrorist act—with many more wounded. What's tragic is that there will still be quite a bit of damning (or brushing off) of "the gays" in light of such a horrific event when, instead, we should be mourning with these people who have just had their lives destroyed and families shattered. People that we, as Christians, preach as "made in the image of God."
We, as Christ-followers, were never meant to fix it. We weren't meant to save people—because we can't. We were never meant to politicize the gospel to a point where if you're politically conservative you're a good Christian, and if you're politically liberal you're lukewarm.
Instead, we are called to show the compassion and care that Christ showed all mankind—regardless of their walk of life.
Tragedy shines a light on what's truly important—and very rarely is it our own agenda. At this time, the theological argument of "gay vs. christian" needs to be put away. Instead of trying to force people to believe one thing or another, we need to mourn with those who mourn, show compassion, show understanding. We need to LISTEN. We also need to meditate on what those words actually mean according to Christ's example instead of jumping to the assumption our way is already right. We need to see people—not flaws and projects to be converted or fixed. Let God take care of the hearts.
Or is our God really so small that He cannot work through kind actions?
—September
September is an avid film nerd from growing up on weekend trips to Universal Studios Hollywood. She is passionate about the intersections of Christian spirituality, faith, and storytelling in popular culture. Outside of 412teens and digging up obscure horror flicks from the 2000s, she works as a freelance developmental editor and acquisitions consultant while comforting her clingy feline floof, Faust, from the anxiety of existence.
