Everyone will know

As I continue to get older, I continue to learn more and more about the world around me. I’ve learned it might be a little out of the ordinary how much I think about death. I don’t fear death. I try to keep a healthy balance of looking forward to the day where my time on earth is done and truly living and loving the blessings brought to me in each day. There are definitely moments though where I can get lost in thinking about my funeral or what people would say about me after I’m gone. The biggest thing I hope people would know or say is that my life belonged to Jesus.

Thinking about this always leads me to ask the question, “How would people know? What are the distinguishing marks of someone who lived their life for Jesus?” Jesus words and example that we find in John 13 provide an answer.

Here we find Jesus and His disciples sitting down for what we now call “The Last Supper.” Jesus knows that within a few hours He will be crucified, so He takes this time to serve and love and encourage and strengthen those He has spent the last few years pouring into and preparing for this night. He has washed their feet, shared a meal with them and has begun His sort of “last speech.” In Leviticus 19, the Lord instructs the people to not seek vengeance and not hold grudges but to love their neighbor like they love themselves. Jesus has referenced this command at different times during His teaching ministry but now, at this last meal, He seems to be raising the stakes.

He has just demonstrated His love for them by serving them the way a slave would, washing their feet. He is about to show His love in an even greater way as He literally gives up His life and suffers extreme torture to rescue them and pay their penalty. In John 13:34, instead of saying to love your neighbor as yourself, He says to “love others as I have loved you.” They have just gotten a really good picture of what He means but they are about to get an even more radical one.

It’s really verse 35 that I’ve been meditating on lately. He says, “ by this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another.” Like I said, when I think about what I would want people to say about me at my funeral, it is that they knew I was a disciple of Jesus. Jesus is clear here that the mark of His disciples is love. Not just any love and definitely not a fake “bless your heart” kind of love, but a deep, costly, sacrificial love.

We are surrounded by a fake smile that hides a judgemental disdain. It is so common in our culture to assume the worst about someone because of something they wear or even a song they like, much less their gender or the color of their skin. If you think you know anything about someone before you have ever spoken to them, and you have already made decisions about their character, you are not loving them.

Right now, Johnny Depp is in the news a lot as this trial against his ex-wife continues. Both parties are claiming the other one was abusive and people are taking sides. I have no idea what the truth is. It’s not my job to decide because I’m not on the jury or in the courtroom.

It does have me reflecting though, on the idea of #believeallwomen. It is appalling to me to think that someone would not be believed just because they are female. But that’s the whole point, someone’s gender shouldn’t dictate how trustworthy they are. A person shouldn’t be seen as a liar just because they are female but they shouldn’t be trusted just because they are female either. Women are just as capable of lies and manipulation as men are. A person’s age, race, gender, style, number of tattoos or piercings, or over-all “attractiveness” cannot determine their character. I’m sure that throughout history there have been times when a woman wasn’t believed or taken seriously just because she was a woman, that needs to change, but not by calling all men liars just because they are men. Anyone can be guilty of lying.

We must stop letting one famous or infamous person represent an entire race, gender, political party or generation. Each person is an individual and must be treated as such.

When we use any of these things to determine a person’s value, honesty, trustworthiness, importance, or believability we are not loving them authentically. We must take the time to see past any of those qualifiers today. I don’t mean ignore them. A person’s race, gender, etc. have shaped who they are and should not be ignored. But those things alone cannot tell us enough about a person to pass judgement on their character. Do we really think Jesus would run around screaming about someone’s guilt based on some external qualifiers?

We should be marked by love. Marked by a love that is unworldly. Marked by a love that makes a person feel seen, heard and understood. We have got to step away from the current push to cancel someone and be willing to see them as an actual person, complicated and unique, with a history and wounds and experiences that have molded them through out their life. Every person has value. We must stop lumping people into groups based on gender, race, age, political party, religion, the way they dress, etc. etc.

That means there are people God has actually put in our lives to love. People that we can know personally. People that we can sit with and listen to and empathize with through their pain and experiences. People we can love, encourage, strengthen and show value to. People all around us that shouldn’t be ignored or judged.

This is how the world will know we belong to Jesus, when we love one another.

Your Fellow Traveler

Lacey