LOVING OTHERS AT THEIR WORST
I. Introduction - Not long ago I read the story of a man who came to love a woman named Helen, who was a drug addict. She was living with an abusive man who supplied her drugs and in return used her for his pleasure. But another man, an honest and virtuous man, learned of her plight and brought her out of her awful circumstances. He bought appropriate clothes and other necessities, and made arrangements for her to live with an elderly lady he had befriended many years before. He expected nothing in return, desiring only that she would accept his help to get out of the gutter.
Helen was a prisoned bird set free. She appreciated the improvement in her mode of living. But after a time she began to feel unworthy, and her unworthiness led her to feel dishonest. Down inside, she still felt like a tramp and seemed to be pretending to be someone she wasn't, and could never be. Also, her body continued to crave the drugs to which it was accustomed. So she left the better life, and returned to the abusive, drug-supplying monster, who received her back, but with a beating. She was like one Peter describes as a dog who returns to its vomit, or a pig who, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mud.
Our good man in the story went after her and persuaded her to return. But again, after a time, she again felt like an undeserving pretender and went back to the lowlife. She believed it was more honest to acknowledge that she was simply no good than to be a hypocrite.
Again the man persuaded her to leave her miserable life and step up to a higher plane of living. This became a repeating pattern, occurring many times. Helen's is a true story, as it parallels many real life situations in which women, of their own free will, go back to the prison from which they have been freed, and tolerate the abuse of a scoundrel for his paltry and worthless favors. Not comprehending the meaning of true love, they may genuinely believe they love him and return time after time for more abuse and shame.
But what of our good man?
He loved her at her worst. He was not gullible; he knew exactly what she was. But he knew that she could have a better life if she would simply accept it. His love persevered long and patiently, and Helen eventually came to understand love as she had never known it, and stepped up permanently to a wholesome, chaste life.
II. Hosea and Gomer
This story echoes that of the prophet Hosea and his wife Gomer. God told Hosea “Go, take to yourself a wife of harlotry...” So Hosea married Gomer, a prostitute. They had two sons and a daughter, who are called “the children of whoredom.” But her natural desires and impulses manifested themselves. Gomer proved to be unfaithful to Hosea, and went to lovers. As time passed, Gomer's circumstances descended to the point that she was apparently reduced to being a slave, either to one of her lovers or another person to whom she sold herself. Now Gomer was for sale as a slave.
To all appearances, Gomer was a woman to be avoided. She was trouble, and that is true. Hosea could have gone through the motions just to give a literal obedience to the command, as if it was an item on a “do list.” But there was a problem with that, for you see, Hosea loved her. In the beginning, God had told him, “Go, take yourself a wife of harlotry.” But now God says to Hosea "Go again, love a woman who is loved by her husband, yet an adulteress.” It was to be an active love, not a mere acknowledgement of an obligation.
There she stood—unfaithful, disgraced, wretched, no doubt ashamed to have been reduced to being bought and sold--or perhaps, past shame. Hosea bought his wife for fifteen sheckels, the price for her freedom, and received her back to himself. We know little of how things worked out for Hosea and Gomer after that, but we see Hosea as a man who obeyed God from the heart, not simply to give compliance to directives.
He loved her at her worst.
Hosea's story illustrated God's love for Israel, his patience in Israel's unfaithfulness, and his eventual payment of the price for her freedom from the sins that enslaved her.
III. There is a model for us in these stories. Not that we—men or women--should look among people steeped and entrenched in sin and disgrace for our mates—but that we should actively love the people in our lives who disappoint us by sometimes acting in inappropriate, unbecoming ways.
In various relationships and associations, especially those close-in, “tight” ones, we see people at their worst.
A. Marriage
Marriage usually follows dating. Dating is a stage where a man and woman are both on their best behavior, show only their best side, careful to look their best and say just the right thing, both presenting themselves as thoughtful and caring. I am sure that sometimes after dating, marriage is a rude awakening. In marriage, the worst in each person eventually comes out. We see each other's “morning person,” see how disillusionment, anger, and even weariness degrade that carefully guarded behavior that can be sustained in the dating hours, but not round the clock. I heard this morning on a TV news channel that 70% of the conflicts in marriage never get resolved. That is why couples have the same arguments over and over, with the same old issues being tossed in, unrelated and unresolved.
It is easy to love someone at their best. And in marriage, love should deepen and grow richer, making deeper roots and profound expression. Often it does, and when it does, it is in part because it leaves behind surface appearances and carefully guarded expressions, and overcomes difficulty when love must conquer these difficulties to endure. In marriage, you eventually see not just the best, but also the worst, in one another. But when love conquers, you see love at its very best for...
…you learn to love at the worst.
B. Parents and Children
The same happens between parents and children. As babies, children are easy to love, and the occasional unpleasant things babies do are easy to overlook. As children grow into adolescence a generational gap often appears, in which a youngster begins to desire to establish his own values, sparking disagreement with parents. Sometimes values are chosen because they differ from the parents' and for no other reason than they test the wings of the child. Parents, feeling control slipping away, may “tighten their grip on the reins.”
Tension develops. World views are poles apart. Discussions become heated arguments. A child speaks hurtful things and in anger, the parent may discipline the child too harshly.
Both the parent and the child see the other at their worst. The only solution is love that goes beyond adversity and loves anyway.
Other relationships could be used for illustration, but you can easily find your own.
IV. When people are at their worst...
...they anger and hurt us. Seeds of resentment and bitterness are sown.
It may seem that if we didn't love them, the wounds and bruises would not be so deep, or hurt so badly.
David's close friend and trusted advisor was Ahithophel. But when David's son Absalom sought to take over the kingdom from his father (and in fact did drive David out of Jerusalem into the countryside) David's friend Ahithophel betrayed him, and defected to Absalom as his advisor.
Listen as David pours out his anguish, as only David can: Psalm 55:12-14
When people show the worst of themselves, it hurts the people who love them.
V. We love others at their worst, or we do not love at all.
Their worst is part and parcel of who they are, and in close relationships we inevitably experience the worst in our spouses, families, friends...in each other.
VI. How do we get to the point we can love that way? The natural way for humans to act is to protect ourselves from disappointment and hurt. It's easy to comprehend the concept of loving others at their worst, but how can we make it a reality?
A. Be transformed. Romans 12:2 “... be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”
Paul urges his readers in Rome to a transformation, which is accomplished as the result of a renewed mind, transformed to a new way of thinking.
Love is thought of as primarily a “feeling” function of the heart. But the heart (although sometimes reluctantly) resonates with the mind and is guided by that which the mind treasures. Our actions in disappointment and anger must emanate from the mind, not feelings—and our renewed, transformed minds must maintain discipline over our feelings when the going is rough.
B. The answer lies in “allowing” God to complete his workmanship in us, the work of refining, shaping, forming, molding, training, and conditioning us. His work involves both the mind and the heart, and in fact tunes them so that they are pointed the same way.
Eph 2:8-10 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
This is the walk of grace. As he has given grace, it is ours to give as well.
C. When we come to Christ in obedient faith, two things occur:
1. Salvation - we are saved, redeemed from sin and made a new creature.
2. Rehabilitation of the soul – The innermost parts of our being begin to be renovated.
D. A wonderful model of loving others at their worst is Jesus...
...not only in his willing acceptance of abuse and death from the chief priest, rulers, mob, and Roman soldiers, but in is love for the church.
Eph 5:25 “he loved her, and gave himself for her.”
Is the church at her worst today, with rampant, often bitter division over issues of procedure and method and matters of judgment? Jesus prayed (John 17) for unity among his disciples “that the world may know that they are his disciples.” But if agreement on all religious questions is the test for unity, Jesus' prayer has been unfulfilled in every generation.
Is the church such a hideous mess that it is an embarrassment before the world, and nothing more? I rather think not.
What is the church? Who are the church? It is not a superstructure, council of churches, a national or multi-national organization, although the church herself is global. Nor is the church a grouping of people who are like-minded on disputable subjects.
Paul explains in 1 Corinthians 12 that the church is a body composed of members, with each regenerated person being one member and Christ being the head. As a Christian, you are a member of Christ's body, no less than the apostles, the towering spiritual giants who led reform and restoration in the church in ages past, or any Christian alive today.
We need to think of Christ loving the church not only in a global, national, or multi-national framework, but as the individual members who make up the body. Whatever the condition of Christendom across the whole world, it is as individuals we have the power to make choices and act for Christ, and we as individuals are loved, even at our worst. And it was individuals he died to save.
The church is not just quarreling and division over issues. The church is a ministering, loving, serving organism, with each member having gifts and using them for others. This concept of the church is fully developed in 1 Corinthians 12 (mentioned earlier), Romans 12, and Ephesians 4.
On this very day Jesus is deeply in love. He loves his bride, the church. It is not a faded love of what was wished for but never realized. He loves his bride with her shortcomings and failures, even when she displays weakness the world can use to mock him.
E. How can we love as Christ loves in my marriage, toward my children or parents, the church, and others?
1. Lose anger, indignation, and pride.
2. Never let anger control your speech and actions.
3. Allow hurts to heal quickly – don't pick at them, pulling the scab off.
4. Forgive easily, quickly, and permanently.
Make a covenant with yourself that every time an incident disappoints, angers or hurts you, you will forgive the offender AS WELL AS YOU ARE ABLE. Forgive past offenses, all the way back to your childhood. Forgive your parents for any mistakes they made.
5. “Receive one another as Christ received you.” Romans 15:7
How did Christ receive me, or us? Full of sin. He received us with my flaws and weaknesses to redeem me from sin and refine us and mold us to become like himself.
6. If we love as Jesus loves, we will exhibit the qualities of love as he did. Consider:
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.
Jesus demonstrated every one of these qualities. He invites you and me to join him in doing the same.
