Disown?

We do it on Facebook when we decide that someone posts things which are offensive, inappropriate, or racist, and we think nothing of it. We do it in life with some folks we come into contact with who might be opposite from ourself in so many ways and you get irritated and annoyed when you are in their company. Churches do it, by excommunicating or excluding those who do not uphold that church’s beliefs, and who go directly against doctrine. They might be called heretics. These are all examples we could live with, and we may have done one of these ourselves. Social media comes to the rescue, and makes it so easy to ‘unfollow’, ‘unfriend’ or ‘block’ that annoying person.

Does this mean we are free to disown anyone we take a dislike to, or one who goes against the things we like, accept, believe, or uphold? Disowning someone publicly has serious consequences, especially if we claim the name of ‘Christ’-ian. In life, there are lots of people who don’t agree with us in everything, and likewise there are those we don’t much like ourselves. Is it enough to disown someone purely because we don’t like their lifestyle? I don’t think so. We might decide never to holiday with them, but disown them? No.

What message are we giving to the people we would disown? Maybe it’s that they don’t live up to my or your standard? Is it because they are inferior? Could it be that we forget how we behaved when we were immature, and the behaviour we now detest, we once did ourselves? Am I getting uncomfortably close to the truth? If we really want to claim the name ‘Christ’-ian we need to believe His word and behave like He tells us. After all…..

God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 5:8