A Major Quandary

I woke up this morning fretting about how messed up the institutional church and the world has become.  How we have forgotten the main thing — Jesus call to love instead of the need to always to be right.

I started the day by praying: God take away all these negative feeling and thoughts.

Now sitting here with my coffee reading a commentary, on 2 Corinthians 5:16-21, I read these words written by Ralph C. Wood:

‘Karl Barth was once asked what he would say to Adolf Hitler if he had the chance to meet the monster who was destroying Europe…….Barth replied instead, that he would do nothing other than quote Romans 5:8  ‘While we still were sinners Christ dies for us.’  Only the  unparalleled mercy and forgiveness of God, the unstinted gladness and grace of the gospel, could have prompted the Fuhrer’s genuine repentance.” 

The commentary went on to say: “We cannot see any person as anything other than a creature for whom Christ has died and risen,  and thus as one meant also to become “a new creation.” (p. 110 & 112 Feasting on the Word, Year C, Vol. 2) 

And i remembered a morning, soon after 9/11, a woman walking out of worship, and instead of shaking my hand, she scolded me saying: “How can you preach about praying for your enemies after what has just happened?”

The thought of God loving those we see as “enemies.” or “evil,” or other than we approve of is appalling and just wrong.

And my mind asks:  How can we reconcile with Jesus’ request to be conduit of love, forgiveness, mercy and compassion?

I have no answer for this struggle.