My Dearest Sister,
My original plan in writing this letter to you was to encourage you in the many ways in which we, as daughters of the Most High King, can show kindness to others. However, as I was seeking out the Scriptures, inquiring about the importance of being kind to our fellow man, God began pointing me in a different direction. Almost all of the verses I came across were in reference to God’s kindness toward us, not our kindness toward others. It was then that I realized I had been looking in the wrong place. How can we even begin to understand how to be kind to others if we don’t first look at the One who has shown the most kindness of all?
For starters, we need to understand that the Lord’s kindness is eternal. Although some of us are better at being kind than others, everyone has those times when our abilities fail us. We fight it, but the flesh wins, and we end up saying or doing something we shouldn’t – something that certainly isn’t the kindness we want people to see. But you know what’s neat? That whole process never happens to God. In Isaiah 54:10, the Lord says “For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed, but My kindness shall not depart from you, nor shall My covenant of peace be removed.” Our whole world can turn upside down, and yet His kindness toward His children will remain constant, never to be taken away.
Secondly, even in His anger the Lord does not remove His bountiful mercies from our reach: “With a little wrath I hid My face from you for a moment; But with everlasting kindness I will have mercy on you” (Isaiah 54:8). I don’t know about you, but I can’t even count how many times I have been harsh or even spitefully mean to someone because I was angry with them. In all honesty, it feels good to lash out at someone when we’re mad – at first; then we feel angry and guilty. When the Lord is angry He may hide His face from us for a while, but it’s for our own good, not His personal satisfaction (Trust me, you would be worse off if He openly showed His anger to you). In the end, His kindness prevails.
Thirdly, in Luke Chapter 6, we see that God’s kindness is not conditional. Thank goodness, otherwise we would fall miserably short of receiving any. In verse 35, Jesus calls His followers to love their enemies, to do good, and lend selflessly, just as God “is kind to the unthankful and evil.” Kind to the unthankful and evil? I have a hard enough time being nice to the jerk who cuts me off in traffic or to the fast-food employee who is rude to me as I pay for my lunch. You know, it’s funny how often our kindness towards one another is directly related to how much we get in return. After all, it’s easy to do good to those who do good to us; Even sinners do that (v.33). The real challenge however, is when we are called to be kind to someone who doesn’t give you that warm, fuzzy feeling inside, but rather that stone-cold, slimy one. Not an easy task when you think about it. Often times our first instinct is to turn our backs on those kinds of people and not have to put up with them. Thank goodness God doesn’t treat us that way!
The last and perhaps most significant word on kindness I found was in 2 Peter 1:5-8 where Christians are instructed on what fruitful growth in the Faith looks like. Peter says “But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” I don’t know about you, but I was amazed as I read this. I had never before thought of kindness as the link to love, but its true. We can have all these other things (faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, and godliness) but if we do not have a brotherly kindness, we miss the boat completely in showing love, which the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 13:13 deems our greatest calling in this life.
Surely, how can we expect others to see the love of Christ working through us if we don’t even care enough to be kind when its not convenient or beneficial to ourselves? When we don’t even give a second thought to showing kindness to that homeless man on the park bench or that elderly woman living out her last lonely years in a group home? We can’t even start at the most basic level and then we are challenged with being kind to even the unthankful and evil among us? To the people who make us angry and don’t deserve our compassion or sympathy? Houston, we have a problem! And yet even in the midst of all of our selfishness and shortcomings, God showers His eternal kindness upon us. How amazing is that?
So you see, my sister, we have to first look at how great God’s kindness is toward us before we can even begin to understand the full meaning of the word. According to Him, kindness means showing mercy to our enemies, reaching out to the unreachable, and giving freely to the undeserving; It means putting away our own anger and selfish desires, and treating everyone as we would a brother or sister. Showing true ‘brotherly kindness’ requires letting the Holy Spirit work through us and also having an awareness for opportunities to show it. I don’t know about you, but I am tired of passing people on the street every day and not taking the time to show them a little genuine concern because it’s just not convenient or important to me. If God’s kindness toward us is so great, how can we stand to not share it? It’s time to stop sleepwalking our way through life and start seeing others the way God sees them: as people in need of His great and eternal loving-kindness. It’s time, sister, to wake up!
Your Sister in Christ,
~ Lauren