BOTTOMS UP!

Deuteronomy 2:1-3:29; Luke 6:12-38; Psalm 67:1-7; Proverbs 11:27

“But to you who are willing to listen, I say, love your enemies! Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you.”

 “If you search for good, you will find favor; but if you search for evil, it will find you!”

Humans have an unfortunate fascination with the negative. Consider how easily and flippantly negative gossip gets repeated, often without any regard for the truth. Entire newspapers are dedicated to that kind of garbage! Yet, by comparison, how seldom we express our appreciation for the accomplishments and consideration of others! We are, unfortunately, a race consumed with finding fault. Many of us prefer to tear life down to its lowest common denominator, never stopping to think it is a measure of our own emptiness. We wonder why the future looks so bleak.

Thank goodness God does not judge us by our own yardstick! He is in the re-construction business, not the demolition business. It was never His idea for skepticism to flourish. He has a better way. Call it a “bottom-up” mentality. God started an entire race from one nomad. His best ruler – a man after God’s own heart – was a nondescript shepherd boy, the least impressive of Jesse’s kids. God came into the world incarnate through the son of a carpenter, in a manger using a trough for a bed. God persistently builds from the bottom up.  His gold standard for greatness is servanthood.

Here is some plain truth. It takes no character and little effort to find life’s negatives. If we so choose, we can even find the bad in manna. We can elect to ignore every bit of beauty and love the Spirit sends us. And we can do it all just by neglecting to affirmatively tune ourselves to the positive. This isn’t so much about good and evil as it is about inertia and momentum. Like a CD caught on a scratch, if we’re not careful, we tend to replay and brood most over life’s rough spots.

My parents got caught on this. They have a dear friend - a wonderful person, actually - who just got stuck on the negatives. She was in a bad job with inconsiderate family members, had a cold boss, was unappreciated, and so on and so on. For months, my folks were exposed to this. At first, they just listened and sympathized. Then, they began to see life the same way. Without even being aware of it, they both started to enable and adopt their friend’s negativity as a first response. It was not easy getting them to see that what started out as compassionate listening had become a contagion of cynicism, and it was even harder for them to break the habit.

We can do better. We can choose construction over destruction. We can dedicate ourselves to working with whatever we are given to make life better. But there probably is one catch: we cannot do it without God. Only in His power do we have any hope of elevating life from a servanthood to all the wrong things to the greatness that can only be found in true repentance and conversion. The good news is that the Lord stands at the door knocking, ready and able to make all things new, and good.