Love the Sinner

Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. - 1 Peter 4:8

Love covers over all wrongs. - Proverbs 10:12b

[Love] keeps no record of wrongs. - 1 Corinthians 13:5b

Today's devotion can best be summed up by "Love the sinner, hate the sin."  But it is mostly about loving the sinner.  This is a very difficult thing to do for us.  But I think Andy Stanley did the best job of any message I've ever heard on this topic in his Future Family series in the fourth video message.  I'll try to sum up the thoughts as they relate to this topic.

The verses used were 2 Corinthians 5:18-19, "All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them.  And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation."  The idea is that God reconciled us "in spite of" us.  God restored friendly relations with us.  He cleared the table, prepared the table, and gave us an invitation and the only thing that can keep us from being at the table is us.  We must choose to accept the invitation and sit at the table or to turn it down. 

For those of us who choose to sit at the table, we have been given "the ministry of reconciliation".  We must tell the world "that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting people's sins against them".  This is our witness to others, but there is more, God "has committed us the message of reconciliation".  2 Corinthians 5:20 follow on this explaining that "We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us."  That is, if we are carrying the message of reconciliation, we must do so as an ambassador of Christ where God is making His appeal through our actions.

So, if God is willing to clear the table, prepare the table, and send us an invitation to us who have sinned against him, "in spite of" us, we must also be willing to clear the table, prepare the table, and send an invitation to others who have sinned against us, "in spite of" them, for His sake.  It's a long sentence but I think it is accurately stating why and how we are to love others.