If You See Your Brother Falling By the Way

There's an old Glen Campbell song called, "Try a Little Kindness." In the song we're encouraged to tell people they are on the wrong path. After all, it isn't kind to to turn away as a brother stumbles willy-nilly toward his own destruction. The kindest thing is to put aside our own feelings, such as fear of displeasing or upsetting the person, and let him know he's heading toward a cliff.

Unfortunately, political correctness and a corrupting of Christianity has edged many of us church-goers toward a dangerous cliff ourselves. We're on a path of pseudo-kindness and false compassion, a path paved with man-made philosophies embodied in such cliches as: just spread the 'love,' build your self-esteem, err on the side of 'kindness,' believe in yourself. These catch-phrases are not gospel-based, they are more indicative of the preachings of the anti-Christs in scripture who insisted there was no such thing as sin and no need for repentance, that God saves us all without repentance, that our eternal future is dependent on our own merits rather than the merits of Christ, that there is no Savior. Of course true followers of Christ know that the way to salvation is through Christ the Redeemer alone, through turning back to God continually, through seeking the Holy Ghost for truth and guidance and learning, all of which is possible only because of Christ's Atonement.

The anti-Christs preached delusions about the self, about ease, about temporal feelings, about our own merits, about getting self-esteem from ourselves, each other and our deeds, whereas Christ is all about reality, God's perfect love apart from our deeds, our fallen state, letting go of our selfishness and pride, giving all credit to God for any good we do, killing off the natural man and replacing him with humble spiritual reliance on Christ. To those who resist this doctrine, here is the litmus test. Which way would fit us for God's holy presence: the self-serving, self-congratulatory, self-centered way or the humble, grateful, submissive Christ-centered way? The truth is, the Christ-centered way is the only way to learn all those magnificent godly traits God wants to bestow on us---humility, long-suffering, unselfish love, the riches of eternity---while the self-centered way stops one's progress toward those traits like a brick wall.

Here at SoL we receive a certain amount of hate mail. It's interesting that most of those who hurl the most angry attacks also call us unChristlike in the same breath, as if to use Christianity as a weapon against us. But if these people were truly followers of Christ who sincerely believed we were wrong, the truth is they would react in a completely different way. They would show a firm and constant kindness rather than wish us dead. They would intelligently try to persuade us back onto the right path rather than cast dispersions, call us terrible names, or condemn us to hell.

Please note that we at SoL do not engage in personal attacks. We see our detractors as on a wrong path. To them we stop and kindly say, here's the right one. While standing for God's unchanging and objective standard of reality, truth, and righteousness, we wish the best for our enemies, now and forever. That's Christianity, and kindness, in its solid true form.