Christian Living
Larry Lilly's Letter Friday January 25, 2008
I often work with men and women in prisons, county jails and a few mental facilities. I do not condemn them, as that is not why I am there. I want to try to help them primarily through helping them trust the Lord Jesus. This noble endeavor sounds simple enough, but oh that simple were so.
I learned something when I was kid that in later years has brought some sense of what we Christians call the Incarnation, to my mind and heart as to the why of God taking on human skin.
The Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky made a statement concerning working with evildoers that every student of the human condition should study and wrestle with at least to the point of near insanity. The grand Russian wrote:
"Nothing is easier than denouncing the evildoer. Nothing is more difficult than understanding him." The billions that are wasted year in and year out through well meaning people attempting to implement programs to enable the "evildoer" to lift himself or herself out of their plight by their bootstraps, though I'm certain most people no longer know what a bootstrap is, is disgusting when you realize most of the programs do not deal with what is going on inside the person they are trying to help. So much for short, crisp sentences.
A reading of the great writers, the great preachers reveal that they along with the Bible had a good understanding of the why of the evildoers. The justice system is not designed to delve into this, but to deal with the actions of the evildoers regardless of the why. When blind lady justice forgets her purpose, we have the current mess in our country. However, we who wish to be used to help must get by the what, no matter how horrible and delve into the why; why did he/she do this? The Bible gives more insight than the mere, "Oh, well he/she is a sinner." That explains a lot. According to this authority we all are sinners, but we all do not murder old men, or commit atrocious acts on tiny children, so there is room for an additional why concerning evildoers.
It is said by John concerning Jesus that "Need not that any should testify of man: for he knew what was in man." I have yet after 46 years to figure why so many who claim to be His healing hand extended have failed to even try to grasp the why in the people we say we want to help. Dostoevsky knew we had to know if we wanted to lift people up rather than merely add to their condemnation.
One of my all time favorite phrases from literature comes from Harper Lee's fantastic wise man, Atticus Finch, when he explains the ancient secret of identifying with and therefore qualifying to help Dostoevsky's "evildoer."
"You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view--until you climb into his skin and walk around in it."
Is this walking around in another's skin, somehow tied to Incarnation? I don’t know for sure, but I do know you are pretty much wasting your time until you learn to do it. Go ahead and take a week, even two!
Larry Lilly Copyright © 2008 Use with credit
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