Musings on Love and Judgement

When I was 17, after reading the sermon of the mount in Matthew, especially the part on ‘giving to all who ask’, I decided to conduct an experiment on myself. I would buy tissue paper, and any knick knack from anyone who asked me on the street, as an attempt to live out that command. It didn’t really ask long, maybe at most 1 month, as I was spending a lot of money on that shit (and it did open my eyes to the number of those kinds of people out on the street), and I was accumulating a huge pile of tissue paper in my room.

Around that time, I talked/discussed abit about the significance of that verse with people in church, especially Greg. He didn’t completely agree with me on the way I interpreted that verse on a blank command to give to all who ask, as he believed that we had to be sure that the money would not be spent of stuff like alcohol and drugs ect. In essence, he said that giving like that must be reconciled with the idea of redeeming people to Gods kingdom, making things right, that it had to be in a certain sense, “conditional”. I never bought that argument tho, but I never thought about exactly why I didn’t do so until I was 23 and thought about it abit more.

As part of the thought experiment, I would throw away any assumptions and judgement I was unconsciously applying to these people. I mean, we aren’t called to Judge peoples lifestyle habits in this sense, since we should live it to God. Note that I am not saying that we cannot judge right from wrong, but we should not let this judgement of right of wrong infect any other aspects of our assessment of the situation.

One of the first few thoughts I threw away was that “we know better”. What do I mean by this? Well, I threw away the assumption that we knew better on how poor people should spend their money. When we tell poor people that they shouldn’t spend money on alcohol, we are in fact assuming that we know better than them on what is important in their lives (even if we in fact do know whats better for them). And indeed, can we be so arrogant as to assume that we know “right from wrong” in the cases of their lives?

When I threw away this assumption, I then had to think of another reason why we would ask them to not spend money on alcohol, or at least not give them money if they would go and spend it on alcohol. I then thought of why I drank alcohol. It was because alcohol helps me relax, to do a little “escapism”, so to speak. But I don’t actually need alcohol to do so, because my life is quite comfortable. Alcohol to me is like a toy or a recreational drink, something to have for a little fun, but not essential, and also not addictive enough to make me an alcoholic. But what about someone from a poor segment of society? When his life is full of monetary stress, when his home isn’t a sanctuary (if he even has a home), when he sees no progress or future, indeed, when he doesn’t have much to live for, what is alcohol to him. It is his ONLY way to escape from this life. It is his only way to get release from his circumstance, if even for a moment. To him, it is as important as a part of life as it is to us in more comfortable circumstance to have a home and family to go home to every day.

When we tell him (or insist) that the money cannot be used for alcohol, is that truly love? Because to him, all he might see is that we don’t understand, that we do not emphasize with his plight.

-How did Jesus do it? Did he ever withhold anything?

-Did Jesus actually mean that we had to give with this deep theological understanding, or was it a simple, blanket command?

-What is the interplay between Love and Judgement?

-How do we Love without passing Judgement?