"But God demonstrates his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:8 NIV)

Jerk: A person regarded as disagreeable, contemptible, especially as the result of foolish or mean behavior.

One of the biggest jerks I ever knew was a 23-year-old college graduate whose anger and arrogance spilled into many of his relationships. His hypocrisy was astounding - one moment he claimed to be a Christian and the next he acted like a son of hell. If it had been my choice, I would have avoided him all together - but since that jerk was me, I was stuck being around him!

Most of us try to avoid jerks. We pat ourselves on the back for not telling them off. We applaud ourselves for putting up with them. We remind ourselves everybody has a cross to bear, and so we grudgingly accept certain jerks as our divinely ordained burden.

But is that what we're called to do?

Jesus embraced jerks; he graced them with love - while stilling telling them the truth in love. Now he had no qualms about pointing out a whitewashed tomb when he saw one, but the corporate evil of the Pharisees was a far more serious matter than mere human jerkiness.

The point is this: Jesus didn't shelter himself from the pain and heartache caused by jerks. In fact, he voluntarily stretched out his arms on the cross and allowed several jerks to slam nails into his hands and feet.

Behind all their stomp and snort, jerks are still spiritual beings, created in God's image and destined for heaven or hell. We're compelled to be ministers of reconciliation, willing to embrace the pain of a fallen world for the sake of our God. (2 Corinthians 5:16-21)

The heart of the gospel is that God loves the unlovely. Could it be that the jerks God places in our lives are there to teach us to be more like Christ, to teach us the God-like quality of loving the unlovely?

Most of us take for granted the incredible change God initiated in our own lives: We were once jerks to God, yet even while we were still jerks, Christ died for us!

Jerks are never easy to embrace. If it were easy to love everyone, then Christ need not have died; we could love them on our own. But in order to embrace the jerks in our life, we need the Life of Christ within us so that, as new creations, we can overwhelm jerks with God's grace, showing them the only power that will stop them from stumbling in the darkness, teaching them to cling to the only thing able to move them from being jerks to being Jesus-followers.

Hello Thomas

I find it hard to believe you ever were a jerk.  I too walked that path but by the grace of God, with love and support of others I finally learned the true meaning of love and acceptance. Each and everyday I try to be a better person than the day before and pray for help to achieve this.

Enchanted Hollow

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MadVlad

 Hi Thomas,

  This was a nice forum.  Where is everyone????  It does seem that when someone has something important to talk about, no one is hear to listen.  However, if you put up a forum to Slam someone you will receive more responses than you can handle.  I am considered a Jerk by many people, simply because I say how I feel, not to hurt anyone but rather because I don't feel that it is right to tell people what they want to hear but rather tell people what they need to hear.  Jesus suffered and died on that cross for all of our sins, however we still display hatred in everything that we do.  We need to pray not only for the righteous but for the wrong doers as well, which is a very difficult thing for most of us to do. 

GOD BLESS YOU

Mike  

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Jerk: A person regarded as disagreeable, contemptible, especially as the result of foolish or mean behavior.

One of the biggest jerks I ever knew was a 23-year-old college graduate whose anger and arrogance spilled into many of his relationships. His hypocrisy was astounding - one moment he claimed to be a Christian and the next he acted like a son of h*ll. If it had been my choice, I would have avoided him all together - but since that jerk was me, I was stuck being around him!

Most of us try to avoid jerks. We pat ourselves on the back for not telling them off. We applaud ourselves for putting up with them. We remind ourselves everybody has a cross to bear, and so we grudgingly accept certain jerks as our divinely ordained burden.

But is that what we're called to do?

Jesus embraced jerks; he graced them with love - while stilling telling them the truth in love. Now he had no qualms about pointing out a whitewashed tomb when he saw one, but the corporate evil of the Pharisees was a far more serious matter than mere human jerkiness.

The point is this: Jesus didn't shelter himself from the pain and heartache caused by jerks. In fact, he voluntarily stretched out his arms on the cross and allowed several jerks to slam nails into his hands and feet.

Behind all their stomp and snort, jerks are still spiritual beings, created in God's image and destined for heaven or h*ll. We're compelled to be ministers of reconciliation, willing to embrace the pain of a fallen world for the sake of our God. (2 Corinthians 5:16-21)

The heart of the gospel is that God loves the unlovely. Could it be that the jerks God places in our lives are there to teach us to be more like Christ, to teach us the God-like quality of loving the unlovely?

Most of us take for granted the incredible change God initiated in our own lives: We were once jerks to God, yet even while we were still jerks, Christ died for us!

Jerks are never easy to embrace. If it were easy to love everyone, then Christ need not have died; we could love them on our own. But in order to embrace the jerks in our life, we need the Life of Christ within us so that, as new creations, we can overwhelm jerks with God's grace, showing them the only power that will stop them from stumbling in the darkness, teaching them to cling to the only thing able to move them from being jerks to being Jesus-followers.