Is it right?

[Brian]

If I love someone and that person commits an heinous crime against God and Humanity, is it right to love that person any less

What is your opinion and why

[Craig]

Does Christ love us any less??

Craig

[OBrenda]

IMO...what we are capable of and what is right are different.
Yes....It is right to still love them, and to also separate and hate their sin or their actions.
But in my ability, there are some situations where I don't have the capacity, unless God puts it there.

If our Child or Loved ones comits it against someone else, it may be easy because love is already there.
A heinous crime against one of our Loved ones, by a Stranger is much more difficult...
The hardest would be to be able to love ourselves, if we committed the heinous crime


With Gods Love,
Brenda

[frecklegirl417]

Brian,

IMO.....You can love someone but you DO NOT have to like the act or the person they became to commit this crime.

Didn't Jesus love Paul when he was Saul? I believe he did!
You need to look deep with your heart and listen. God will show you they right thing to do. We here will listen and give opinions but we can't tell you what to do. I am sorry this may not be the answer you were looking for but it is only my opinion.
                                         
                                    With God's love & understanding,
                                                  Pam

[winner08]

I can tell you from first hand experience. If you loved that person before the crime ,It is difficult not to love them after the crime. For people who never experience this they will say depending on the crime. They should be killed or sentence to a long prison term. When it is your loved one it is hard to turn your back on them. no matter what the crime was. Anyways, people shouldn't talk about things they don't know anything about.

                                             Darren

[Samson]

I can tell you from first hand experience. If you loved that person before the crime ,It is difficult not to love them after the crime. For people who never experience this they will say depending on the crime. They should be killed or sentence to a long prison term. When it is your loved one it is hard to turn your back on them. no matter what the crime was. Anyways, people shouldn't talk about things they don't know anything about.

                                             Darren

   Good Point Darren,

                              That's Called, IMO, " Walk a mile in my shoes "; Your right, it's usually unlikely that if someone's very close to you, your going to completely turn your back on them; easier said than done. Think of cases where a parent is strongly opposed to Homosexuality, both Biblically and Politically, and their Daughter or Son reveals they are Gay, do they stop loving them; or the scenario where a Racist has a Son or Daughter that Marries someone of another Race and they have a child, your Grandchild, this may change their perspective.

                              Sometimes, I play these possible scenario's in my mind and pray that God will grant me the ability to maintain a proper balance in all of this; it's easier to apply the principle: Love the sinner and Hate the Sin when it's someone personally close to us, but when it's someone that we don't know, we tend to pronounce the kind of punishment we expect a person should receive, we should be carefull of this. Jesus came to save the Lost.

                                             Kind Regards, Samson.

[WhoAmI]

Watch people and how they react when the evening news is on. That will tell you a lot about a person. My favorite one is people who after hearing of a terrible crime yell out that we need to get the guy and make him suffer for a long time and then kill him. Usually you have two or three who chime in with full support of this idea. When your blind you can't see the beast in you, but you surely can see the beast in everyone else.

[Kent]

Even Hitler had a wife that probably loved him. If I was a woman, would I want a Hitler as a husband? Probably not. Eva Braun was nuts.

Some of the SS were loving family men that came home from the camps exhausted, after a long hard day of beating and killing prisoners. Would I want to be married to one of them, if I was a woman? I really doubt it. But women are hard to figure out...
They seem to like the bad boys.

If perfect love casts out fear, I'd personally have a hard time turning my back on someone that "commits an heinous crime against God and Humanity".

[OBrenda]

What are your thoughts Brian?

[Dave in Tenn]

I don't want to get pedantic (though I can't help it often), but define 'Love'.

If you mean as the Greeks defined it a Phileo love (brotherly, familial, fellowship) then yes, I think it's OK to love someone who's committed a terrible crime less...particularly if there is no tie between you...than you would a neighbor, a friend, or a family member.  We're not called on the be 'friends' with people who do evil. 

If such a person WERE in your circle of Phileo loved ones, then a greater love Agape--sacrificial, without expectation of return--would have to take over and you'd be called on to love them MORE than you would love a more casual friend or family member.

If such a person were NOT in your circle of loved ones--a stranger (more or less)--then at the very least we'd be called on to not hate them, and we might be led of the Spirit to love and minister to them with a greater love than we might show to those we naturally care for.

The problem with these times in our media age is that we think we know LOTS of people who we really don't and are exposed to faces, celebrities, criminals constantly.  Unless we are called on to specifically actively love and minister to these people, then again, we're only called on to not hate them and to pray for them as we are led.

"Active" is the key word.  Love is doing, not just feeling.  We encounter strangers with kindness and humility and an attitude of love.  If God leads us across the paths of 'people who have committed gross sins against God and Humanity' then we are to love them too.  All of us are guilty of gross sins against God and Humanity, after all.

   

 

[gmik]

You can always "love them as your enemy".

My sister in law had a hard time w/ her ex until she discovered that principle.

Kent....girls always love the bad ones!   My girlfriends all marvel at my 35 year happy marriage!!!  But, I swear, they alll picked bad ones!!!! Several times even!

[AK4]

You can always "love them as your enemy".

My sister in law had a hard time w/ her ex until she discovered that principle.

Amen, My ex has and still is putting me through hell all out of spite.  I kept praying to God that she just die or something so me and our kids wouldnt have to deal with her no more.  And this almost happened twice.  But now i realise that the only way she will stop doing what she is doing is if God will touch her heart and let her come to the Truth.

I cant say that i love her (my worst enemy) but now i pray for her

Anthony

[winner08]

Yes Samson: When it is someone who is very close to you it really messes with not just you but the whole family, it can divide them. It is terrible. Relations break up, children suffer, parents and grandparents suffer. The line of suffering is endless. All it takes is one person in a family commits a terrible crime. We all pay the price one way or the other. Those who are not related pay the price (literally) It cost lots of money to keep someone in prison. I know.


                                                     Darren

[Kent]

Kent....girls always love the bad ones!   My girlfriends all marvel at my 35 year happy marriage!!!  But, I swear, they alll picked bad ones!!!! Several times even!

Which leaves me out in the cold, along with most other single men that aren't jerks. I gave up a long time ago. No sense in acting like a criminal, just to find a woman. They aren't worth it. I dont hate them, I just avoid them. But thats OK, I dont exactly have women beating a path to my door.

You put a in there, and I understand why you did it, but it's a little hard for me to smile about this.
To me, a  or a  is more appropriate.

No man in his right mind wants someone with that kind of baggage. I, and a substancial and growing number of men, won't put up with it anymore.

The family is dead. This country is in big trouble.
Sad, really. We had a good run of it. I blame the so-called "men" for the mess we are in, not the women. They enable it, they encourage it.

[Linny]

Kent, you sound like my hubby. He is one of the good guys too. He also blames the men for the mess we are in. Wishes women ran the world. 

But you don't have to be bad to find someone. I picked very badly for a LONG time until I grew up and realized that the kind of guy I needed was the kind that WASN'T bad. That's when I gave up looking and asked God to send me someone. I was the one with the most baggage but honestly, don't we all have baggage of some sort? I don't know how you live in this world without it. 

But some of us ARE worth it! 

Blessings,
Lin

[frecklegirl417]

Lin,

I also picked badly for a LONG time and then decided to give up on men and love all together. Then one day Samson walked in to where I was working and the rest was history. We all have all kinds of baggage its just that some people like to carry it around and dwell on it others let go. I learned to let it all go life is to short and hard has it is so why make it harder to carry the baggage too.

Kent, Don't give up on all the women out there not all of us are bad, so leave your heart open and just maybe God will show the right women just for you. That's how I felt when I met Samson.... I still feel that way.

[Linny]

Frecklegirl, you are SO right! Hanging onto all that is not worth it and makes life miserable.
I think working through the baggage is what makes you so close to one another. Learning to release it together is what I really mean to say.
We both learned quickly how to "handle" each other as opposed to how we were raised to deal with things. We have such a deep respect for each other's different personalities.

We are so happy together and just celebrated our 17th anniversary!