Jesus Loves Everyone, so Why Don’t Those Who Follow Him Do the Same?

What difference does it make if someone is gay, has mental health issues, is overweight, because of their sex, or has a different faith?

Photo by Paul Zoetemeijer on Unsplash

When I was a child growing up in the Bible Belt, the first thing a stranger would ask you was about the church you attended. Lawd help you if you didn’t attend some church or other, unless you were Catholic. That was the same as not attending church to many Baptists.

By the time I came along, my parents were not attending church, although my mother was a member of a Baptist church around the corner. I think she did take my older siblings, but they had stopped attending by the time I was born or shortly thereafter.

Once I got to college, I had a roommate who was a devout Christian. She is the one who introduced me to Jesus. I became a student of the Bible and took so many religion classes that the head of the Religion department pulled me aside and asked what was up, since I wasn’t part of their department. When I told him I was just learning about Jesus, he prayed for me.

I got involved with a group of Christians at college. It was then that I realized that everything about me was all wrong. If I wanted to follow Jesus, I had to act a certain way, look a certain way, and even eat a certain way. I won’t go into what happened with my Christian boyfriend, but it pains me to this day even though it’s been forty years.

After the boyfriend debacle, I became angry and rejected all the people who I felt had rejected me. I wanted to leave school, but it would have been too expensive for me to transfer during my last year. I won’t talk about the behavior that last year, but all of these former Christian friends shunned me. I still occasionally have nightmares about attending that college and having no one speak to me.

Since those days, I’ve been a member of a few different churches. I ended up leaving them all for one reason or another. None of them were serious reasons other than I just didn’t feel I fit in. I even met my husband at one of them. I no longer attend church but am thinking about finding a new one.

Here is my problem. If I attend a new church, I want to be in one where the members love everyone just like Jesus does. In my eyes, Jesus would want a church to accept everyone. Isn’t that what he did? The only person I remember him being angry with was the money changers.

I don’t like it when I see people being judgmental. Even if they don’t say anything, you can see it in their facial expressions and actions. My hairstylist’s face tightened when I mentioned my son was living with his girlfriend. I don’t have a problem with that. When the right time to get married, it will happen — or not.

My almost daughter-in-law was raised by two gay men. Her granduncle adopted her as a baby; otherwise, she would have gone into foster care. The dads are visiting this week, and it’s the first time my husband and I have met them. On the day they were to arrive, a family member stopped by, and I told her we were expecting the “dads.” My family member stayed a few more minutes, and they said they wanted to leave before the “dads” got there.

I knew why. She belongs to one of the most “Christian” Baptist churches. The last time I went there, the minister was telling people how to vote. I noped out. This family member tends to be very disapproving of me. After 67 years, I’m used to it. I still love her.

However, I don’t think that if Jesus had been at my house, he would have left early. He would have embraced these new family members of mine.

Back during my college years, my great-aunt came to visit. She was also a member of that most “Christian” church. In her eulogy, the minister joked that she would be waiting at the door to tell him what he got wrong during his sermon. I think he was joking…

On that particular visit, my aunt was highly upset because one of her grandchildren was attending seminary to become a Catholic priest. It was during my religion class days, and I spoke up with the appropriate Bible verses to point out to her that what he was doing was a service to God. My mother backed me up.

My great-aunt stormed out. My father, who had been ignoring everyone, began laughing his head off because his aunt was upset that her grandson had become a priest. She thought her grandson was going to hell because he wasn’t Baptist!

When did we get so arrogant that we can ignore our own sins and shun others for theirs? Why do we think that our beliefs are the only beliefs that are correct?

Think about the Pilgrims who came to this country to escape persecution. Then once they were here, they did the same to others who believed differently from them? It boggles my mind to think about it.

No one is without sin. We all need to remember that.

When I find a church that accepts everyone with love, I’ll let you know. I hope they can accept me warts and all. It won’t be a Baptist church, I promise. I’m not against Baptists, but they don’t allow women to be ministers.

Somewhere out there is a church for me.