People are crazy

The local television station shares the latest news on its Facebook feed. Of course, the story includes some controversy. I give myself a warning: skip the comments and stick to silly baby, cat, and dog reels. I know what’s going to happen, but my curiosity gets the best of me.

I take a peek. Someone proclaiming themselves to be a kind, God-fearing person shows how little they care about their neighbor. Another person throws out a bunch of numbers and crazy claims that I know are false. They make several broad generalizations that are nowhere near reality. I start to get filled with anger. My veins start to pop. I want to go on social media and light up their world. I want to point out their hypocrisy and call them names. Please excuse me, but I want to send out a flurry of heat-seeking missiles and start social media’s version of World War III.

“Oh yea, well respond to this, you obnoxious bully.”

But I stop.

Thinking first, acting second

I take a deep breath. I take another breath. Two images pop in my head.

First, I get an image of my first grade Sunday school teacher. I forget her name. She was someone’s mom. She’s the same lady who taught us the story about Jesus Christ and the loaves of bread and fish. The story details how Jesus took five loaves of bread and two fish, blessed them, and fed a large crowd. The miracle shows his kind and caring nature.

But now, I focus on my memory of her teaching us a simple children’s hymn. The words come back to me. “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.” We sang the song every Sunday. I’m sure she taught it to us because of its reassuring message.

“Really this song? Right now?” I think to myself. “Nice memory and all, but I’m kind of in the middle of something. Do you think you could come back in like an hour?”

Secondly, I’m reminded that “people are crazy.” When I was a young kid, I struggled in school and would often come home feeling left out. In the evening, my mother would read to me before putting me to bed. I would tell her about the mean thing someone had said to me or some slight I felt. One evening, she told me that people are crazy. She’d pause for a long time and, then in a whisper, told me to “love them anyway.”

I think about the moment: “Really mom, right now. I get it, love the person, hate the sin. Can I get back to you though? I’m about to give someone an ass whooping they won’t soon forget.”

Right on cue

I put my phone down. When I see my wife later, I complain about how irritating people can be. I tell her about the hateful comments. This is a mistake. My wife is kind-hearted and can find something good in the most wretched of situations. She reminds me that people can be kind and loving too. “Oh stop it,” I tell her.

She points to the grumpy guy who let me merge in front of him. She tells me about the progress one of her developmentally delayed students made that day. The boy surprised everyone by reciting the sounds of the alphabet. If that hasn’t convinced me, when an old man says hello to us in the grocery store, she hits my arm. “See,” she says. “People are nice.”

“Yea, yea,” I grumble.

A full picture

In the end, I concede that people are loving, trusting, kind, courageous, honest, patient, gracious, compassionate, wise, generous, and respectful

Of course, later when I pull up the article again, I tell my wife that people are also hateful, deceitful, unkind, fearful, distrustful, impatient, rude, uncaring, foolish, greedy, and self-centered.

She frowns at me.

“Okay, okay, I’ll ease up.”

I’ve written this ending a dozen different times. News and current events are polarizing. Now more so than ever before. I want to say love is the answer, but we live in a crazy world. I can’t discount that there’s real hatred in the world. Poverty is out of control. Evil exists. We need to stand up to it. We need to fight for what is right. We need to fight for the meek and powerless. But I also need to remember: People are crazy and we need to love them anyway. When that’s not possible, love them the best you can.

Billy Currington – People Are Crazy 

Images by Pexels.