As I was walking along on my way across the parking lot to my job last week I had what one could describe as a rather forced confrontation with another human being. I was walking across the pedestrian line about to reach my score when a loud honk alerted me that another person had decided their right of way was more important than my own and sped in front of me with their tricked out Subaru. This in of itself wouldn't have concerned me much but two quickfire realizations during those mere few seconds sent me down a thought process ultimately leading me to writing this article today. One was the incredibly rude gesture displayed to me by the driver of the vehicle as they cut in front of me, but the other was the Christian bumper stickers of various sorts they had on the rear of the car I could clearly see as they drove off. This locked me into the inevitable thought of "well that wasn't a very Christian thing to do." When the thought initially struck I was thinking of it more for a laugh, but then, the more I considered it, it made me realize the many opportunities we as Christians have to show God's love in the little things we do every day.

Now before I continue let me make one thing perfectly clear, I too have problems with this. I have many vices in my own life that I have only recently begun to see as a problem and one of many is my behavior behind the wheel of a car. I understand fully that what this person did was likely not even worth a thought to them, but that's also exactly the point of this article. Why don't we put more thought into the little things that we do in our interactions towards others every day? Why don't we show the kind of love God wants us to show to everyone? After all the Bible does say the following in Matthew 22:39 that "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." So why don't we do it?

I make no claims of being any kind of Biblical scholar but this is a verse that always seemed very simple to me, the kind that internet jokesters might make a "Did I Stutter?" joke after. It's true though, there's very little to no room for interpretation here. As Christians we're supposed to love everyone equal to ourselves, but why is that something that is so hard for me and countless other Christians in America and undoubtedly across the world?

The simple answer? We don't love ourselves.

Honestly, let's have some real talk here. We don't love ourselves, at least not in the ways that we're probably supposed to. How many of us complain about our jobs, complain about money, gossip about other people, and just perpetually live in a state of at best hoping for just ok or, at worst, outright self loathing? Be honest with yourself now because I will be. What I just described is me more often than I care to admit. I just like any of you worry about these things and struggle with anxiety, depression, and common problems that i'm sure many others do too, but should that be an excuse? I feel like our society today has created an environment where we're told to define ourselves by our faults and weaknesses. Not that recognizing these things about ourselves isn't important and downright useful at times, but here's the problem...if the fundamental basis for how we interact with people is based on flaws and negativity...how can we possibly expect to love anyone if we can't even love ourselves?

Again the simple answer is we can't.

We are an imperfect people and we simply can't expect that every time we encounter another person we'll be in a position to make their lives better or expect the same thing in return, but in my opinion it doesn't take much effort to shed just that little bit if kindness on people's lives, even if it's from simply not doing the unloving thing we were initially going to do (including rude hand gestures). The Bible is a book full of examples of people whose small acts of faith and love in the name of God lead to tremendous good, even if they themselves aren't around to reap the benefits directly. In order to do any of this though, we need to be able to love ourselves to the point that we want to share that love with the people around us, and not just the hollow contempt we tend to fill ourselves with more often than not these days.

So by this point i'm sure you're asking "How do we love ourselves like that?" to which I honestly have to respond...I don't honestly know. Now before you go and get disappointed with this anticlimactic payoff let me elaborate. I don't honestly know because it isn't through my own power to know how everyone should love themselves, let alone myself. There is only one that can do that for us. It's God. We need to give over our worries, problems, and distractions to God and have faith that he'll help us through it all because then and ONLY then will we have room to truly see how to fully embrace the life that he gave us. Only then will we see His love enter into our hearts through all the every day things we overlook. Only then can we fill that void with said love and share it with the rest of the world.

It isn't easy and it's a struggle we face daily, Lord only knows I don't get it right and that i'm still working on it, but that's the trick...to work on it. Hold a door open for people, listen to people when they're sad and don't tell them how your problems are worse, don't ironically flip the bird at people in the parking lot while driving your car covered in Christian paraphernalia, and, most importantly, pay attention to the little things in your own life God's given you to make you genuinely happy. If we can't love in the little ways, then we've got no business loving in the big ways.