YOU’RE BETTER THAN THAT [T, 7-21-20]

CHRIST IN WINTER: Reflections on Faith & Life for the Days of Winter

YOU’RE BETTER THAN THAT                     [T, 7-21-20]

Our pastor, Jimmy Moore, told this story. A white supremacist went into a restaurant. He had a swastika tattooed on his hand and proudly displayed it with his hands on his table. A waitress put her hand on his and said, “You’re better than that.”

He suddenly realized that he was defining himself not by who he was but by who he hated. He didn’t have to do that. He was better than that. He was damaged, and that made him hate, but he could be healed, because he was better than that.

We are always tempted to tell others: Stop hating! Be loving! Be good! Don’t be bad!

Doesn’t do much good, does it? What it really takes, if it’s going to work at all, is “You’re better than that.”

It won’t get through every time. It’s quite possible that someone had told that Nazi a dozen times that he was better than that, before that waitress saw that swastika, before it got through to him. But we need to be faithful to that task, no matter how many times it takes, to remind others, and ourselves: You’re better than that.

We are all damaged, one way or another. So we take out our doubt and fear and confusion from that damage on other people, and on society, and on the environment, and in doing that, on ourselves. But we don’t have to. The damage will remain, as a part of who we are, but we do not have to be defined by it. We can be healed. Whatever that damage is, we are better than that.

John Robert McFarland