Labels

Have you listened to the news or to talk radio lately? I tend to be a news junkie like a lot of people, but it's getting crazy out there.

The one thing I've noticed is that people are getting really heavy handed when it comes to labeling others.

THEY are Republicans. THEY are democrats. THEY are conservatives. THEY are liberals.

And it always helps that when people speak of THEY, they speak with authority, sounding pious and being very dogmatic.

Yet do we not do the same thing in the kingdom?

There are temperament labels. She's a choleric...Married to a melancholic!

There are emotional labels. "Well, you know her, she's the nervous type." or, "He's a classic neurotic, a perfectionist to the core."

And then there are doctrinal labels. I always cringe when someone calls me a fundamentalist (especially when they don't know what it means).

Or even Pentecostal. It's so limiting.

"Well, I am a pretribulational, rapture believing, premilllenialist, dispensationalist." Well, whoopty-do.

Sticking a label on something saves time and can sometimes give a fairly clear mental pictures. Yet the main danger in giving labels is that it limits the perception of someone to one area of their lives.

We are far more complex than that. And we are growing. Outside of my strong beliefs in the basics of the gospel, some of my views have changed over the years.

I think you will agree with me that we are not the same today as we were even last week. And that is as it should be.

So don't label me. And Holy Spirit, help me to not label others.

Being alert and discerning, basing our opinions on the absolute truth is a sign of maturity.....But pasting labels on people and churches and schools with only partials facts, feelings, and opinions to back those statements up is worse than unfair...It's un-Christian.