Kings of Compassion (pt 1.)
Another form of false compassion is the elevation of “truth” over sensitivity. The “truth” in this sense is often defined as being “right”. The danger in this idea is that defining a precise notion of right or wrong requires you to oversimplify what it really means to be good. In condensing what it means to be good, to generalized rules of “rightness” (the law), we end up living and forcing others to live by incomplete truths. —
Rules are a Simplification of Good
Jesus challenges this idea when He says, “I am the Truth..(John 14:6)” or when he points out that “No one is good but One, that is, God” (Luke 18:19). What I believe He meant by this is that you can only define and pinpoint rightness insofar as you can define and pinpoint God. Every human definition of “right” is only an approximation for for who God is, and is therefore incomplete.
The Pharisees attempted to follow the law so precisely that they failed to understand God. It was out of this false “love and devotion for God” that they condemned our savior to die. They saw the law as God, instead of the approximation for God that it is.
The way the apostle Paul expressed this idea was that the law was a “tutor”. “Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith.” KJV Gal 3:28.
When I was younger my mom told me to be home before the street lights came on. That was the explicit rule but her intention was that I learn higher principles from that rule. (For example: its less safe to be out late, it is important to prioritize going to sleep to prepare for the next day, or there is a disciplined time for fun and a time for family, etc). As I get older the explicit rule has been abstracted out to general principles of living like these. Sometimes I stay out later, but I’ve held on to the principles that simple rule taught me. In this way, precise definitions of right and wrong are not erroneous but simplifications that attempt to point to a higher way of being. Jesus “came to fulfill the law”, and to elevate the law to a way of being in the world.
Sin and Holiness vs. Right and Wrong
This is why Jesus sent the “Holy Spirit” whose purpose it is to “lead us into all truth”. Integrating the law into a personality and a being is the only way to have a complete picture of what is good. True compassion is rooted in the idea of sin and holiness, not right and wrong. They are not equivalent. True compassion does not attempt to oversimplify God to rules, but understand goodness as a relational ideal. To be holy is to aim at God in all his infinite complexity and goodness, and to sin is to miss the mark and not aim at Him. The nuance and complexity of compassion can only be found when we share his spirit (the holy spirit) and not merely His rules. Truth and Goodness is a way of being in the world that can only be developed by imitating a Being. Compassion is orienting the world towards God ( a being a personality full of depth, emotion, and complexity and his infinite goodness).
Moving Forward
He has told you, O man, what is good;
And what does the Lord require of you
Except to be just, and to love [and to diligently practice] kindness (compassion), And to walk humbly with your God [setting aside any overblown sense of importance or self-righteousness]?
