How Should I React to Someone Else’s Sin?

We have a choice: contempt or compassion.

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“Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted.” — Galatians 6:1

I’m a fan of the television show Life Below Zero, which chronicles the lives of several people who live near or above the arctic circle in Alaska.

It is really cold up there. Thus, the name of the show — Life Below Zero. As in zero degrees.

These folks talk about subsistence living. Rather than holding down typical day jobs, most of the Below Zeroers survive by hunting, fishing, and trapping animals for food. Some of them have built their homes by hand. It is old-school frontier living.

In one episode, a snow hare is caught in a steel trap. The trapper is thrilled. The rabbit, not so much. Apart from the mercy of the trapper, Mr. Rabbit is going to be stew for supper.

This is the image Paul paints for us in the first five verses of Galatians 6. But it is not a rabbit that is caught in a trap. It is a fellow believer. And the…