But You Don't Know My Neighbor!

“It is wrong to say bad things about your neighbors. Be kind to the poor, and you will be blessed.” Proverbs 14:21

Most people, when asked, “Would you like to receive a blessing,” would certainly reply, “Yes!” Even if they weren’t exactly sure what a blessing is, it sounds positive. And so, like children who want Santa to leave them something special on Christmas Eve, we respond as well. “If I get to choose between being blessed or…hmmm…what is the opposite? Cursed? Simply not blessed, like living in a world of random events? No matter. It doesn’t matter much what the opposite is, I like the idea of being blessed. Bring it on!”

Then we wait for the genie wave his homemade wand, granting the obligatory three wishes. But, as in every tale connected to desired wishes, there is always a lesson or some strings attached to the bargain. A current automobile commercial shows a pretty young girl dressed as a modern-day genie in a purple pantsuit. 

Halfway into the ad we see her sitting on the tailgate of the SUV with a number of witches flying around her on their brooms. The poor man she appeared to is groaning, “I said unlimited wishes.” The genie responds, “I heard ‘witches’. Sorry.”

We can be assured that God is not in the business of tricking us with a contractual obligation to accept a particular “blessing” because we misspoke or misheard. But, God is also not in the business of handing out wishes like lollipops to children along a parade route. There are certain “strings” attached. There are attitudes and actions which God does bless. So, if we really do answer, “Yes, I would love a blessing,” we would do well to kept at least a mental note of what behavior God enjoys rewarding.

Blessings are not simply nice things that happen because we did nice things. There is not a universal scale that keeps ping-ponging our good deeds back across the net to us. We would love if it worked that way, but personal experience tells us otherwise. We can probably recount many times that nice behavior had limited measurable effects. We give someone a ride late at night, and the next day at work the boss asks if we stayed up too late partying.

I do believe that God is personally in the blessing-giving business, though. Yes, there are some principles that work in the general long view of life. Doing good is more likely to yields positive results across a lifetime that doing bad. Excellence in my work will bring much greater opportunities than merely getting by.

But all those leave out the idea that God personally is involved in blessing. There are a number of reasons for this, I suppose. One is, it is hard to distinguish if God was involved in that promotion, or it was a combination of another employee moving on, new market opening up, and my own hard work paying off. Or, on the other hand, we may think we actually deserve God’s blessing and we see nothing coming.

It has been said many times before, but I thing we are very shortsighted when we try to define what blessings are. For instance, the promotion is a blessing we recognize easily. But what if we were overlooked for a promotion and remain in a position for many years. And, in doing so, we develop friendships with half a dozen people who, years down the road, actually give their all in a time we needed friendship the most. We might not call the missed promotion a blessing at all.

So, lots of musing about blessings here. My “blog” is usually about that. It is not meant to be an in-depth Bible Study on a particular subject; but instead a response to the verse that has started me thinking. Today, when I read, “Be kind to the poor, and you will be blessed,” I wondered about how those blessings actually happen.

The first half of the verse lets us in on how to avoid being blessed by God. Stay annoyed at your neighbors, yell at them across the fence, and constantly call the police on them. And, if they don’t speak my language, all the more reason to be irritated. They should learn the language of the country they moved to, for goodness’ sake. How am I supposed to tell them how annoying they are when I can’t speak their language!

Nope, the writer tells us it is wrong, unequivocally wrong, to say bad things about our neighbors. That’s right, we have defaulted quite a number of blessings without doing a thing but bad-mouthing people we know. I can’t tell you often, even among Christians who have known Christ for years, that conversation includes at least some reference to “those people”, or “my neighbors”, or “those young people”. And, even though we are told in uncertain words that talking that way is wrong, we let our tongue flap like shutters against a wall on a windy day. We may even start another subject about how bad and wrong all those homosexuals, abortionists, democrats and mainline churches are without one bit of blush about our faces. We easily speak falsely and harshly, ignoring God’s own statement about speaking badly about our neighbors.

But, we want blessings, right? Then be kind to the poor. Be kind to the poor girl who got an abortion. Be kind to the homosexual couple that lives in your neighborhood. Be kind to the Muslim who is having trouble adapting to our country. Be kind to the immigrant you suspect is undocumented. Be kind to the mother in line with food stamps. Be kind to the unruly teen brought up in foster homes. Be kind to the aged who won’t bend to your way of thinking. Be kind, be kind, be kind.

Why? Without appealing to our selfish nature too drastically; you, my friend, will be blessed.