There is a quiet ache that echoes through human history: the ache of not belonging.

From ancient tribal divisions to modern-day polarization, we’ve become skilled at drawing invisible lines – us vs. them, right vs. wrong, worthy vs. unworthy. This act of distancing others, of placing them outside the circle of grace we reserve for “our kind,” has a name: othering.

But the gospel tells a different story.

Made in His Image

Genesis 1:27 reminds us that every person, regardless of nationality, race, gender, background, belief, or behavior, is made in the image of God. The imago Dei is not selectively bestowed. It is intrinsic. Sacred. Undeniable.

To “other” someone, then, is not just a social act; it is a spiritual rupture. It is to deny the divine fingerprint in another. It is to forget that Christ did not die for a chosen few, but for all (John 3:16, Romans 5:8).

When we diminish another’s dignity, we forget who God is. And we forget who we are.

Jesus and the Other

Jesus had every right to remain distant. Holy. Separate.

But He didn’t.

He touched lepers (Mark 1:40-42). He broke social codes to speak with a Samaritan woman (John 4). He dined with sinners, elevated women, honored children, and healed Roman enemies. Again and again, He crossed the boundaries that others had drawn, cultural, religious, ethnic, moral, and said, “This one belongs. This one matters. This one is Mine.”

If Jesus was comfortable with proximity to the other, why aren’t we?

Why We Other

Othering often begins in fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of losing control. Fear of being wrong, displaced, or uncomfortable. Sometimes it’s inherited from our culture or upbringing. Other times, it grows out of wounds we haven’t healed.

But fear is never a fruit of the Spirit. Love is. And love casts out fear (1 John 4:18).

It’s far easier to dehumanize than to sit in the discomfort of difference. But Jesus didn’t call us to easy. He called us to love.

Rehumanizing the World

What if the Church became known not for who it kept out, but for how far it would go to bring others in?

What if we stopped asking, “Are they one of us?” and instead asked, “How can I love them well?”

To rehumanize someone is to see them as Christ sees them. Not as a label, not as a statistic, not as a problem but as beloved.

This doesn’t mean we excuse harm or abandon discernment. Boundaries are biblical. But even boundaries can be held with compassion instead of contempt. Even disagreement can happen with dignity.

A Kingdom Without Lines

The kingdom of God is not tribal. It is table-shaped. And that table has room for tax collectors, doubters, immigrants, addicts, scholars, skeptics, and saints. It has room for you. It has room for me.

At the cross, Jesus didn’t just erase the dividing wall between us and God (Ephesians 2:14)—He also destroyed the wall between us and each other. Every “them” we’ve created, He died to redeem.

So let us be bridge-builders. Let us become a people who refuse to “other” those whom God has called beloved.

And when we’re tempted to draw lines, may we remember: Jesus came to erase them.

We don’t like to talk about ruins.

We like stories of victory — the healing, the breakthrough, the miracle. We want the dust to settle and the sun to rise. But what about when the walls are still crumbled, when the prayers haven’t been answered, and all you can see is what was lost?

There are times in life when everything we trusted is torn down — by grief, betrayal, war, trauma, illness, injustice. The ground gives way beneath our feet and nothing feels safe. We wonder where God is, and if He even sees us here.

But friend, the story of our faith has never been one of perfect people with tidy lives. It is the story of a God who enters into the rubble.

God walked with Adam and Eve after the fall, clothed them, and called them still.
He came to Hagar in the wilderness and said, “I see you.”
He wept with Mary at Lazarus’s tomb.
He was born into a poor family under Roman oppression.
He hung on a cross between criminals, stripped and mocked, misunderstood to His last breath.

And even after resurrection, Jesus still bore the scars.

This is the mystery of our faith: we are not alone in the ruins.

We are not forsaken in our loss, in our trauma, or in our aching questions. God is still Emmanuel — God with us. Not just in church pews or mountaintops, but in hospital rooms, in shelters, in bedrooms where grief sits like an uninvited guest. In cities torn by war. In hearts torn by silence.

The presence of God does not always look like resolution.
Sometimes, it looks like someone sitting in the ash heap with you.
Sometimes, it looks like breath in your lungs when you thought you couldn’t survive the night.
Sometimes, it looks like the smallest flicker of hope — enough to get you through the next five minutes.

And that, too, is holy.

You don’t have to rise quickly.
You don’t have to rebuild right now.
You don’t have to make meaning out of what broke you.

But let this settle into your bones: God is still in the ruins.

And He is not in a hurry.

He will sit with you until you are ready. He will hold your tears, honor your pain, and whisper life into what feels like death. And somehow, some way, the story isn’t over yet.

I’ve been sitting with a line from Pastor Thomas’s sermon all week.
“It is not to us to condemn—but we were given the ministry of reconciliation.”

That one sentence has turned over and over in my heart, sifting the ways I’ve looked at people, spoken about people, distanced myself from people. It’s brought me back to something so central, so deeply rooted in the heart of God, that it should shape every part of how we live:
Every human being is an image bearer of God.

Every single one.
The neighbor who waves kindly from across the street.
The stranger who cuts us off in traffic.
The friend who fails us.
The person whose lifestyle, politics, theology, or choices feel far from our own.
The hurting. The hardened. The hopeful. The hardened.

Image bearers.

Not one of us is more made in God’s image than another. That’s not how this works. And yet… how quickly we forget. How quickly we divide and other and judge.

But here’s the thing—Scripture is crystal clear on the posture we’re called to carry:

“He has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors…” (2 Corinthians 5:19–20)

Not ambassadors of condemnation. Not gatekeepers of who is “in” and who is “out.”
Ambassadors of reconciliation. Bearers of a message that restores and heals and mends.
That message is love.

Jesus summed up the entirety of the law and the prophets with two commands:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind.
And love your neighbor as yourself. (Matthew 22:37–40)

Not “love those who vote like you.”
Not “love those who are easy to get along with.”
Not “love those who follow the rules you think matter most.”
Just…
Love.

Love God. Love people.
Period.

I’m reminded that Jesus, who had every right to judge, chose instead to draw near.
To touch the leper.
To eat with sinners.
To welcome the outcast.
To forgive the ones who betrayed and denied and crucified Him.

If He did not come into the world to condemn it (John 3:17), then how dare we take up that mantle?
We weren’t called to condemnation.
We were called to compassion.
To truth wrapped in grace.
To courage that lays down pride for presence.

So here’s the invitation I’m holding today, and maybe you are too:
To see every person—every person—as an image bearer of the Most High God.
To lay down the need to be right, and pick up the call to be reconcilers.
To love when it’s easy, and especially when it’s not.
Because the love of Christ compels us.

And maybe, just maybe, when we lead with love, we make room for the kind of transformation that only God can bring.

In a world aching under the weight of injustice, oppression, and inequity, it is right and holy to rise up in defense of those who are silenced, mistreated, and marginalized. Scripture calls us to “do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God” (Micah 6:8). Jesus Himself overturned tables, confronted religious hypocrisy, and consistently stood with the least of these.

But there is a caution here, too—a sobering reminder we cannot afford to ignore: In our zeal to stand for justice, we must not lose sight of love.

Because if we’re not careful, we can become what we oppose.

We can become so consumed with proving a point that we forget to love people.

We can become so devoted to calling out injustice that we begin to see others only as enemies, not image-bearers.

We can begin to divide, to label, to dehumanize—thinking we’re fighting the good fight, when in fact, we’re slowly trading in compassion for contempt.

This is not the way of Christ.

Jesus never compromised truth—but He also never lost sight of love. He corrected, but He never canceled. He called people to repentance, but He looked them in the eye while doing it. He flipped tables in the temple, but He wept over the city.

His battle was always against the systems that crushed souls—not the souls themselves.

We are living in a time when outrage is easy. And when the cause feels righteous, it’s tempting to justify cruelty in the name of conviction. But the fruit of the Spirit has not changed: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Galatians 5:22–23). These are not signs of weakness. They are signs of Christlikeness.

So how do we stand firm without hardening our hearts?

How do we fight injustice without becoming unjust?

We begin with humility. We examine our own motivations. We remember that the call to love our enemies wasn’t a suggestion—it was a command (Matthew 5:44). And we resist the urge to “other” people, even as we resist the systems that harm them.

Because if our fight for justice leads us to hate, to mock, or to devalue, we are no longer aligned with the Gospel.

We must hold truth and love together—tenaciously, courageously, unwaveringly.

Justice without love becomes vengeance.

Love without justice becomes sentimentality.

But justice with love? That changes the world.

So let us not become like those who sow division. Let us be known by our love. Not a passive, permissive love—but a fierce, holy, truth-filled love that restores dignity, challenges evil, and sees the image of God in every human being.

Even the ones who don’t see it in us.

Even the ones we struggle to love.

Even when it’s hard.

Especially when it’s hard.

Because that’s when the light shines brightest.

“By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” – John 13:35

There is no shortage of noise in our world today—loud voices, sharp rhetoric, and endless opinions demanding our allegiance. But for those of us who follow Christ, there is a clear and timeless instruction from Jesus Himself: we are to be known by our love. Not by our arguments, our positions, or our affiliations—but by how we love.

Love is not passive agreement or blind tolerance. It is fierce in its protection of dignity. It is honest, humble, and sometimes costly. Love reflects the heart of Christ, who did not draw dividing lines between those worthy and unworthy of care, but moved toward the hurting, the marginalized, and the misrepresented. He didn’t posture for power; He knelt to wash feet.

So it is right—and wise—to pause and examine where we place our loyalty. If an individual, a church, a political figure, or an organization makes its name by spreading hate, fostering division, or belittling any image bearer of God, then we must ask: Is this the way of Jesus?

Scripture teaches that every person bears the image of God (Genesis 1:27). That alone demands respect. And yet, in the name of religion, people are often degraded rather than dignified. We are watching this unfold in real time across our culture—where fear is cloaked as faith, and cruelty masquerades as conviction.

But love cannot be divorced from truth. And the truth is, if our beliefs lead us to despise, dismiss, or dehumanize, we are no longer walking in the way of Christ.

It is not unfaithful to question. In fact, it may be the most faithful thing we can do.
To ask:
– Does this align with the character of Jesus?
– Would the fruit of this be love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control?
– Or is it bearing fruit of pride, rage, fear, and contempt?

Love is how we will be recognized. It’s the evidence of Christ alive in us. So let us be people who love bravely. Who speak truthfully. Who do not flinch from accountability, nor shrink back from mercy.

And when we see hate disguised as holiness—may we be discerning enough to step back. May we have the courage to walk away. And may we never forget that our first and lasting call is not to a party or personality, but to a Person—Jesus Christ, whose love made the broken whole and called us all His own.