Why We Love The Haters

The key to any good story is a great villain.

Darth Vader. Longshanks from Braveheart. Heath Ledger’s Joker. Kevin Spacey in SE7EN.

Mike Myer’s Dr. Evil…?

Let’s face it: there are just some people that we love to hate. Whether it’s the Dinosaurs in Jurassic Park or a boy’s battle with his own selfishness and narcissism in Into the Wild, the human spirit longs for struggle—longs for a good fight.

Personally, I want my villains smart and cunning. I want a villain who can actually defeat the hero. I want to believe that it’s possible the hero might actually fail. I want The Matrix’s Mr. Smith.

Yes, I’m convinced that we love our villains.

But maybe more than that we love to villainize.

Villainizing is what we do when we leave the movie theater—with its heroes and villains—and begin creating villains in our own world.

Our souls long for drama, so often times we end up creating melodrama.

The typical situation might go like this: have you ever accidentally cut someone off while driving in traffic? Maybe you were thinking about how your mom’s visit to the hospital went, or maybe you were just trying to look at googlemaps on your phone. But you drifted into another lane and—luckily—the car behind you didn’t hit you but slowed down. This happens probably several times a month and we might not even realize it. We often times don’t know what small inconveniences we accidentally are for others.

But has someone ever cut you off? When this happens it’s an entirely different story.

Immediately—if you’re like me— you’re questioning their IQ and their sanity.

In short, they have become your villain.

So maybe you honk at them. Totally justifiable, right? After all, they almost killed everyone. Have they no dignity for life?!

Then they look back at you and are embarrassed. They feel bad, but maybe they don’t deal with embarrassment well. Maybe they react to embarrassment with trying to stick up for themselves. Maybe they were just coming back from a seminar where they’re taught to stick up for themselves because, generally, they don’t and that’s why they’re in an abusive relationship.

So in an effort to grow, they mistakenly overact by giving you the one-fingered salute out their driver’s side window. Horrified at themselves, they speed off, only to be rebuked by their abusive girlfriend a few hours later for the speeding ticket they’ll get trying to get away from you and their never-ending shame.

But that’s not what we see. We see this punk kid nearly destroy the world, then flip us off and speed away.

“The nerve of that guy! I hope he gets a speeding ticket!!”

We always want our villains to suffer.

The act of villainizing is subtle. But it happens all the time. Our friends become Jokers. Our bosses become Longshanks. Our in-laws become Vaders.

As if they have nothing better to do than play the villain in our little story.

This has been a huge learning for me over the past couple of years. Some could call it ‘empathy.’ Others might call it ‘learning to believe the best in people.’

I’d like to call it the journey of finding the hero within the villain.

Fact is, people are rarely as bad, manipulative, conniving as we think they are. Most people make really boring villains. And often times when they do make the villain list, it’s not who they want to be, and the darkness that’s in their hearts is an aching pain that they wish would go away, if only they knew how.

It doesn’t mean people can’t do horrible things. Of course people are capable of that. And of course we all have shadows in our hearts and ghosts in our closets that haunt us and own us in the night.

But that’s not why your boss doesn’t listen more. And that’s not why your kids never call. It’s not why your husband leaves the toilet seat up or why your roommate doesn’t get breathe-rights for his snoring problem [they’re not that expensive, you cheap little…ahem]. It’s not why you didn’t make the team and it’s not why she didn’t return your email.

90% of the time, it’s just not.

Which is good. Because that means people are not as bad as we think they are.

But it’s also hard, because now we have less melodrama in our lives…and our souls are left wanting.

The good news is that there’s plenty of real drama in the world to satisfy our spiritual hunger. There’s the real drama—the real fight—against poverty, drugs, corruption, narcissism. The real fight to love the world into a better condition, to take real risks—not in confronting the person who just cut in front of us at the grocery store—but to get involved in our local communities to help raise the poverty wages that the people at the grocery store get paid.

And, of course, there’s the real fight against our need to villainize. There’s the very real fight to continue to orient our hearts more towards beauty, compassion and risk. Towards Proactivity, understanding, life and wholeness.

Our greatest heroes embody these attributes.

And we become the villains when we oppose them.

When we villainize less, we have more energy to give to those fights that simply matter more, and the less we become the villains of our own stories. The more understanding and forgiving we become the more we open ourselves up to the healing reality that the world is not conspiring against us, even though it sometimes feels that way.

The ancient idea that the fundamental core of the reality—that God—is love, begins to be not a cliché that is parroted in empty church cathedrals and pasted on dirty car bumpers. The idea that God is love begins to become the very truth that we need most to hear.

It’s a whisper that frees us from our need to villainize. It’s a whisper that leads us to greater compassion. It invites us into the adventure of making the world beautiful again…

And it leads us to the greatest Hero of all.




By_Jason Jaggard

Oven-Baked Flakies

I didn’t know whether I should be furious or depressed. The sixth person had just called to say, “So sorry, I won’t be able to make it tonight.”

Normally it wouldn’t have been that big of a deal, but this was the third or fourth week in a row that something like this had happened, and I was beginning to see a pattern emerge that I didn’t like at all. It was as if I was stuck in a parallel universe where “yes” now meant “no” and “you can count on me” now meant “I’m going to bail, but only at the last minute.” It reminded me of high school.

It was then, in a brilliant flash of light, that the answer came to me (if it sounds dramatic that’s because it was). I don’t know if you know this, and what I’m about to share may shock and amaze you, but I’ve discovered that people, yes even those close to you, can be…FLAKEY.

There, I said it. I know you’re probably reeling from the aftershocks of such an insightful realization. We’ve all been victimized by the Flakies, as I like to call them. Those people who look so excited as they assume some huge responsibility for you, holding your credibility in the balance only to laugh as they gleefully run away without ever doing a thing that they had promised.

I can’t think of how many meetings I’ve been to or people that I’ve talked with who have had encounters with the Flakies. The stories all have an eerie ring of familiarity. Maybe it was an event collapsing before it even got off the ground. Maybe the parent of a kid in your youth group forgot the food for a Wednesday night gathering. Maybe it was the fourth volunteer who balked at the same project. One thing is for sure, this was all the work of those dastardly Flakies, strategically sabotaging everything good that we try to do.

One thing is interesting though. I’ve noticed that it’s easy to take my frustrations with an individual, or with several, and project them onto an entire group of people. It leads to saying things like, “College students are lazy!” “All of my volunteers care more about themselves than they do about who we are trying to serve!” “No one here supports what I do!” Sound familiar? Johnny’s mom forgetting the pizza rolls for Wednesday night wasn’t really that big of a deal, but it illustrates everything wrong with where you’re working. Why couldn’t she have just remembered?

Has something as silly as pizza rolls ever become an oven-baked metaphor for the fact that no one cares about you or what you’re trying to do? Suddenly Johnny’s mom forgetting the pizza rolls reminds you of when Stephanie’s dad didn’t let you host the Super Bowl party in their brand new gigantic house, which reminds you of when those 3 kids that you really wanted to get to go to camp this summer couldn’t go just because their parents didn’t sign the permission slips, which reminds you that no one has really shown up to your parents’ meetings that you’ve carved out of your ridiculously busy schedule, just to try to involve them. Oh, and that reminds you that they keep accusing you of not involving them. No one would blame you for being frustrated. No one would think less of you if you moved to another ministry area. It seems like a lost battle, so best throw in the towel, chalking up another victory to the flakies.

At least that’s what I did. I lead a group of students at UCLA who are trying to make a difference not only on the campus, but in the Los Angeles community. Our meetings were going great. We had a solid group regularly showing up to dream, brainstorm, and learn from each other.

And then it happened.

One by one they began disappearing.

Phone calls, emails, and Facebook messages were always responded to with a “Oh yeah, sorry about that, things just got busy this week. I’ll be there for sure next time.” Most never were. By the end of the quarter, our group had dwindled down to two.

As I watched our group shrink by the week, I couldn’t help but remember what other people had told me about UCLA. When I first started, I talked to several people who had been doing ministry on campus for several years. The problem was that they had the same experience that I did. Instead of helpful advice, what I got was reinforcement that I would never be successful. “You can’t work with UCLA students. They don’t care about anyone but themselves.” “All they care about is their studies, they don’t make time for anything else.” “Just go on campus, everyone is either listening to an iPOD or on the phone, they don’t even make time to talk to each other!” I began to believe them.

Each time I walked onto campus and saw students on the phones, listening to their iPODs, or talking to themselves like crazy persons (which I later realized was just them talking on their cell phones via Bluetooth hands free device, my bad), I could feel something bitter and acidic swelling up inside of me. Here I was to save the day, and none of them cared. I saw them as villains.

Looking back, I wonder how many people in our group actually stopped coming and how many people I just stopped inviting. When you expect the worst from people, it’s easy to operate on the assumption that they will meet or exceed your expectations. Villains are never heroes. But I had to ask myself, if I really was seeing only the negative in people instead of their potential, why was I spending my time with them?

That realization just made matters worse. I was still upset, but now I felt trapped by this annoying little thing called a conscience that kept telling me that giving in to my own conclusions couldn’t be the best answer. I was still frustrated, but now felt guilty for feeling that way. Ever been there? I knew that somehow my mindset needed to change; I needed a new vantage point. On a whim I decided to try to see things from the students’ perspective, to understand their side of the story; and when I began to put myself in their shoes my heart began to change. What I found was that the first step towards humanizing my villain was to find empathy.

I had forgotten that when I’ve spent the most time on the phone with people back home was when I was feeling most alone. I began to remember how awful I felt when I had to cancel something I had committed to because I just ran out of space in my day. Slowly it all started making sense. If I didn’t have anyone to talk to, I’d walk around talking on the phone or listening to music. If I felt trapped under the weight of 18 units per quarter plus a full time job to pay for it all, I may call to cancel at the last minute even if what I desperately wanted was to feel valued and like I had a place to belong. Suddenly the iPods and cell phones weren’t symbols of self-absorption anymore, but simply ways to try to ease the pain of being lonely. Suddenly, the last minute cancellations weren’t signs of flakiness, but the extroversion of someone overwhelmed by all the responsibilities they faced with no solution in sight.

I wonder how many times what we see as the worst in someone is actually their pain finally finding a way out. I wonder if the villains that we’ve created in the past have actually been the ones who needed our help the most. What would our relationships look like if we began to try to put ourselves in the shoes of those we’ve chosen to villainize? What kind of impact would it make on someone who has been labeled by their worst moment to have someone who actually understood what they were going through? 

What if in every villain, we chose to find the hero inside, waiting to be discovered?



By_David Haley

The Other Side

We wanted to create “The Other Side” to facilitate conversations about things that matter with people who may see things differently than most of us. That means you will probably disagree with something that you read. Please know that it is not our intention to use this space for a theological discussion, but rather a relational one, helping all of us move forward in developing authentic friendships with people we might not normally seek out. We trust your ability to search the Scriptures on this issue for yourself should you feel the need to. This section exists to allow those who normally do not have a voice in these conversations to share their side of the story.

Since this blog is centered on the theme of villains, we find it ironic to be interviewing two of the nicest people we know. Julie and Shana are some of our best friends in Los Angeles. They let me (David) stay with them after I had surgery on my arm right after I moved here and didn’t know anyone else. Julie has a job so cool that I literally cannot say what it is (awesome, I know) and Shana is in school to become a mortician. Be glad there are great people like her to do a job most of us would hate to do. They have a poodle named Poe, love to travel, and enjoy great literature. They also happen to be a couple. 



Here’s the other side.


Fringe: Sexuality can be a defining characteristic of a person. As a gay couple, how do you want to be defined? Do you feel there are other things that are more important in the aspect of who you are?


Julie: I think that being gay is just a part of who I am. Being half-Sicilian is part of who I am, being an American is part of who I am, but those are just parts that make up who I am as a person. There’s not one defining characteristic that says “that’s me,” or at least I would hope not. I would hope that each person is more complex than just whatever label we decide to stick on them. That’s definitely not the first thing that I would use to describe myself, but it is part of who I am.


Shana: I would hope it’s one of the least interesting things about me. I write, I paint, I hope I’m a good partner, a good daughter, a good sister, a good citizen, but I hope that’s way down the list of what people would think when they see me.

Fringe: What is the main message that you get from Christians towards being gay or the gay community in general?


Julie: (laughs) They don’t like us very much. It’s an across the board x-ing out that says “we’re not going to validate you at all.”


Shana: It feels completely opposite of everything we were taught to believe, and that’s why it’s like a slap in the face every time we hear it. That’s not what I know of Christianity. All I know is love and acceptance, and it’s completely opposite. Even if you do believe that we are someone to be changed, I don’t know how you would go at it from that standpoint.

Fringe: From conversations that we’ve had, it’s obvious that wrestling with this issue is a deeply painful and emotional process and experience. Traditionally we (Christians) have a horrible track record of being great friends to people who are going through this. What are things that we can do, even those of us who come from a perspective that causes us to disagree with the end result, to be great friends to someone in the middle of this situation?


Julie: Just knowing that when your friend in coming to you with this, in a very real sense this burden, that they’ve struggled with and they finally get to the point that they want to tell you, please realize the amount of trust that they are putting in you as a friend. They know full well that you could just turn around and reject them right then and there. Just try to take a step back before reacting realizing that person is still the same person and even though you’re just now finding out, they were gay before they told you, and you were still friends. Just knowing this little tid-bit of information that you don’t agree with shouldn’t nullify the friendship you’ve built up until that point.


Shana: I agree, if you can just show love, that’s what they really need in that moment.

Fringe: Sometimes that moment doesn’t go well. We’ll talk about one side first, and then about the other. If we have a friend or family member who has almost an angry outburst when they come out, can you talk a little bit about where that person is coming from? Is it real anger, or is it motivated by fear?


Julie: I think it could be a little bit of both, but probably mostly out of fear, almost like a preemptive strike. I guess you’re anticipating that they are going to abandon you anyway so you try to push them away so that it doesn’t hurt as much. What people need to realize is that everyone has to go through the process, even the person who’s being told. I guess I’m realizing as I’m older now that I struggled with it, came to my conclusion, and then shared with people. So now that person that I just shared with has to go through the same process that I went through. As the gay person you’re hoping that it’s going to be instantaneous, but it may not be. It may take time, and it may never happen. It’s just hard when you’re the person who’s bearing your soul to someone and you get that rejection. We need to realize that everyone needs time, and if someone never chooses to accept you, then that’s something you have to deal with.

Fringe: Coming at it from the other side now, what if we have a friend or family member who came out and, looking back on it, we didn’t handle it in the best way? Let’s say that we spoke from an adrenaline-filled instinctual place and said things we now regret, and to some degree, have severed a relationship.
Do you have any advice or steps toward reconciling those relationships?


Shana: When you are on the hurt side, you appreciate any sort of reaching out. Even just acknowledging that what you said may have been rash or harsh makes a big difference.


Julie: I don’t think it’s ever too late to offer an apology for a wrong that you’ve committed, now matter how much time has passed, especially if your intention is to try to rebuild that relationship. I think the first step is just owning up to the fact that you didn’t handle it in the best way.


Shana: And that’s hard to do for anyone, on any issue, let alone something as deep as this.

Fringe: Do you have anything that you would like to say to people who have villainized you in the past? Or just to people in general to say “This is who I am.”


Julie: Umm…treat others as you would want to be treated (laughs)


Fringe: Hey! That sounds like a Bible verse…


Julie: I mean we’re all humans, we all make mistakes, we’re all going to mess up, but we all have this deep capacity to love, and I think that we forget that sometimes. 


Shana: All the time people ask “Why are we here?” “What’s our purpose?” I think that ultimately it’s simply just to learn how to love at the deepest, most human level. It’s really the easier thing to do, to not see people as “us” and “them,” but to reach out and try to break down those social filters that we all have.


Julie: I think we spend much more energy on hating someone because it means we always have to be thinking of reasons, and if someone gives us a reason not to, then we have to try to restructure our framework as to why we don’t get along. I think it’s just so draining to try to maintain dislike for someone and it’s so much easier to love someone. Why we pick hate over love so often makes no sense to me.


Shana: Anthropologists and theologists and sociologists would all have different answers as to why we do that, but we do. We like to label people, and it doesn’t serve any purpose but to build walls and make it harder to love people and have a meaningful relationship.

Fringe: I know it’s a lot easier to identify brokenness and flaw and where we’ve gone wrong, but what would you say to draw greatness and beauty out of us? Growing up around Christianity, what are the things that most resonate with you that those of us who have hope for this thing called the Church can do? Where would you lead us to in terms of having these kinds of relationships with people?


Julie: I think love and tolerance are two of the keys. It’s ok to disagree with someone, but that doesn’t mean that you have to vilify them.

Shana: I think not making a judgment on a person’s relationship with God before you know them. You never know what’s going on in their heart, or what they’ve gone through. It’s just harmful I think to do that as a Christian, because doesn’t the Bible say something about being a stumbling block to other people? It makes people react and want to turn away from God because they think “that’s not what I know” or that you’re a hypocrite. They don’t want anything to do with faith anymore, and I think that’s harmful.


Julie: I know so many gay people who have turned their back to the church because they feel the church has turned their back to them, so why go someplace where they’re not welcome? It’s a defense mechanism so that I don’t get hurt to say “that’s not for me anymore,” but it doesn’t have to be that way.

To read the rest of the interview, feel free to check out the complete transcript as well as the audio file on our website, www.fringemag.blogspot.com.




^Fringe would like to thank Julie and Shana for sharing their story in such a public forum. We deeply value your time and friendship.

Becoming the Villain

My parents have a 10 x 14 picture on their wall of me wearing a plaid skirt.

And I am proud of it.

It is souvenir from my childhood, reminding me of the two years that I spent living as an American boy in Scotland. It was pretty much like living in the film Braveheart, without all of the killing and warmongering.

Every day was an adventure...

Scotland is the land of skinned knees, cool scars and chipped teeth. While American children are playing hopscotch, jumprope and teeter totter, Scottish lads are inventing wildly hazardous ways to injure themselves and others. Bruises are badges of honor. Each day carries a sense of impending danger.

One day I am sprinting up and down the soccer field, slide-tackling friends and muddying up my school uniform. I feel a tap on the shoulder and turn to be greeted by a mob of fellow classmates, each sporting a mischievous grin. Probably not a good sign.


“Scot, we’ve go’ a noo game that we’d like ye’ ta play wee us”, explains the leader of the pack.


Translation: “Scot, we’ve developed an insane game. We need a guinea pig, and you’ll do.”



“What game is it?”, I ask, not really wanting to know the answer.

“A Le’ an’ a Weeeng”, he clearly enunciates.

“Nah. I’m good, thanks. I saw you play ‘A Leg and a Wing’ yesterday.”, I say while attempting to disguise my crippling fear.

“A Leg and a Wing” is a simple game. Allow me to explain. One innocent and unassuming young man is tackled and held to the ground by an assortment of Scottish hooligans. These boys each grab an arm or a leg, and then collectively attempt to toss the victim as far as possible. They call it “A Leg and a Wing”, but it could just as easily be renamed “Child Hurling” or “Human Flinging”. Obviously you can understand why on this particular day I am less than enthusiastic about becoming a projectile.

Unfortunately for me, these “friends” do not take my trepidation into account. Before I can plead for my life I am firmly pinned to the field and awaiting the inevitable. As the guys are preparing to throw me, I notice that a crowd is assembling in a circle surrounding us. The soccer match is put on hold so that everyone may witness my exciting moment.

My captors lift me off of the ground and begin to swing me in unison. Like a pendulum, these four young men sway my sixth grade body back and forth. With each arc they successfully gain greater momentum. Fear and panic set in. “Go to a happy place”, I mutter to myself. The violent swinging is accompanied by a catchy little tune, sung in unison by the posse as well as the crowd. 
Feel free to sing along:

“A leg and a wing, to see the king...”

“A one!...”


“A two!...”


“A three!”

I am instantly launched into the heavens. You wouldn’t know it to look at me, but I happen to be quite aerodynamic. Tumbling through the air, time slows to a crawl. Like a black box, my brain records the intricate details of this solo flight. Snapshots of green grass, an overcast sky, flailing arms and legs, and an excited mob each vividly play in my head to this day. As I begin the descent, instinct kicks in. Sensing that I am going to land on my back, my brain tells my arms to awkwardly stretch behind me to break the fall. Thanks a lot brain. I have been able to piece together the next few events through the accounts of friends in the crowd. Several attest to hearing a “snap” as my arm bravely cushions the fall. Understandably, I’m a little fuzzy on details involving the impact.


Have you ever had an injury in which the pain is almost non-existent in the beginning, but slowly builds over time? Well, this was not like that at all. This pain was instant and throbbing. I immediately rolled over, clutching my arm to my chest and gritting my teeth in agony. I lay on the ground, waiting for anyone to come and help me to my feet. Several minutes pass before I muster the strength and presence of mind to sit up and survey my surroundings.

What I see next, surprises me. The once vibrant mob of onlookers has dwindled. Only a few sympathetic individuals remain. Life in the schoolyard has returned to normal. Realizing that no one is stepping forward, I clumsily manage to stand. Alone, I make my way into the school to seek out help.

Although I can obviously relate with the reality of experiencing loneliness in the midst of pain, I have a confession to make. More often I identify with those within the crowd. Countless times I have chosen to stand by and watch from a distance as others grapple with their own pain, brokenness and sorrow. I’ve even found myself making comments about the difficult situations I see people in, all the while choosing to remain a concerned spectator. I resonate with the internal conflict experienced by those within the crowd. I have used many personal reasons for choosing not to step into an opportunity to show compassion, even as others are retreating. 


I’m sure some knew that they would get in trouble for flinging me and were simply choosing the path of self-preservation. It’s possible that some of these same guys felt bad for hurting me and didn’t know how to deal with having to help their victim. Others simply wanted to return to the soccer game. There were probably even those who were completely unaware that I had been injured. Perhaps some expected that someone else would take care of my needs. Others knew that I was hurting but simply weren’t concerned. And certainly, some stood by and looked on, deeply wanting to act, but lacking courage. These reasons, among countless others, provide fuel for the fear which paralyzes you and I.

Albert Einstein observed that, “the world is a dangerous place. Not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.” He correctly identifies a dark side of human nature, the tendency to join the crowd in choosing to remain spectators. Can you identify with the mob?

Imagine you are standing in line at Starbucks. The Barista is new and is hurriedly trying to handle the line of drinks that sit on the bar. You’re keenly aware that the customers in front of you are becoming agitated. You even begin to recognize the universal signs of impatience. A glance at the watch, a loud sigh, an obvious attempt to peer over the bar at the beverage queue. Some customers even begin to comment to one another about their dissatisfaction. I’ve been in this exact situation, have you? I’ve even chosen to join in with them as we express our not-so-subtle irritation. I’m in a hurry. My schedule is important. What’s taking so long?

What if instead of giving into our base emotions, you and I searched for opportunities to diffuse these situations, standing in between the critical crowd and their “villain of the moment”? In Starbucks, it may be as simple as just saying a few words of genuine encouragement to the frantic Barista. Perhaps even a smile to the disgruntled customers. Maybe you can change the subject. Of course, by choosing this line of action you risk incurring some of the negativity of the crowd. That comes with helping others carry their burdens.

Or perhaps you work for someone who is commonly perceived as being incompetent. Mob nature is to confide in everyone who agrees with you, spending large quantities of time talking about all of the substandard decisions they have made. Almost without effort, this boss has become the “villain of the moment”, a person that the crowd can commonly oppose. It actually seems cathartic to gossip behind closed doors, doesn’t it?

Is there another way? Can we choose to buck human nature in favor of compassion and understanding? What could that look like? Perhaps it begins with taking the time to see life through the eyes of our ‘villain’. Warning: you may begin to actually care about this person. Often, you will find that bosses, administrators, teachers, co-workers, parents, mechanics, the guy who cut you off yesterday, and friends carry hurts, insecurities and other baggage which informs the decisions they make. These scars can actually skew their interactions with others, causing them to transfer their personal pain into the workplace, home, mall and highway.


In the scriptures we continually find Jesus displaying compassion towards those who are broken, marginalized, or even despised. In other words, he spends time showing authentic love to villains. You may be familiar with the story of the religious leaders who bring a woman who has been caught in adultery to Jesus. They announce that she deserves death and wish to show her no mercy. They place her brokenness on display. In bringing her before Jesus, they are attempting to put him in a difficult situation. Will he side with those who are demanding strict adherence to the law, or will he show mercy? In a moment of extraordinary courage, Jesus boldly responds to the accusers.

His response sounds something like this:

“Sure, this woman is broken. She has even broken the law. I’ll tell you what, any of you who are blameless can and throw the first stone. Go ahead.”

Over the next few moments, the impassioned mob disperses. Jesus then turns to the woman and asks her how many of her accusers remain to condemn her. She answers, “no one, sir.” Jesus then responds, “then neither do I condemn you. Go now and leave your life of sin.”

Jesus’ answer to the crowd of religious leaders is not vague. As he places himself in the line of fire between this woman and her accusers, his actions shout the worth and value that God sees in her. Without fear, he stands directly in the path of anger, misunderstanding, prejudice, and bitterness and willingly becomes the villain in the eyes of the crowd. Jesus reminds us that God is not distant and uncaring, but rather is deeply aware of our most intimate needs. His choice to stand for her outrages her accusers, who leave the situation with indignation. Their God could not possibly tolerate a woman like her. The God that they serve only loves people like them. Sound familiar?

Each day, we encounter those who have fallen to the ground. Tossed back and forth by circumstances, they are desperately trying to navigate this life. Many are alone. Could it be that we do not engage opportunities to show love to those in need because we want to avoid the piercing disapproval of our crowd? Are we so preoccupied with the fear of being misunderstood, criticized or rejected that we simply fail to respond to the cries of the broken? Do we fear being cast as the villain?

Or is it simply that our schedules do not allow us the freedom to become involved? Perhaps you and I are unwilling to act because we want to avoid drama, or pain. Maybe we don’t even see people who are hurting. Believe me, they are there. Do we stand back, hoping that someone more qualified will save the day? Or do we live like Jesus, whose deep love for each individual outweighs any potential fear?

The scriptures clearly say, “there is no fear in love. Perfect love drives out fear.”

Will love compel you and I to step in between the crowd and their “villain of the moment”? Are we willing to incur the wrath of the mob on behalf of the broken?

Are you willing to become the villain?

by_Scot Burbank