You wouldn’t play Scrabble that way!!!
Galatians 3:27-28
How many who read this actually play Scrabble? I love to play it, but rarely do I find someone who shares my enthusiasm about it. A couple of the rules in Scrabble are that you cannot use the dictionary, and you are not allowed to use proper names. Those are fair rules and all that play the game have to follow those rules. If you played against your family with those rules, but allowed your friends and co-workers to use the dictionary and proper names, someone would call foul. I believe you’re family would say you weren’t being fair. What would your co-workers or friends think? They’d probably say, “Man, he makes playing Scrabble so easy for us, but makes it so hard with his family.” Yeah, that’s probably what they would say. You might see where I’m going already.
There are some of us that play the game of life (not the board game) with two sets of rules. We tend to treat our friends and co-workers according to one set of rules and then we treat our family with a completely different set of rules. Take me for example; I may say something sarcastic to my wife when we have some disagreement or when she doesn’t understand my intended meaning about a topic. I’m human, I sin, and I do this sometimes. I do this with my wife or maybe another family member, but I rarely if ever do this to friends or peers of mine. I sometimes play by two sets of rules, maybe you do too. If you think hard enough, can you remember a time when you’ve acted unfair to your family?
I think as Christians we need to treat everyone fair. This means eliminating that extra rule book we sometimes use with our families. Let us look at Galatians 3:27-28: For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
While my wife and I may have different roles at home and at church, and we are physically different, we are exactly the same in God’s eyes, in other words, we are of the same value. We are His creation and He loves us equally. God doesn’t have a different set of rules for different people and we shouldn’t either. Join me today in shredding that other rulebook we sometimes use. Let us have some character in our lives by treating our family as well as we treat our friends, co-workers, or our neighbor across the street.
