Shades of Grey
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It has become apparent to me that everyone around me knows everything. They all know what’s right and wrong, good and evil. They know what the mayor or the governor or the president needs to do. They know exactly what is best for themselves, the people around them, and the world as a whole. In fact I’m sure each of them could solve all of the world’s problems if they only had the opportunity. Or at least that’s what they say—and if they don’t actually say those words it’s apparent in how they act.
Okay, maybe not everyone has this mentality, but it sure does seem to be fairly common.
I think many of us see the world this way—in black and white. Everything fits neatly into two opposing categories: truth or lie, right or wrong, good or evil. Something that is good cannot be evil. Something that is right cannot be wrong. Something that is true cannot also be a lie...or can it? Read this excerpt from When Religion Becomes Evil by Charles Kimball:
“When my daughter tells me I am the best daddy in the world, and there can be no other father like me, she is speaking the truth, for this comes out of her experience...But of course it is not true in another sense. For one thing, I myself know friends who, I think, are better fathers than I am. Even more importantly, one should be aware that in the next house there is another little girl who thinks her daddy is the best father in the world. And she too is right.”
Some of you may still say that obviously someone in the world is the best father in the world, and therefore both girls were probably wrong, but that’s missing the point. The point is that absolute truth is not the only kind of truth. There is a more human kind of truth that is more dynamic and relational. A humble truth that understands it might not be true at all. Charles Kimball calls this truth “the language of faith and love.” For human understanding, truth is always accompanied by an aspect of faith, for which one of us can claim that they know the mind of God? Often, however, the aspect of love is missing. Our truths contain enormous amounts of faith, and little to no love.
You see, in our world of black and white, love is found in the grey. Most of us don’t want to associate with what we perceive as evil and wrong and lies, and we often feel like we aren’t good enough for what is good and right and true. We can’t meet others with empathy and love in either of those two spaces, because when we are honest with ourselves, we realize that we aren’t in either the black or the white ourselves. We are present in both, doing good things and bad things,being right and wrong, speaking truth and lies. We are present in the grey.
Nobody is perfect, and the good news is, nobody is expected to be. That’s why Jesus came—because God understands that no human being can live in perfection. God transcends our concepts of black and white and grey (yes I’m still speaking symbolically) and redeems them with the beautiful palette of God’s colors. The colors of grace and the colors of love. The colors of hope and the colors of peace. The colors of joy and the colors of compassion.
Maybe we don’t know what’s right and wrong, good and evil, truth and lies. Maybe we don’t know what the mayor or the governor or the president needs to do. Maybe we don’t know all there is to know. And that’s okay. Instead of pretending that we do know all of those things, let’s try to embrace a little humility with our concept of truth. Let’s try to meet others where they are, realizing that they probably have just as much faith in their truths as we do in ours. And let’s all try to fill our truths with both faith and love.