Ice-cold folks are among the toughest we encounter. Nothing moves them. Nothing seems to break through their frosty exterior. And if we’re honest, their coolness repels us. They’re hard to love. But are we excused? You know the answer. We are not. Not only are we called to love those who love us, we are called to love those who do not.
The Titanic was an engineering marvel: the largest, fastest cruise ship ever built. Her designers boasted that she was unsinkable. But history records that the great ship encountered an iceberg on her maiden voyage and sunk to the bottom of the sea, claiming more than 2,000 lives. The iceberg was sighted before the collision, but the ship met it “full speed ahead” with disastrous results.
Sometimes we meet the “iceberg” folks in our lives in much the same way: we go full speed ahead, hoping to overpower them. We meet their barb with one of our own. We try to disarm them before they can disarm us. We match their chilly ways with our own brand of cool. But there is another way to deal with an iceberg. In time, the ice that wrecked Titanic broke away from its moorings and floated out to sea. Surrounded by the warmer waters of the ocean, it eventually melted away. When we love the unlovable with the warm and steady love of Christ, amazing things can happen.
MEMORY VERSE
For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax gatherers do the same?
