Be Ye Kind to One Another

Somewhere in my late elementary school life, my parents decided that their older children ought to memorize a verse in the Bible for each letter of the alphabet. I still remember a number of those verses – memorized in the majestic language and cadence of the King James Version.

For the letter B, we memorized Ephesians 4:32. Here’s what it says:

And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted,
 forgiving one another, 
even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.

Unless you have been off the grid for the past couple of weeks, you know about the upheaval that erupted at the Oscars on Sunday evening, March 27. That whole ordeal has been talked to death on all kinds of levels, and I’m not planning on adding to that. The opportunities to cast blame are nearly limitless. I wasn’t there, wasn’t actually watching the Oscars telecast, and am not smart enough to weigh in on the blame game.

But, for some reason, this verse, the one I memorized probably as a fourth grader, keeps popping up in my head. Be ye kind to one another . . . tenderhearted . . . forgiving one another . . . even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.

Kind. What a novel idea. What a needed virtue in our public conversations these days!

I’m old enough to remember regularly watching the monologue Johnny Carson did on The Tonight Show. He was always funny. I don’t remember ever thinking that his humor was cruel. But Carson retired, and Jay Leno took over. For a while, I liked watching him every night. But before long, President Clinton messed up his life with Monica Lewinsky. Leno’s humor, in my opinion, took a deep dive into the world of going just a bit too far – at least for me. He certainly wasn’t kind. Clinton, of course, put himself in that predicament, and I guess if you want to be president, you should expect some of that sort of humor being directed your way.

But eventually I quit watching Leno – or any other late-night comedian – because I just didn’t think such humor was good for us as a culture. I wasn’t trying to be “Sammy Sunday School,” but it just didn’t seem right. I make no claims of being a prophet or the son of a prophet, but it seems to me that what we let pass as humor continues to go down the tubes. I get it that a part of humor is “poking fun” at someone for some characteristic or behavior. But can’t that be done without being cruel?

Depending on which network you watch to get your daily dose of news, you are likely to hear some pretty cruel comments about “the other side” of our political disagreements from the talking heads who claim to be journalists, but typically miss that mark. Politicians repeatedly say cruel things about each other. Andy Stanley’s comments to the Georgia legislature a few weeks ago may indicate that his parents made him memorize “Be ye kind to one another,” as did mine.

Getting back to the Oscars, Chris Rock’s “joke” about Will Smith’s wife was more in the category of cruelty than humor. Will Smith’s response was nowhere near the “turn the other cheek” advice Jesus gives. I don’t know if either of them would make a claim to be a follower of Jesus, and it really is unfair for me to expect them to behave like Jesus unless they are His followers.

But . . . that Chris Rock was cruel and Will Smith was violent in his response isn’t the problem. They are mere reflections of our culture. Art is imitating life. If we didn’t pay big bucks to go hear them or watch them, their platforms would disappear. Their behavior happens on a much bigger stage than yours or mine. But our own unwillingness to practice kindness may be more harmful than we think – and more harmful than the big-stage moments the rich and powerful have.

In my own life, on that smaller stage, I can decide to treat others with kindness. Humor doesn’t need to be cruel, and our response to those who aren’t kind to us need not be violent.

The incident at the Oscars was embarrassing on all fronts. It doesn’t speak well of our culture that something like that could happen at what is supposedly a celebration of American creativity and culture. But before throwing too many jabs at Chris Rock and Will Smith, we might want to take a hard look into our own behavior – both what we do and what we allow to pass as entertainment. 

Would “kindness” be an apt description?