So I was thinking the other day. I don't even remember what thought path brought me to this, but I put into words why I have such a tough time with being friends with people like Rhonda. It's not a happy answer, but it's an answer nonetheless.

I am not good at extending grace to nonbelievers.

I'm pretty good at extending grace to Christians, but not nonbelievers.

I'm not really quite sure where else to go with the realization. I wish somebody could give me a detailed course in how to relate to nonChristians. Like, one where I could ask a thousand times, "And what do I do in this situation? And this situation? And this situation?" That's how I put pieces of a puzzle together: "Does this fit here? No. Does it fit here? No. How about here?" Other people, like my husband, can look at the picture on the box and say, "Oh, that piece doesn't go there. This one does." Yeah, I don't think that way. :)

Anyway. The problem is, I feel like there is only so far you can go to extend grace to nonbelievers about the choices they make.

On the one hand, they're acting like nonChristians, which should not surprise us at all!

On the other hand, they're still making bad choices and the fault is entirely theirs. And most of them don't think they're doing anything wrong at all.

I guess it would be best to remember that her choices come from a non-Gospel-changed life.

But I'm still not quite sure how it looks in practice to remember that about her.

I know a couple people who might be good to run this by though (and would also LOVE an excuse to talk about outreach to nonbelievers)... Hmm...

-Stephanie

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