Roses of Grace

What do you do when you've been hurt by someone you love?  I don't mean when you've been hurt a little by someone you love, like when someone's having a bad day and they snap at you.  What do you do when someone you know consistently hurts you? When your friendship with them is doing you more harm than good?  The world's answer, of course, is to cut them out of your life completely. Friends who hurt you are hastily labeled as "toxic," and you're encouraged to get rid of them ASAP. They aren't worth you. And in extreme cases, that might be right. Sometimes you need to get away from someone for your own safety.  But is that loving? Is that the Christian way to live?  What does the Bible say about loving people who hurt you?  Note: This is something of a sensitive topic, and I've tried to base my thoughts entirely on the Bible to make sure they're as sound as possible, as I usually try to do. However, I want to make it absolutely clear that...

Proverbs 12:15 says, "The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice."  It's clear in the Bible that taking advice is important. As we grow in wisdom, we begin to understand just how foolish we actually are, and a proper response to that is to seek wisdom from others.  And while this is good and right and Biblical to do, it opens up a tricky can of worms for a Christian living in a secular world: should we take advice from unbelievers?  It's one of the most relevant questions we can ask, I think. We're surrounded by people who want to give us advice—and who we genuinely love and care for—but who don't believe in the truth of God's word, and it's hard to know how much weight to give to their ideas.  Fortunately, the Bible gives us some insight. So let's take a look at what the Bible says about taking advice from non-Christians.    First of all, we should recognize that not everything unbelievers say is false.  This shou...