Be Right? Or be Kind?

Sometime ago, I saw a meme that said “When given a choice between being right and being kind, choose kind.”

I smiled at that, and thought to myself, “of course, choose kind over being right.”

But then I thought “Wait a minute. Shouldn’t we chose truth? I.E. being right? What if being “kind’ meant denying truth?”

And I thought about that. I know people who, if they are “in the right”, cannot yield. They feel that truth is the most important thing of all, regardless of how other people feel about it.

They have a point. Truth is important, and should take a high priority.

But…

Still…

Is being right better than being kind? If being right build walls between people, is that the right thing to do?

And, of course, I have to ask myself, what would Jesus do? Would he be right, or would he be kind? And I thought about passages in the Bible, where Jesus had choices between being “right” or being kind.

If given a choice between being right and being kind, Jesus almost always chose being kind. And when it came to relationships between people, I think he always chose being kind.

So, when did he choose to be kind?

A woman was caught in adultery. Under the Judaic law, the right thing to do would be to stone her to death. But when asked about this, Jesus chose to be kind. “Let the person among you who has no sin cast the first stone.” One by one, the accusers left. When they all left, Jesus told the woman that he also did not condemn her. He, of all people, could have cast the first stone. But he chose to be kind, rather than “right.”

When he and his apostles were traveling, they came to a well. The apostles went off to buy some food, and a woman came to the well to draw water. Jesus spoke to her, asking her to give him some water. She was surprised – the “right” thing to do would be for this Jewish man to pay no attention to this Samaritan woman. “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” But Jesus spoke to her, and the words that he said not only changed her life, but changed the lives of many in her town. He chose to be kind, rather than “right.”

Leprosy was a terrible, horrible disease. If you had leprosy, you were cast out, unclean, had to warn people away from you. No one wanted to associate with a leper. There were Jewish laws and regulations dealing with this. And yet, when a leper dared to approach Jesus, not only did he heal him, but he touched him – something that was most definitely not “right” under Jewish law. Jesus chose to be kind, rather than “right.”

There are many more incidences where Jesus chose to be kind, rather than “right.” Invariably, when it came to relationships with people, Jesus chose to be kind. He chose mercy. He chose forgiveness.

He chose to be kind.

When did Jesus choose to be right, rather than kind? When it came to a relationship with God, Jesus chose to be right. The main example that I think of on that is when Jesus drove the money changers out of the temple with a whip.

So, be right? Or be kind? In my opinion, Jesus chose to do things, even when they were not “right”, that would build relationships. He chose to do things that would bring people together.

He chose to be kind. I hope I can follow that example.