It is cliché.

A cartoon character will be in the middle of an ethical conundrum. The cartoonist will picture an angel on one shoulder and a demon on the other. Both are vying for attention and to direct the future behavior of the character. Have you felt that your bad side is trying to convince your good side to do something? We preachers talk about this matter as a paradox or as one author put it, “human polarity in Biblical perspective.”

I had a preacher friend who described it as “people who are too bad to be good and too good to be bad.” The Apostle Paul wrote, “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.” That is one of the super-saints of the church describing his inner struggle and he was an Apostle!

We all have struggles with good and bad behavior, with doing what is good and doing that which is wrong. You don’t have to ponder the great truth of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden; you simply need to tell a toddler not to do something and watch what happens next. The Bible portrays us as saints and sinners simultaneously. The good news is that Jesus loves sinners, and He also loves saints. You can’t lose with the radical grace of the cross. Are you getting this, Jesus loves you and there is nothing you can do to change that.

I have arrived at my point now. If you are struggling with good and bad, right and wrong, being a saint and a sinner, do you suppose that person who so aggravated you this morning might also be struggling? The truth is all people are incredibly broken and beautiful simultaneously. Out of our acknowledged brokenness grows our unique beauty. Are we seeing others as Jesus sees them?

Are we treating others as Jesus would treat them? Remember that Jesus said, “As you did it to one of the least of these, you did it unto Me.”