“He’s from over there. He’s one of them.” What exactly does that mean? I’ve thought a lot about some of the reasons I’ve heard people give for not wishing to vote for a particular potential presidential nominee. Most of the explanations reveal more about who we are rather than who we may not be voting for. It’s not a pretty picture by any stretch.

I’ve considered that ‘over there’ must be referring to anyone who doesn’t share our same geographical roots. We here in Breathitt County have long been leery of outsiders. You know, people who don’t talk as we do, people who aren’t called by an easily recognizable name. After all, we’ve been duped before by those wolves which came in sheep’s clothing.

And then, ‘one of them’ must have something to do with how we believe. ‘One of them’ apparently is anyone we would consider as having trouble fitting into any of our churches on a given Sunday morning. Surely those we meet in Heaven will look just like us, talk like us, and have names like those down the road or over the hill.

Remember the ‘Golden Rule’ as Jesus stated in Luke 6:31-32, “Do to others as you would have them do to you. ‘If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ love those who love them.’”

Do I really have to love everybody? And what if I don’t feel like it? How we act is evidence of our love for each other…loving each other is confirmation of our Christianity, even someone from ‘over there’ or ‘one of them’.