How do we love others when we feel like hating them?

Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

I’m sharing a situation my wife, Karen ad I, are experiencing for two reasons. We need your prayer support. We want to remind others and ourselves when we don’t know the way out God does,

Before I do that the thoughts that have gone through our minds and could be going through yours in conflict with someone, gives context to our story.

You judge yourself as lacking insight into the character of the individual responsible for your predicament.

How could I have been so wrong about this person? Why didn’t I see their true self? I can usually tell what it would be like being in relationship with someone. What did I miss? Could I have taken another course of action?

You have done nothing wrong. We try our best to exercise good judgment – to have godly discernment. People can deceive us about their true nature. Things happen in their lives that can change their character.

None of this is your fault. If you do feel guilty that is what we say in counseling is false guilt. Don’t carry that garbage in your mind.

People who have been traumatized can be influenced by the person(s) abusing them. They can believe they are responsible for the crap they are going through.

All of this is a lie,

We are not mind readers.

Our story
Our landlord who lives below us has put me in the hospital twice with anaphylaxis within one week. Each time has required two 0.5 mg of epinephrine (EPI) to keep me alive. This is the equivalent to more than six regular doses of 0.3 mg of EPI. I carry three injectors of 0.3 mg EPI at all times.

Our landlord thinks she has a right to use caustic chemicals. She doesn’t. She is violating my right under the Ontario Human Rights Code and the Ontario Landlord and Tenant Act for reasonable accommodation of a medical disability. I have an auto immune condition that is triggered by things such as chemicals. Our landlord has been informed of this fact in several emails.

We gave her a written list of the chemicals I am allergic to.

We can’t count how many days and weekends of our time together our landlord has ruined because of her behavior.

We are in a state of constant hyper-vigilance. We wonder when our landlord will use toxic chemicals that will send me to the ER again. Will I require an 11^th intubation? (I have had ten already within the last thirteen years. Seven of them were in Toronto between 2008 to 2009 before the auto immune condition was diagnosed. I have only needed three in northern Ontario).

Will our landlord cause me to have periods where I can’t swallow my medications and food from inflammation in my throat?

How many times will I have to recover from her irresponsible actions?

We have hidden nothing from her about my medical condition.

We have offered to pay for any cost of using products such as Greenworks. She has refused.

Attempt at resolving the issue

I sent an email to our landlord seeking to bring the matter to some level of resolution. She called me. When we spoke she fixated on this statement in that email: “We prayerfully hope moving forward we will have a better relationship.” Our landlord denied doing anything wrong. She proceeded to try and dump her emotional garbage all over me. I ended the conversation.

It sounds like a plot line for a thriller movie or book, but sadly it’s all too real.

Our landlord has shown us no remorse. Something happened to her last November that caused her character to change. When I pointed out this truth she had no words.

Our landlord has stepped up the chemicals she uses. She is aware Karen has asthma. Thankfully, her allergies aren’t life-threatening like mine.

in Canada, because our legal system works differently than in other countries such as the United States, the strongest consequence for our landlord is civil liability.

We believe whether a tenant does harm to a landlord or a landlord hurts a tenant by what they do, both need to be charged with a criminal offence. Neither should escape having a criminal record for their conduct. Otherwise, they think they get away with it.

No one escapes God’s justice, which always includes the availability of His mercy. We pray for our landlord to repent (that means to turn around and change) and allow God to reshape her character.

We ask only that you pray for God to show us the way out.

We thank God for the network of people who are helping us find a safer place. We pray for God to pour out His richest blessings upon them and their families.

Our God appointment

God brought a young man into our lives who is using the contacts he has in the community to help us find an apartment or house.

Recently, Karen needed assistance getting groceries upstairs. God provided a young man seemingly from nowhere to help. He did this expecting nothing in return. We know it would have been an insult to him to offer anything. This young man offered his strength to Karen as a gift.

The stairlift purchased by the landlord has been broken for three weeks. Our landlord wrote in a recent email she will decide if she can afford to fix it. She is required by law to do this. In the province of Ontario anything attached to the unit owned by a landlord is their responsibility to maintain.

I have a neurological condition that causes my right leg to dump me without warning. I require a wheelchair and scooter for most of my mobility. I can stand. I can walk a number of steps in our apartment using walls to support me. I use a walker for short distances.

I have been bumming it up and down several stairs. I’m experiencing times when I’m short of breath and dizzy.

The story gets better.

Rex moved with his wife and six-year-old daughter from Sri Lanka to Canada about a year ago.

When we invited him into our home we told him we are Christians. He said with excitement, “”So am I, my wife and daughter. She is going into Grade 1.”

He showed us a photo on his phone of his pastor and the pastor’s wife.

We have been invited to visit the church they attend in Timmins.

He told us he works as a rock tool technician at a local mine. Rex is praying God will open a door for him to study mass communications. He doesn’t have the academic training, but he has lots of experience working in this field in Sri Lanka. I ask you to pray for an opportunity to open up for him with a combination of an internship with a college diploma or university program in mass communications as well as funding for the family’s living expenses.

Rex has no Canadian academic training. He tried to get into a program in mass communications at Northern College in Timmins without success.

His wife is in her second semester of a two-year program in supply chain management at Northern College is Timmins.

Rex is proud of his wife for doing very well in her first semester.

Rex had an ear-to-ear smile when I told him I studied journalism as part of my Bachelor of Theology degree.

There are people who oppress others. Please stand up for those who are being treated with cruelty and injustice.

You may be the only gospel they see.

God calls us to be living letters of life to others (2 Corinthians 3:2-3).

A little compassion goes a long way.

Are we willing to risk being vulnerable in telling others the areas in which we yet need to grow? That takes openness. This requires willingness opening some of our wounds for them to understand how we struggle with our character development.

How do we overcome evil with good? I believe it is in doing more good.

Think of what a better world we could have if we were all just a little kinder to one another.

Love and hate can’t co-exist.

A fire needs oxygen to continue burning. When love smothers the fire of hate, it is extinguished. It has no more oxygen to reignite unless the hate rises again.

Love is more powerful than hate. it can never survive in the presence of love.

Pray God will help us love our landlord with the love of Christ, while still holding her accountable for her actions.

While we are called to love and forgive her, we don’t like what she is doing to us.

You can love someone, but object to the individual’s conduct.

How many times have you said to your son or daughter, “I love you, but I don’t like you very much right now?”

This is where we are at with our landlord.

“Goodness is stronger than evil.
Love is stronger than hate.
Light is stronger than darkness.
Life is stronger than death.
Victory is ours through Him who loved us.”

–Bishop Desmond Tutu

We are praying about our options.

We would still leave even if our landlord stopped using the chemicals we are allergic to. She has committed a serious breach of our trust. We don’t feel safe around her.

Our landlord has transformed our beautiful apartment into a prison in which we get temporary community absence passes to escape for our emotional well-being.

I have to spend most of my day in our bedroom where our air purifier is to keep me as safe as possible. But the allergens our landlord is using are still coming into it.. We are in the process of getting a new air purifier. Our current one is over 20 years old. It is harder for it to function at the capacity we need.

We rented an apartment. We didn’t rent a bedroom with periodic use of the kitchen, bathroom and living room.

Truths we are clinging to

Love always wins. It may not seem like it when you are going through a trying situation, but in time it does.

If God should call you to suffer or die, darkness never wins. Your life, Karen’s and mine has been bought with such a high price – Christ’s blood shed on the cross for our sins.

What extravagant love!

When there is no love left in you call upon God. He will give you all you need to love others.

When you do that love wins every time.

Dr. Kevin Osborne is the Dean of Psychology and President of Student Affairs for St. James the Elder University. He is s therapist, writer, poet, and singer. He helps people in their inner healing journey. Dr. Kevin Osborne lives in Timmins, northern Ontario, Canada, with his wife, Karen. She is the Registrar for SJTEU. Karen has a B.A. in Clinical Christian Counseling summa cum laude from St. James the Elder Theological Seminary (now St. James the Elder University). She is planning to pursue graduate studies majoring in Psychology and Applied Theology. Karen is a writer, editor, and counselor. Karen and Kevin are powned by their 21-year-old cat, Katherine, a.k.a. Her Royal Furriness, Princess Katherine of Timmins. Happy Birthday, Katherine! You’re going to love the royal purple birthday hat we’ll we putting on you so much!