I've written about empathy for years, and I still find most of us mixing it up with sympathy. Sympathy sees a man stealing groceries because he's hungry and says, "That's okay." Empathy sees the same hunger and says, "I understand.  It's still wrong." 

That's easy to hold until they're our groceries.  Then we remember how much we've been forgiven ourselves, and suddenly we're not sure which one we owe. Jude, a brother of Jesus, wrote a short letter about walking that narrow line.  Before he tells anyone how to show mercy, he tells them where they need to be standing first. 

This week's devotional is about loving people like Christ without making peace with what's hurting them.