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I believe that God likes variety. I also believe that God likes to “paint.”

Look around the world about you. Flowers in all shapes and sizes. Flowers in different colors. Trees, bushes, ponds and lakes, all painted differently and all unique. People are no different. There are rich and poor. People in mansions, small houses, and trailers. There are old and young. There are those who do good and those who cause harm. But each person is just as unique as each snowflake that falls from the sky.

God loves variety. He didn’t make just one species of fish. He made millions. The same with birds, animals, insects. The list goes on and on. He didn’t make just one kind of flower, he made millions. The same with trees, plants, and this list is just as long as any other. God didn’t just make one person or multiple copies of the same person, but instead throughout history as the creator of all lives He has made billions upon billions. God loves variety.

God loves color. He didn’t stop with blue or green. He wasn’t content with yellow and red. It wasn’t just black or white. It was a multitude of colors He created and continues to create. Just look to the sky, the flowers, the trees, the ocean. You can tell God loves all colors.

God loves humankind in all of our different colors and all of our different varieties, shapes and forms. As a matter of fact, God loves humankind more than any other thing I have listed. The proof is found in John 3:16: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

God took human form in the life of his son Jesus Christ. And that son loved humankind so much that he died to save all humans, all varieties and all colors. I don’t believe Christ sacrificed Himself for the salvation of rocks, trees, animals and plants. I do know He went to the cross, to the grave and to the heavens for the salvation of “whoever believes in Him.”

Not just the people we like. Not just the people who look like you. Not just the people who act and live like you think they should. John says “whoever.”

If we believe God loves color, as we can tell by the painted world around us, and if we believe God loves variety as we can tell by the many species and life forms on our planet, and if we believe that God loves humankind, enough to offer them salvation through grace, forgiveness, mercy and reconciliation by way of his son, Jesus Christ, then we can certainly learn to love one another in all varieties and colors. We are called to be like Christ, and this is part of that calling.

REV. BARRY VASSAR is pastor at Fitzgerald Memorial Baptist. He can be reached at fitzgeraldmemorial@gmail. com.