Neighborly Love

I just found out that our neighbors think my son is a bad kid. Bad kid? Okay so he likes the nickname "maddog", and he is a little obnoxious. But he doesn't destroy property. He doesn't go tormenting animals. He doesn't cuss. He doesn't physically fight the kids in the neighborhood. I don't understand why he is considered "bad".

The first instance that I heard about bad "vibes" with our neighbors had to do with the cat we adopted. A stray wandered up and we fed him. We kept feeding him and he decided to stick around. Our neighbor's son (who is a good kid) said that his mom said that if our cat doesn't stay out of their yard that she would call animal control. Well one day animal control came out and we had to prove that we had provided shots for the cat. (The cat has since left. I think he didn't like the neighbors either.)

The next instance was when Maddog and his sister "GoobiLou" were standing outside. I had just stepped out and good "neighbor boy" was telling maddog that his mom said "if he knocked on their door again, then she would have to get ugly." I asked "good neighbor boy" why? And she called him over to the house.

The clincher was when maddog came into the house in tears. He said that he had left his brand new fishing pole next door and "good neighbor boy" threw it away. This was irritating to me because the pole was a gift from my dad. Also when "good neighbor boy" left his gameboy on the porch, we would bring it in so it wouldn't get rained on. At that very time "good neighbor boy" had his bicycle lying in my front yard. I marched next door and asked him to take it home (I was a lot nicer and didn't throw it away).

I new that we had our differences, but I didn't think my son was a "bad " kid.

Well I was thinking last night while I was hanging up our Christmas lights and they had driven up and I had been thinking what I thought they were thinking about me (people with low self-esteem do this a lot). I remembered that Jesus says to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. But what if our neighbors hate us?

How do you love someone who hates you? Should I take them cookies? Or will they throw them in the garbage? Should I wish them a Merry Christmas? Or will they slam their door in my face?

Can you show your neighbor love when they don't want it?