Be gentle. 

It seems that for human beings to live alongside each other peacefully has always been a challenge.  I don’t know about you but my sense is that we have become less tolerant, more confrontational.  Words and actions are often charged with impatience and disdain, if not hostility and outright threats and violence. 
At best we are unaware of how the words we speak and the things we do affect others; at worst we simply don’t care as long as we get what we want.
 
Every one of us knows what it is to feel vulnerable, lonely, anxious, isolated, fragile.  I believe that more than ever we need gentleness and tenderness.
Be gentle.
 
“Go peaceful
in gentleness
through the violence of these days.
Give freely.
Show tenderness
in all your ways.
 
God speed you!
God lead you,
and keep you wrapped around His heart!
May you be known by love.”
 
(from a hymn by Paul Field)
 
‘The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control…’ Galatians 5:22-23