A thought by Philip Yancey (2014-10-21) from his
book, Vanishing Grace: What Ever Happened to the Good News? (p. 37). Zondervan. Kindle Edition. (Click on
the title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.)
Now if Christ would
have taken the attitude that He only wanted to be with someone just like Him
then for sure He would have never come to earth. I mean He was God. But we have a tendency to only be around people
just like us but that isn’t what He did.
Philip quotes Jonathan
Sacks, who was the former chief rabbi of Great Britain and he said, “The Hebrew
Bible [Old Testament] in one verse commands, ‘You shall love your neighbor as
yourself,’ but in no fewer than 36 places commands us to ‘love the stranger.’ ”
He adds, “The supreme religious challenge is to see God’s image in one who is
not in our image.”
And then Philip says, “All
too often Christians take the opposite approach. Some demonize opponents, branding
them ‘secular humanists’ or ‘heretics’ or ‘perverts,’ and then retreat into a
fortress mentality.”
I’m challenged by what
Jonathan Sacks says, “The supreme religious challenge is to see God’s image in
one who is not in our image.” I spend a
lot of time in Starbucks where the homeless come in to sit. My supreme challenge is to see God’s image in
them and to not be judgmental of their situation. But Jesus doesn’t do that to me. He didn’t come to this world to condemn me
but to love me, accept me and be gracious to me.
Oh how I need Him living
and loving through me.
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