I Feel I Am Not Acceptable to God and Peopleনমুনা

Go to the people outside the walls

Jesus comes to us again today with a cross over his shoulder. He walks through the "city gates" of these new walls that separate us from our neighbours and those who have been cursed and rejected by society. He is on his way to the people whose curse He already bore two thousand years ago, and He asks if we will go with Him and invite them in. This is why He came, after all. He came for those who need a physician and to call sinners to repentance (Luk.5:31-32).

We must remember that we all once lived outside the wall. Have we forgotten that? Have we forgotten what living as an outcast, unclean, and rejected was like - beyond the wall? Have we forgotten the hopelessness, fear, pain, pain, despair and scorn? Do we remember the pain of Godlessness and God-forsakenness? What of the resentment over our sin and its shame?

Have we forgotten how Jesus picked us up outside the city wall, became our Friend, and invited us to sit at his table with him and his friends? Matthew 9:10 – Many tax collectors and sinners came to dine with Jesus and his disciples.

Have we elevated ourselves to finger-pointers – do we think we're a little (or much) better than those who live outside the wall? It cost Jesus his life to go to the accursed outside the city. In the same way, it will also cost us something. In fact, it will cost us our lives to go to the despised outside the wall. We will have to die to our disgust for the sins and unacceptable behaviour of such people. Jesus will command some of us to go and live among them. Jesus moved and lived among harlots and the tax collectors. Shall we back down? Shall we disobey? He's already staying there. He's waiting for us there.

Somewhere in the midst of this, you may feel you're also outside the city wall, even if you are a Christian. You feel people have rejected you. Your family, "the church," the people outside the wall, as well as the people inside the wall. Often, it is a feeling that is far removed from the truth. Many times (most times), when people feel "the church" has rejected and hurt them, it is more of a feeling than reality, and they use it as an excuse to flee from God.

Come back – the gate is open.