By: Erlinda Mejia-Olson
LUKE 19:10 ~ “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.”
One specific area in serving the LORD Jesus that I see rather challenging is getting connected, reaching out to all sorts of people. I sense my inadequacy. I know that I wasn’t born with a natural gift on social skill. I was an introvert before I was saved and changed person in Christ. When Christ has become increasingly more and more in my life each day, the lesser and lesser, this old nature of mine have become—until the very wart that I was vanished into thin air. By God’s amazing grace, He molded me into a new being, a wart still I would claim, because I was created by the Almighty God, saved by a Great Savior, serving the LORD of all lords. And for that, I am a wart before a great and awesome God!
LUKE 19:10 ~ “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.”
One specific area in serving the LORD Jesus that I see rather challenging is getting connected, reaching out to all sorts of people. I sense my inadequacy. I know that I wasn’t born with a natural gift on social skill. I was an introvert before I was saved and changed person in Christ. When Christ has become increasingly more and more in my life each day, the lesser and lesser, this old nature of mine have become—until the very wart that I was vanished into thin air. By God’s amazing grace, He molded me into a new being, a wart still I would claim, because I was created by the Almighty God, saved by a Great Savior, serving the LORD of all lords. And for that, I am a wart before a great and awesome God!
My dear friend, aren’t you glad that our God is a great God? A God who sent His only begotten Son, the LORD Jesus Christ, to redeem, to forgive, to change a wart like—you and me.
The LORD Jesus had a precise and specific deputation—to seek out and save those who were lost. In order for Him to fulfill His task, He connected with all intents and purposes to every soul our Heavenly Father put in His path—all sorts of individual in every strata of society. He did not allow Himself to sidestep anyone no matter who and what they are.
If we are to follow in the LORD Jesus’ examples and carry out His mission, we must do the same. It won’t be easy, and we will be tempted to relate only to those with whom we identify, with whom we are comfortable. But if we want to follow Christ's lifestyle, then it will mean making inroads—that is, reaching out to people we don’t normally connect with.
Let’s look at the ones the LORD Jesus sought out, in Mark 5:1-5, He befriends a guy with a serious mental illness, something no Jewish fellow would be caught dead doing. In Luke 5:27-30, He established a relationship with a tax collector, a conspirator and a known cheater. In Luke 7:36-39, the LORD Jesus befriends a loose woman whose reputation was the talk of the town. In John 4:5-9, He connects with a Samaritan, a real outsider, a loner, an oddball. In Luke 15:1-2, we see the LORD Jesus co-mingled with bums and low-lifers. He goes out of His way to get to know people riddled with disease and wracked with mental illness.
Every day we sidestep people who are considered outsiders and oddballs, loners and second-class citizens. Yet God has put these individuals around us in our neighborhoods, on our street corners, in the mall parking lot, or even within our own circle of family and friends. I remember the time when I used to work as a Nursing Assistant, I was helping a patient who was hesitant to get out of bed because she thought nobody would care enough to help her stand up and walk for being heavy set. By God’s grace I was able to encourage her, and before she knew it, she was able to ambulate around the hallway several times that day. The doctor was so pleased with the result that she was discharged the next day.
It’s so easy to overlook someone when we are so caught up with our own little world, but the LORD Jesus, is not.
