Together
Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so. Why do we learn that simple childhood song? Because it is true. Jesus loves people. All kinds. He loved those who followed Him, His disciples. He loved sinners. As a friend of mine recently said, “If you are not a sinner, the gospel is not for you.” It is for me, because I am a sinner!
Jesus hung out with people of all types. Read the Gospels and see the folks around the Lord. One can hardly find a reference in the Gospel records of Jesus without His disciples nearby, unless He arose early to be alone with His Father (Mark 1:35), or if His disciples went to look for food or something else (see John 4). He loved His disciples, and spent most of His time with them. He loves you if you are His follower, and He loves time with you.
Jesus also spent time with obvious sinners: tax collectors like Matthew (see Matthew 9) and Zaccheus (Luke 19), an immoral Samaritan woman in John 4, etc. He even spent some time with the religious hypocrites who loathed Him, and who called Him in derision a friend of sinners.
What can we learn from Jesus’ associations? As I noted above we can learn He loves time with us. But there is a practical lesson, one I had never thought of until the other night when a guest youth speaker made a comment to our youth. He noted that when Jesus hung out with groups of sinners, He typically had His disciples with Him. In other words, if you will be serious about reaching people in your school, work, and/or community, you don’t need to go alone. Sure, there will be times you will have to stand for your faith, and stand alone. But why would you go to a group at your school who has no regard for Jesus and seek to reach them by yourself? Why would you go to parties or events that you know will bring you down if you go alone?
When you pick your friends you pick your future. Pick friends who don’t love Jesus, and you will be brought down. Date people who don’t love Jesus, and you will wreck your life and probably the life of your children one day. If you are a follower of Jesus, your very best friends should love Jesus more than you. When you have those friends, then you should also have friends who do not know Jesus. But do it in that order. If I have a few solid followers of God with me, I can go into most any situation to share Christ confidently. We need each other. God wired us that way. And Jesus lived that way. Let’s be like Jesus. Let’s be together for the gospel.
Note: as you can likely tell this was originally written for young people. I first posted it on my myspace and facebook. blessings.