This morning class was canceled so I decided to lounge around and read instead. I read a bit in Job and then I turned over to John. For a while now I have really loved the book of John. I love the stories and the things Jesus did and said as told by John. At Urbana we went through the first four chapters which are powerful.
One story that sticks out to me in particular is the story of Jesus and the woman at the well. Her story starts in John 4:4. I love how Jesus just goes up to her even though she is a Samaritan woman, and not only was she a Samaritan, she had been married several times and was with another man that was not her husband. Jesus knew all of this and still asked her for some water! He did not care what she had done in the past or what she was currently doing. She had sinned and He still met her where she was, He loved her. All of us as humans have differences. We are all unique. We all have different backgrounds. We have different sins, but we all have sinned. They may be different, but they are all sin.
Some of us might look at the woman at the well and be like, "Look at that woman! She has had five husbands and is now with some other man! We are not as bad as her." I know I have felt that way. I have been that person who looks down on others who fall into sin after sin and don't seem to care. My heart breaks for these people, but some times I get tired of it and eventually write them off. I sit back and watch them screw up there lives and do nothing about it. We are not supposed to do any of this. We are called to love all people! We are called to live just as Jesus did. He did not sit back and watch people mess up there already broken lives or criticize there every wrong move. He went to them. He met them where they were. He showed them love and grace and gave them mercy and forgiveness.
He didn't just come to the Samaritan woman, He also came to me in all of my self-righteousness. Just a few chapters earlier, John 1:14 says "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us." Jesus came to all of us. He walked this earth to restore our relationships with our maker. I am so broken which makes my relationship with God broken.
Flipping to John 17 I saw that Jesus prayed for us before He was arrested and crucified. John 17:20-26 says
"My prayer is not for them* alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
"Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.
"Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them."
We are meant to be reconciled to God through Jesus and also to each other. We are meant to be a body of believers that reaches out to this hurting world, meet them where they are, and show them the love of Christ. My prayer is that I stop judging and disregarding the hurting. Jesus came for me and He also came for them. He came for each and every one of us. I pray I can show love to this beautiful neighborhood where God has sent me, spread that love of Jesus.
*them refers to Jesus' disciples
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