One of the worst side-effects of Covid – quite apart from the awful physical ones – was that the enforced isolation caused many of us to lose contact with others. And so we lost the Way of love in the process and we lost the lifestyle of always reaching out. However, it would be a great pity if Christians were dissuaded from their primary calling, by a virus! Yet we’ve left behind things like sharing His love, witnessing, and evangelism – out there where the people Jesus dearly loves, live. Maybe because fear has taken over and squeezed us silent.

Looking down on the rest of this difficult world is another wrong viewpoint. Sadly His love goes out the window whenever we forget where WE came from. We’ve been given His holiness – and now we steward it.  In other words we are made holy by what Christ did for us, and we have to look after that way to live – carefully, with the Holy Spirit’s help. Holiness matters to God … nobody will see Him without it. Jesus gave us His holiness – and we are still here – today – in this life … the only one we will get … to live our lives like He would. We were not saved to go and sit down in a comfy chair, and criticise the pastor, or each other, and wait for eternity.

If we are ever going to reach the unreached people of this world we need to stop treating other people like we are in some kind of exclusive club. We are not better than others – we just know what Christ did for humanity. There are so many times when we leave behind sharing His grace and love with other people  – because we are too busy with our own lives. Or we go into judgment and make that an excuse. Christians disapprove of the way people dress, or the way they live, the way they talk, the way they smell … the things they do. But those people are not saved … yet. Why on earth would we spend hours commenting on the way others live – instead of living this life the way He told us to live? 

This can be a real problem … I call it the older brother syndrome. He’s the guy who stays at home doing the right thing endlessly. He gets grumpy when some dead-beat lost son staggers in, because the father is so happy to see his lost son, he throws a feast! There are times I’m not sure any of us totally understand what SIN is! The sin we are guilty of, is living our lives for our own benefit – instead of dying to self for His sake, daily.

The church at large has forgotten that Jesus Christ came into this world to save sinners … and every single human being qualifies. We put out the vibe -“if you want to be like us, then come and join us!” Most people in this world don’t know there is an another way to live. And from the outside, we don’t look that good! That’s the problem when Christians start to think we are now somehow special.

Because we’ve collected our eternity ticket – we’ve become immune to other people’s heartache and pain. Sadly, we don’t change the way we live. Or perhaps we think that we don’t actually need to change  … surely God would not want our lives to be difficult? Perish the thought! What book are we reading? Nobody in the bible had an easy life! However, the longer the Apostle Paul was saved, the lower his estimation of himself became: “Although I am less than the least of all the Lord’s people, this grace was given me: …” Ephesians 3:8. Whatever we have has been given to us. 

So here’s my point today – we gotta learn how to throw out the net of the gospel where the fish are, and most of them won’t come into our churches! We simply must stop deciding who qualifies and who doesn’t, and go out everywhere we can, whenever we can, and share His love. The people who don’t-know-Jesus-yet know nothing about GRACE. Sometimes it seems to me that we want to sort out the fish even before His wonderful heart has caught them! In many churches we want to throw out the noisy ones, or the smelly grubby ones, or the ones who don’t dress properly, or perhaps they are living in sin. But a net catches anything and everything swimming past it.   

Finally, I want to look at the parable of the wedding feast. Those people who were already invited made all kinds excuses not to participate in that joyous event. So He sent His servants out to the streets and lanes to compel anybody else wandering about to come in. The servants didn’t have to check to see if the people out there were ‘eligible.’ I wasn’t eligible and … neither were you. I think the greatest harvest ever, is going to be from the people who are so soaked in this awful world – it will take a miracle to save them. And Jesus loves 💕 doing miracles!!

I want to leave you with this final thought today … where are you fishing? The best place to fish is in a river, a lake or the ocean – not in your own puddle.  👋🏻