Disclaimer: If you’re looking for something warm and fuzzy and feel-good, this is not it. You can skip to the next blog, which will be about fuzzy bunnies and cute kittens.
I was wondering if Jesus wrote a letter to one of his churches, particularly the post-modern trendy churches popping up all over the place, I’d bet it would go something like this:
“I came to one of your services and sat in the back row. I felt unwelcome and unwanted. Nobody turned around and greeted me. Nobody even so much as acknowledged my presence there.
They sang songs about me with great enthusiasm, about how great I am to save and how mighty God is. The preacher spoke at great length about how important it is to know me. But I walked in and out of the building and no one even saw me.
You have an amazing facility with some of the latest technology. You have some of the best singers and musicians leading the worship and one of the best speakers to motivate my people. But if there’s no real love behind it, it’s all just noise. And I didn’t see much love.
I came as one of the least of these. The outcast, the loser, the nobody. The ones you say you love, but your actions prove otherwise.
Get back to loving the unlovely. Don’t just associate with the popular and the trendy and those who have it all together. Take time for the ones who are sitting by themselves, who are socially awkward, who can’t do anything for you and probably can’t even say “Thank you.”
When you serve one of the least of these, you serve me. When you ignore them you ignore me.
Remember that I loved you when you were one of these. I loved you when you hated me, when your life was a wreck and you were hopelessly lost. Remember how that love felt and how it made you come alive. Then go and share it with someone who needs it most.