Look around.....

Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed. [.....] Jesus answered him, "I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise." Luke 23:32, 43

FYI: This post makes no sense without the context of this week's other posts.

Jesus was loving the outcast, the sinner, even to the very end of his life on earth. Take a thinking pause....this is an amazing truth. In any case, I have talked about "enemies" and "those in our front row" this past week, now I turn our attention to the outcast and/or sinner. All three of these typologies of persons are vastly different. The "enemy" is the one who opposes everything we do....in this case, we are instructed to not repay evil for evil and to actually love this person. Our "front row" folks represent people with whom we allow to have positions of major influence in our life. We have to be extremely careful whom we allow to take up these strategic positions. Now we turn our attention to the outcast / sinner. Don't you find it wonderfully strange that Jesus continaully hung out with the "wrong" crowd?....like the lepers, the woman at the well, etc. Jesus flat out loved them....the sort of person it was extremely unpopular to be with, the sort of person with whom his "religious" contemporaries found troubling. Even to the end of his physical life on earth, he was speaking life and hope directly into a criminal's life....Hanging on a cross....offering hope, "today, you will be with me in paradise." Wow! Looking around my life, with whom am I loving and offering hope? Do they look anything like the type of folks that Jesus contintually ministered to? If not, should they? ....just a thought worthy of reflection.