“Bold Love”

Daily Devotional – Wednesday, February 16, 2022

“If this man, Jesus, were a prophet, he would know what kind of woman is touching him. She’s a sinner!” (Luke 7:39 NLT)

Jesus wasn’t afraid to hang out with the wrong crowd, to have women among his disciples, to appoint a tax collector as an apostle, to embrace those with leprosy or even to allow a woman with a bad reputation to show her devotion. And every time he did so, someone was in the background *tsk, tsking*. Many in the crowds that followed Jesus were not accepted into nice society. His followers included people whom other religious teachers would have rejected.

Jesus didn’t have any such boundaries. He saw all people as being in need of God, his forgiveness and love. Reading the stories of Jesus found in the Bible, we can lose sight of the boldness of Jesus to live in a manner that would have made him equally culpable as those he loved…at least in the eyes of many who saw themselves as ‘good’ or at the very least, better than ‘those people.’

Sometimes I think we’re too quick to skim over these stories and we fail to put ourselves in the narrative. Oh, sure, it’s easy to think of ourselves being embraced by Jesus even though rejected by others. The real challenge is to recognize our own lists of ‘those people’ as being equally loved by God. Who’s on your list? No point denying it, we all have one. The sex worker? The religious extremist? The white supremist? The immigrant? Or maybe it’s your inconsiderate neighbour, disagreeable family member or just the rude individual who cut you off in traffic. How does Jesus’ acceptance of these individuals sit with you?

Not only that, but what does it mean for us who Jesus commands to, ‘love your enemy,’ ‘bless those who curse you,’ ‘don’t retaliate.’ When the Bible tells us that “all have sinned” (Romans 3:23), no one is left out of the equation; and, unlike us, God doesn’t use a gradient scale when it comes to measuring disobedience. Jesus’ love for others was bold…ignoring the gossip and forgiving freely. For those of us attempting to become like the One we follow, doing life with Jesus every day, we too should be boldly going where the self-righteous never would…boldly loving all people.
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Pastor Jane