No filters please

This morning I heard two things that deeply impacted me.  Firstly I was listening to a message from John 4 about the Samaritan woman that Jesus met at the well in Sychar. The woman had more than a bit of a past but Jesus didn’t hesitate to get into conversation with her.

The speaker spoke about how we can filter out certain people in our lives. It may be the rich or the poor, the sexually immoral, the educated or uneducated, foreigners or certain foreigners but we all place filters on others as to whether we wish to come into contact, socialise or get to know certain people but not others.

Jesus placed no filters on his life. He came into contact and spoke and ate with the rich or poor, educated, uneducated, prostitutes, tax collectors, foreigners – in fact anybody and everybody - even Samaritans. Jews and Samaritans didn’t mix – Samaritans were mixed-blood race of Jews and there was great hostility between them. 

The disciples who had gone into the village to buy food were more than a little surprised to return and find Jesus in conversation first with a woman and then a Samaritan but through his contact they all stayed two days and the whole village got saved.

The second thing I heard was of the Irish band Bluetree going to Pattaya in Thailand – a hotbed of the sex tourism trade. They went to minister in the city.  One of the brothel and bar owners asked them to come and play in his bar as it would be good for trade. Instead of being offended, the band worshipped for two hours in the midst of this bar and brothel and spontaneously the song God of This City was born.

Suppose the band had filtered out this brothel, the owner and the prostitutes as not an appropriate place to worship. Instead they brought light into one of the darkest places – surely bringing love, grace and hope.

I am challenged by who I filter out and yet I am encouraged by those who take the good news of Jesus and his love to the ‘least of these’ – the very people God loves and wants to rescue. As Christians we are all trophies of grace. None of us had anything to bring to Jesus and yet he came and rescued us. 

I pray God touches our hearts with compassion for the lost and shines light on our filters that we may see past our prejudices to people who need Jesus just as much as we do.