In the company of sinners

By John Fischer

In The Purpose Driven Life, ministry has been described as serving the needs of believers; mission has been described as serving the needs of those who are not presently Christians. The latter may present a problem for some. You can’t really serve someone if you don’t know them, but being a in relationship with those who aren’t Christians can be dangerous. Old habits and old ways of life can come back to haunt you when you are around people who don’t share your desire to follow Christ.

For this reason it may be necessary for some to keep only Christian friends for a season, but the goal for us all is to be stronger than this. God didn’t save us and leave us on Earth to band together and live nice, safe little Christian lives until he returns or we die, whichever comes first. We are here to share the good news of God’s forgiveness with those who don’t know about it yet, and we can’t do that without getting close to people who need it. We need to be close enough to people to know them, love them, and serve them without judging them or losing our own hold on Christ.

How will we do this? A couple suggestions to think about today:

1. Don’t ever forget you are a sinner in need of salvation. This will help keep you from a self-righteous and judgmental attitude. We never have a perfect day; we encounter our own need to be saved all the time. We all sin and fall short of God’s glory. We lead people to Christ not by reaching down to them but as one thirsty person bringing another to water.

2. Remember that sin entraps everyone. Your friends who aren’t Christians may very well have a soft heart toward God and the truth but it may be covered up by a host of things the enemy uses to blind us like fear, failure, addictions, and all sorts of false-coping mechanisms. Success, power, and wealth can blind you as well. We need to ask God for the ability to look past all these distractions to the heart, because at the heart, everyone is hungry for God. We were created that way.

Lord, teach us to see people as you see them. May we not give in to the things that once entrapped us. Make us keen to the lie and hungering for the truth today, and help us to find it even in those who don’t know you. Remind us that we are all children when it comes to you, even the toughest among us. Show us how to love everyone and stay true to you.