I’m “stealing” the title from the two part sermon I heard yesterday. A particular piece of the topic stuck out to me. We have remotes for everything. They aren’t just for TVs any more. With remotes we can turn on and off lights and appliances, we can close our garage doors, we can check to see if we’ve set the house alarm, and we can even answer the door. They allow us to manage so much without having to get up to do anything. We can just sit back, and we don’t even have to go near the object for which we’re using the remote.
But sometimes we do that with people.
It is so much easier to sit back and point out that people need the Gospel. It is so much simpler to just drop a tract or say you’ll pray for someone. It is more comfortable to just send money. It is more painless to stand back and not get up close to love people. But that’s not how Jesus does things. He did something incredibly awkward and incredibly loving. Jesus Himself came down here to live with us and to get into the dirt with us. Jesus came to touch us with His love, to show us what it looks like, to reach us with it! You and I must do the same for others.
If someone needs help and I say I’m going to pray for them, what good does it do if I don’t also physically help? I’m right there! I can reach. I should reach. Why should they want anything to do with a God whose people don’t do anything? Why should they care if you and I don’t? God helps people, and often does that through us! If we don’t love God enough and if we don’t love the people He loves enough, then apparently our God and our faith aren’t worth anything at all.
Christianity is not made to sit back and point remotes to manage things. Did we forget what Jesus has done through His life, death, and resurrection? Did we forget that Jesus loves ALL? So who are we not to get close to people and show them what Jesus is really like? Christianity is made for getting into the ditches with people and helping them out. Christianity is made for loving people so much that we get close enough to be hurt.