Dirty Children

The kids probably didn't know or care that they were dirty and that I was clean. Jumping up next to me, they wanted to snuggle into my arms. So, they did, and I held them tightly. Man, they smelled awful! I could barely stand the stench. My heart was breaking for various reasons, but one of them was my selfish state of mind. I was so ashamed of my response.

In a split moment, I heard that small quiet voice speak. "This is how all of you come to me- dirty and smelly, reeking of sin and the brokenness of the world, but I love you anyway, and you are always welcome to come to me." 

Then it dawned on me. The famous story of the prodigal son. In it, Jesus tells a heartbreaking but wonderful tale of a son gone astray, and of the father running to meet the son he loves when the young man finally returns home. The son who was just recently eating with the pigs after years of spending his inheritance on pleasure, alcohol, and on prostitutes. In their culture, it was shameful for a father to do such a thing. But the loving dad didn't care about rules and protocol. He couldn't wait to embrace his son. 

God in the flesh never stayed away from the broken people, the outcasts of the community. Jesus touched lepers and dead people, and interacted with many women- even those of questionable reputation- all when it was against Jewish legalism to do so. Outcasts didn't throw him off. It is the same with you and I. God the Father broke all the rules of men and the protocol of haughty religious leaders by sending Jesus to pay the price for our brokenness, our sins, and the filthy lives we live. All we have to do is coming to Him. He even extends himself to us, putting people in our lives that bear his message of love and forgiveness. I love these two famous verses:

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

(John 3:16-17)

As one who believes, my heart and my actions often fail me and displease Him. But He loves me anyway, and I can always come to him, regardless of how dirty I am and where I've been. He loves me without condition. Paul writes in his letter to the Corinthian church that we are washed clean. We are pure before Him regardless of our past. Listen to this great news:

This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. 

But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us. 

See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure. Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin.

(I John 1:5-10, 3:1-5)

Jesus has done all the work on our behalf. And this new life is a gift- a gift to everyone who believes He was raised from the dead after paying the price for our sin against God. It's by His work on the cross that we can come to Him. It's not by our work so that we can boast.