Christine Caine - All You Need Is Love
Read Luke 7:1-50
The story talks about Jesus, having a meal at Simon the Pharisee. At this point of time, Jesus was highly controversial. The Pharisees were using anyway possible to destroy Him.
In the middle of the meal, a prostitute came into the house and poured perfume on Jesus’ feet and broke down in worship. Before we go further with this story, has it ever occurred to you that this prostitute just walked into the house of a religious leader like a walk in the park? The only possible reasons for this chance are: the prostitute has access to the Simon’s house or that she has been to the house before.
In verse 44 Jesus said to Simon, “Do you SEE this woman?”
Often times we look through people without seeing them. How often do we look at people as idiot drivers, weirdo, or fat instead of seeing them as a human being?
Simon looked at her as a sinful woman, Jesus saw her as a broken human being. Through this perspective, Simon missed Jesus because he was too busy judging people. How often do we miss Jesus because we are too busy judging each other?
The worst part = a lot of us are LOOKING and TALKING instead of SEEING, GOING and DOING.
Christine Caine goes to tell her about a college friend named Debra. Debra was the popular girl in college who is loved by everyone. At that point of time, Christine wasn’t convinced that Debra needed Jesus. She had a great life and surrounded by great friends. Everything went smoothly until Debra came to Christine after she went missing for 3 days. Debra told Christine that she was at this rave party feeling the most extravagant peace, love and joy because of an ecstasy pill. Debra cried out to Christine, “I just want you to feel such peace, love and joy. That is why I saved a pill for you.” At that moment, Christine realized that Debra loved her too much to offer this peace, love and joy while Christine failed to love her as much to offer Debra true peace, love and joy.
Looking is easy. In fact, once you look, you can choose to look away or even overlook. Seeing is different. You can’t un-see something. People choose not to see things because they are afraid of the weight of what they’ve seen.
The truth is, it is impossible to see Jesus and to miss seeing people. Check yourself. Are you really seeing Jesus? Or are you just looking at Jesus to get what you need just the way you look at people to get what you need from them? The love of Jesus and the love of people can’t be separated.
Read Luke 10:25-42
Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan to the people. Throughout the reading of this story, Christine was asked by God, “Which one are you in this story?” In pride of her ministry and everything that she did for God, she calmly responded that she has been the Good Samaritan. On second thought, she realized that she might have been the Levite and the religious leaders who walked pass by the needy.
The danger in ministry lies in overlooking people as obstacles to our ministry rather than objects of our ministry. Which one are we in the story of the Good Samaritan?
The key to change is in our action. The Good Samaritan WENT to the needy and helped him. He let himself to be interrupted to help. How often do we block away God’s interruption because we have a ministry to pursue?
There is a new syndrome in the world that has been talked about by the psychologist. It is called the compassion fatigue syndrome. It is the tired feeling of seeing real life condition. This is why the media doesn’t talk much about what is happening in third world countries. These stories are not on popular demand.
The thing about compassion fatigue syndrome is that, Jesus never had the syndrome. Even on the cross, he looked at the other person on the cross and forgave his sins! What an example to follow.
When the bible was written 2,000 years ago, it had said that the harvest is plenty but the workers are few. In the life we live in today, the access to bible, gospel or Christian sources are plenty, yet the problem remains the same: lack of workers.
Being a worker on the field is tough.
It is tough to be selfless in a selfish world.
It is tough to care in an uncaring world.
This is why, Jesus died on the cross to show us what true compassion is like.