“Come unto me, all ye that labour and
are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”-Matthew 11:28
Exclusivity in our culture has been branded and re-branded a
hundred times over. You see it
everywhere: country clubs, fitness centers, property sales, etc. The desire to be included is solidified when human
intuition recognizes that someone else is excluded. It is not always the intention to exclude that
drives us to exclusivity, more so the longing to be included. Let’s face it, we all want to be loved and
included, but that gives us no right to be exclusive.
If there ever was a man that walked this earth that deserved to
be included it was Jesus Christ. He was
the Son of God. He owed the Earth. He owed the law. He was the first and only person that
understood both the spiritual world and the physical world while here on
earth. If there ever was a person who
could start an exclusive club that excluded everyone it was Jesus. He could have come as a worldly king, conquering
this earth and building a temporal city; a city where he let only the: strong,
intelligent, and beautiful in. He could
have fashioned a community of people that prided themselves on the outward and
avoided anyone that did not measure up.
He could have made: social engagements, outward appearance, and strict
habitual adherence to his status, his standards of accept.
He could have, but he didn’t. You
see a crowd like this already existed, and still exists. The laws and precepts that God laid out did
bring exclusivity. When you serve God,
you are different, and excluded.
However, that does not make you exclusive. There is a difference, and the Pharisees of
old failed to see it; truth be told, we as Christians sometimes find ourselves
in the same trap. For example, the Bible
says that neither fornicators nor drunkards shall inherit the kingdom of God. So, the next party comes around, at work or
at school, and you’re a Christian so you don’t receive an invite. You have been excluded. That’s fine, it’s part of the cross. Now, say a Friday night cook-out is coming up
at your church or a new small group is forming; so you go around and invite the
rich middle class guy, or the pretty white girl, all your church friends you
already hang out with since grade school; they hear about it, but the party
people don’t hear about it, or the scary homeless man you see on the street
corner everyday doesn’t hear about it, or the weird quite kid…..now YOU have become
exclusive. We as people naturally
gravitate towards those with whom we are comfortable with. The better you know someone or the more you
have in common with them, the more likely you are to reach out to them over someone
else. However, when it comes to
spreading the gospel, we must leave exclusivity at the door. People don’t want to come to a church where
they have to sit alone at Sunday supper.
They don’t want to see a Christianity that makes them feel like they are
back in middle school during gym class.
Yes, we are to come out from the world, and yes we cannot accept sin,
but we can reach out and love the sinner.
Did not Jesus do the same? He
said come unto me ALL. He said they that are whole need not a physician,
but they that are sick. We must live
to the scriptures and accept being excluded, but never fall into the temptation
of being exclusive. You want to run the
Spirit right out of your church, and right out of your life? Then put on the robe of a Pharisee. Jesus was excluded by the “cool crowd”
because he refused to be exclusive.
The Bible tells a story of a man who was beaten, robbed, and
left for dead by a gang. Three men
passed by, two of them holding religious office and one of them with no
religious heritage at all. The third
man, the one with no religious heritage, helped this poor man who fell among
thieves; the parable doesn’t say why, except that he had compassion on
him. Perhaps he had compassion because
he himself was once in a similar place.
Perhaps he understood what it was like to not to be cared for and
included. A generation of Christian
raised in an exclusive Christian climate is a powerful weapon for Satan. Every day, all around us, there are those who
have fallen among thieves. Life has
beaten them, robbed them, and left them for dead. Every true Christian was once the same; until
Jesus reached down, and saved us. Thank
God he was not exclusive; thank God, he loved even me. Now, ought we not to do the same?
