Eating at the Father’s Table

Many news junkies would have figured out by now that public displays of (sometimes misguided) religious zeal makes for pretty spectacular headlines. Take for example the clash between gay and lesbian rally participants and members of a church in Adelaide last week (http://www.news.com.au/national/gays-christians-clash-at-adelaide-protest-rally/story-e6frfkvr-1226055977537). How should a follower of Jesus respond?

For starters, God does not hate sinners. In fact the Bible is quite explicit in explaining that God loves sinners (Romans 5:8). And thank goodness He does. Maybe there are some people out there who have discovered how to stop being sinners. Good on them. They should write a book about it. The rest of us imperfect mortals on the other hand need to trust God gives us the grace to plod along the straight and narrow. And we Christians really need to be a bit more gracious to those who don’t know the house rules. After all, they’ve not even members of the family (yet).

All those who love Jesus and follow Him are like children of one Father sitting around the family dining table. Because we’re family, we all know the rules of the House and encourage one another to follow them. Our loving Father typically encourages us to invite our friends over to dinner, but because they are not members of our family (yet) we should not be surprised if they don’t know the House Rules and therefore not follow them. They may choose to eat with their hands and wipe their mouths on their sleeves or even spit the bones under the table. Those who aren’t family members aren’t obligated to follow the family rules. However, if these friends of ours decide they want to be adopted into the family (just like we were), then we need to sit with them and explain what the House Rules are like and the commitment we have to our Father and His Rules.

Those who do not belong to God are living according to their own rules (Isaiah 53:6). Maybe instead of yelling at them, we should encourage them to come eat more often at our table instead (Luke 1:77-79).