Let me in!

Somone once tried to steal my grandma.

Sledding and my grandma letting a kid neither of us knew, call her “grandma”. “That’s not your grandma!”

This kid was an outsider to my family with no biolgoical right to call her grandma. This is what she says:

He might not have a grandma, so I can be that for him if he needs it. Jesus loves him too.

Jesus came to the door of my life, as an outsider, where I was, because I was sick and needed a doctor.

Problem: Our lack of hospitality stems from our fear and brokenness.

Read the bible.

Luke 5:27–31 CSB

27 After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at the tax office, and he said to him, “Follow me.” 28 So, leaving everything behind, he got up and began to follow him. 29 Then Levi hosted a grand banquet for him at his house. Now there was a large crowd of tax collectors and others who were reclining at the table with them. 30 But the Pharisees and their scribes were complaining to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” 31 Jesus replied to them, “It is not those who are healthy who need a doctor, but those who are sick.

Jesus surrounded himself with some off characters whould most likely be known as “outsiders”.

Fishermen

Terrorists (Simon the Zealot)

Prostitutes

Tax Collectors

Hospitality isn’t about our houses or a place we call home. It’s not about surrounding ourselves with just the people we like or get along with. It’s about how we love thow who God has surrounded us with, where we are.

Luke 5:27 “27 After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at the tax office, and he said to him, “Follow me.””

Jesus saw Levi. Who’s name gets changed to Matthew either as a nickname that sticks or some other way.

Jesus saw the oustider and acknowledged his humanity and invited him into a new life.

Away from a life of being enemies of your own people, thieves, enabling a tyrannical kingdom, and stealing from your very own people. He came to this guy and invited him to something new.

Two things we have to be very aware of:

We have all been, or are Levi in this story.

Outsiders from relationship with God

Taking advantage of others for our own benefit because we worship ourselves. Because even if you claim to not believe in God, something takes that place, and it’s usually us.

Romans 5: 8 But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 How much more then, since we have now been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from wrath. 10 For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, then how much more, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life. 11 And not only that, but we also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received this reconciliation.

Galatians 4:4-7  When the time came to completion, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. 6 And because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba, Father!” 7 So you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then God has made you an heir.

And Jesus himself was an “outsider” to his own people but he came anyways.

John 1:10–11 “10 He was in the world, and the world was created through him, and yet the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.”

So look at this: Jesus, though he wasn’t recognized and was an outsider, saw another outsider and said, come on, I’ve got something better for you.

And what does Levi do? Drops it all and walks into the new life ahead of him. Levi is alone and ostrocized, and he’s not innocent. But look what happens to Levi when he’s invited into a new life? He goes and gets his buddies to show them Jesus.

Jesus doesn’t stop with the invitation. Levi throws a party and Levi invites all his outsider buddies because they had to be friends with each other or else they’d have no friends. There were lots of tax collectors and people you would have avoided going to a party with because of what people might whisper.

Jesus went to people who others would have stayed away from.

And there is nothing special here that is outside what you or I can do.

Picture the person at school or work who you know is the outsider or part of a different group of friends, you would disagree with, don’t share the same worldview whatever. Jesus goes and eats with them. We all eat! It’s easy. How does Jesus start the healing process? He sees them and eats with them.

And people will wonder what are you doing and why??

Pharisees ask Jesus: why would you go and sit with these guys as if you agreed with what they were doing? (Essentially saying, you must agree with the way they have hurt the people by taking extra money from them)

Jesus is like: there are sick people. And those people can’t be healed unless the doctor comes to them.

Jesus: In order to see the sick made healthy. He can’t heal them unless he associates with them.

So remember: we are or were outsiders. Our selfishness and self-centredness has made sure of that. Unable to break free from the bonds of isolation, brokeness and we’re trapped. Jesus goes, I’ll come to you. And then follow me into the new.

Here’s our problem: Our lack of hospitality where we go, stems from our fear and brokenness.

There are people out there, and in here who need the healing of Jesus. And the job of a hospital is to heal people. If you’ve been approached by Jesus and asked by him to follow him then you get to do this with him. If you’re feeling like Jesus is coming to you and inviting you to follow him into something new, then it’s time to drop your old life and walk into the new.

Invite people to respond to Jesus’ invitation.

What does Levi do when this happens to him? He goes and gets his friends.

Solution: Jesus brings new life into dead places and heals people. And then people who’ve been healed go and tell their sick friends where to get well. Jesus loved people where he found himself, at the cost of being rejected.

Response: I’ll go do what Jesus did for me. Get up, drop your old life and follow him into the new.

Respond like Levi did? Drop the stuff of your life that hurts you and others. Walk away from it and follow Jesus.

Bring this new life into dead places.

The church is supposed to act as a spiritual hospital, but we have to be mobile. Where we find ourselves. Look around where you are. Sometimes we have to be willing to endure some whispering from other people to go to the people that others wouldn’t normally go to.

My grandma gets this. Letting a random kid be a part of our family for an hour one evening while we were sledding. That’s all that was.

Jesus: I came and I knocked on the door of your life. It’s not a new lifestyle I invited you to, it was to the good story with a new life.

So: where are you going to do this with Jesus? Who are you eating with?

And your invited into something new.