When we arrived there, we were met by a swarm of churchgoers who can't find seats. I was impressed. The sound was great, they have worship leaders and pastors who looked like celebrities. What a great motivation indeed to go to church if you see girls and guys who are good to look at every Sunday. When the sermon came, all was quite going well. It was about Faith and the account was about when Isaiah gave his blessing to Jacob instead of Esau. The pastor was funny, an eloquent speaker himself. But for one thing, it was his behavior as he shared this side joke before the crowd. We all know that Jacob was quite the opposite of Esau. Esau was hairy, a very physical man who enjoyed hunting and the outdoors while Jacob was smooth and fair-skinned, who tended the sheep and stayed near home.
So this pastor made this stupid joke about men who were fair-skinned and he was relating to men nowadays who were effeminate, quite vain about themselves, in short men who are "gay". People were laughing but in one corner I saw this guy. He was wearing pink and by the looks of him it's obvious that he is gay. His face was a picture of hurt. He was angry and I saw him clenching his fist. I stopped myself from my urge to laugh and felt Christ speaking to me. I saw him and felt his agony, as people in the audience laugh in their ignorance. If I were that man, I wouldn't be going to this church.
I'm not judging or anything about a church like this or churches in general these days. As I have observed, churches nowadays don't attend to the brokenness of its members. Most churches nowadays are more focused on evangelism on making thousands and thousands of members eventually making them mega churches. It's not bad actually but sadly most churches are concerned maintaining their status quo. They wanted to be the church of the "elite". They wanted to project an image of a happy church, with all of its members happy and smiling and faithfully appear to obey God's word. It's either they want to hide the reality that its members are broken - they ingore it, they shy away from it or just laugh their way to it just as this pastor is making this sickening joke? They don't offer help, they condemn. What a hypocrisy!
Didn't Christ dined with the sinners? Didn't he associate himself with the tax collectors? Didin't he saved Mary Magdalene, the prostitute? Didn't he gave the living water the adulteress woman of Samaria badly need? Didn't he choose Peter who was fickle-hearted? or Judas whom He know would betray him? Our churches become the modern-day synagogues; with their pastors, the modern day Pharisees. Is that what Christ want his church his to be? With people who claim to be clean and spotless? Think again, the church should exist to welcome sinners. To provide help to those who are needy, to be a safe place to anyone who needs refuge and most of all to transform the lives of the people to be Christ-like, not tolerating the sin but lovingly care for the sinner.
The Calling of Matthew (Matthew 9:9-17)
9 As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth. "Follow me," he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.
10 While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew's house, many tax collectors and "sinners" came and ate with him and his disciples. 11When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and 'sinners'?"
12 On hearing this, Jesus said, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. 13But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.'[a] For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners."
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