God incarnate, enjoying the company of "scum"

Who do you like to hang out with?

When I first became a follower of Jesus, church people warned me about my current and future friendships. "Be careful," they intoned, "Your relationships may lead you astray, so be friends with those who are on the same path as you." I even heard (more than once) the metaphor of being a good apple in a barrel of rotten apples.

I understand the well-meaning intention behind these dire warnings. Our friends influence us, and my new spiritual family did not want me to struggle more than necessary as I learned to follow Jesus.

There is some wisdom in that. I became a Christian a few days before my 19th birthday. On my birthday, my friends, who had been planning for weeks, wanted to celebrate with me. They took me to a strip club. Even though I felt it was the wrong choice for me to make, I did not have the fortitude to say no.

About a year later, when I was more rooted in Christ, I worked a graveyard shift at the airport where occasionally, on their midnight lunch break, all my co-workers would go to a strip club. They invited me every time, and every time I declined. What I didn't have the strength for at the beginning of my journey, I was able to handle later.

All that to say, helping new followers of Jesus walk the path of discipleship makes complete sense. If we're coming out of addictions, it makes sense to not surround ourselves with that culture. It also makes sense to invest in friendships that strengthen our faith. Even now, I appreciate every time I spend time with followers of Jesus where we exhort, encourage, and pray for one another as we follow Jesus.

But to only hang out with Christian people is not the way of Jesus.

As I got to know Jesus better, how surprised I was to discover stories like this one:

Later, Matthew invited Jesus and his disciples to his home as dinner guests, along with many tax collectors and other disreputable sinners. (There were many people of this kind among Jesus’ followers.) But when the teachers of religious law who were Pharisees saw him eating with tax collectors and other sinners, they asked his disciples, “Why does he eat with such scum?"
~ Mark 2:15-16

Teachers of the law criticized Jesus for not just hanging out with "these people," but enjoying their company, eating with them, showing them love and acceptance, and including them in his fellowship. He was friends with them!

I also admire the wisdom of Matthew not to shun his old friends, but to bring Jesus to them. And Jesus didn't chastise Matthew for surrounding himself with "rotten apples." Instead, he sat at the table with them, eating, drinking, and laughing.

God incarnate, enjoying the company of scum.

PAUSE and REFLECT: Take stock of your current friendships. If you've followed Jesus for a number of years, chances are the majority of your friendships (especially the close ones) are with fellow followers of Jesus. Like I mentioned above, there is *nothing* wrong with Christian friends!

However, if you have little (or no) true friendship with people who do not follow Jesus, ask yourself why. Perhaps you're simply not around people who don't follow Jesus very much. Or, perhaps you see people far from God as a project, which immediately eliminates any possibility of true friendship with them. Even worse, perhaps you’ve been told that "following Jesus is best calibrated by... keeping company with the right people and avoiding dark alleys frequented by non-believers" (Kelly Nicondeha).

Jesus says otherwise.

So ask yourself (or better yet, ask the Spirit), "Am I comfortable being at the table with people who do not follow Jesus?"

This is important. Are you comfortable sitting next to the Buddhist, the Muslim, the same-sex couple, the person with opposite politics to you, the person with no roof over their head, the person with no morals, and the business person who lives for money? Can you laugh with them? Love them? Open your life to them?

Are you even inviting them to your table?

Jesus is. And he's loves their company. It was the religious leaders who refused to associate with those of different morals, values, or religious-political views who ended up on the outside of Jesus' fellowship.

Jesus loves you and is delighted to spend time with you. Yet he also wants you to be with him as he is with others. All others. Not just our church friends.

What can you do this week to build friendship with someone unlike you? Jesus wants to hang out with them, and he is inviting you to the table as he sits with them. Will you say yes?

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Photo by Luisa Brimble on Unsplash