Today, at work, I took some time to do some leisure reading. I was reading Twelve Ordinary Men by John McArthur. I was reading the chapter about James, who is known, in part, for his request of God to send fire from heaven to envelop the Samaritan countryside due to the inhospitable attitude they had toward Jesus and his followers. (James was a thunderous man, eh? 😉 )
McArthur makes a remark along these lines (I left the book at work, or I’d quote it word-for-word): It wasn’t that there wasn’t room in the inn; they were simply refusing hospitality to Jesus because they despised all Jews.”
This is an interesting idea to me and one that I’m not sure I’d considered before. As Jesus was entering the cold, harsh world, people essentially tried to say that there wasn’t room for Him. They had so many people in their place, that Jesus didn’t seem to be able to fit. Then, as Jesus was returning to Jerusalem so that He could fulfill prophesy with His crucifixion, He went through Samaria–a place where no Jew would be caught dead. Jews took the long way around Samaria; they crossed the Jordan River twice instead of just walking right through Samaria. The messengers Jesus had sent ahead of Him couldn’t find anyone to house them as they passed through. They were simply inhospitable. They refused to let Jesus in. Jesus was a man who had made the Samaritan a hero in a parable, healed a man of Samaria and honored him for his attitude of gratitude toward Jesus. It’s safe to say that he was not cruel toward the Samaritans, yet they neglected Him.
I wonder: How often do we treat Jesus with one of these attitudes?
Sometimes, we’re just so busy that we don’t seem to have the time to fit Him into our regularly scheduled programs and schedules. We have soccer practice, work, workout schedules, weekly television programs, hobbies, places to go, people to see. We have groceries to buy, bills to pay, children to shuffle, and social time to be had. Where can an involved person these days find time to spend with Jesus?
Other times, we simply refuse to offer hospitality to Jesus in parts–or all–of our hearts and lives. We claim to have control over parts of our lives and know that letting Him in would ruin that. We hate the idea of letting these things into which we’ve poured into with our sweat, blood and tears being handed over to Him, the Way-Maker. If we keep our ladle in the pot, stirring the soup with all our might, we might be able to make things come out just perfectly. Why would we hand things over when we have confidence in our work ethic?
Let’s keep these attitudes at bay, shall we? Let’s be sure we are intentionally throwing out the excess in order to make room for the King. We should make all attempts to hand over that scary part of our hearts and lives to the Man who makes a way and heals all things. Afterall, He washed away those grimy sins we seem to collect. He is able to do more–even more than we could ask, think, or imagine.