Are you the kind of person that Jesus would hang out with if he were around today? I find it amazing the kind of people that Jesus hung out with when he was on earth. He didn’t hang out with kings and government officials. He didn’t really spend most of his time hanging out with church leaders. Jesus spent most of his time hanging around simple like farmers and fishermen. That’s pretty interesting if you ask me.
Rebellious people
Here’s what’s even more mind blowing, Jesus spent a lot of time hanging around rebellious people. Think about this… Jesus is God in the flesh. He comes to earth and chooses to hang around very simple people, but he’s also willing to hang around very sinful people! All sin, in case you didn’t know it, is ultimately an offense against God. So the face Jesus, as God in the flesh, was willing to hang out with sinful people is mind blowing to me.
When asked about this, he told people that it wasn’t the healthy that needed a doctor but the sick people. (Mark 2:17) Jesus chose to spend much of his time around people who were sick with sin. Obviously, Jesus hung out with them to make an eternal difference in their life.
Religious people
Did you ever stop and think about the kind of people who Jesus didn’t hang out with? Jesus didn’t hang out with religious people. In fact, Jesus had a lot of negative things to say about religious people.
The religious people of his day got mad at Jesus for hanging around drunks, prostitutes, and thieves. (Luke 5:30) is almost as if Jesus would rather hang around people who are sick with sin and know it, than hang around people who feel they are “holier than thou”. You see, compared to Jesus, every one of us are sick with sin even the most religious people.
The fact that Jesus chose not to hang around people that were religious says a lot about how Jesus views religion. Don’t be left out…
Righteous people
Jesus didn’t come to start a religion; he came to create a relationship between sinful men and a Holy God. Sometimes, it’s more difficult for the religious person to realize they’re sick sin than for the wicked, rebellious person. We teach that Jesus didn’t come to make bad men better, he came to make dead men alive! (Luke 5:32) This is is what it means to become righteous.
Maybe one of the reasons why Jesus chose to hang out with rebellious people was because they knew they needed a Savior. Maybe one of the reasons why Jesus avoided and criticized religious people is because they failed to see their own sin. They were too busy comparing themselves to other people, rather than comparing themselves to Jesus, that they couldn’t see their own sin. I guess you could say, that Jesus, the most godlike man to ever walk on planet Earth, hated religion!
So which one are you- the rebellious person who knows you need Jesus, the religious person who is comparing yourself to other people around you or the righteous person whose life has been transformed in Jesus Christ?
