James 2: 1-9
God does not treat some people better than others just because they have more money or because of their skin colour. God loves everybody the same. Agape; the God kind of love is colour blind and does not value one person over the other. This is very instructive because when we have the nature of God by being born of God, that nature then gives us the capacity to think, feel, talk and act like God. This nature is the nature of love and what we learn about God is that He does not discriminate; Acts 10: 34.When we have God’s nature, we will frustrate that nature if our hearts are filled with prejudice. God loves people the same; when Jesus was around He broke cultural rules in the bid to reach people who needed Him. He needed to get across to drunkards, gluttons, and the message of God’s saving grace to sinners. Unfortunately, the religious leaders of His day had become so elitist in their thinking that they banished sinners from the synagogue. Therefore Jesus moved out of the synagogue to hang-out with them where they were. Luke 5: 27-32 captures a scenario where Jesus hung-out with tax collectors and sinners and He was criticized for doing so by the scribes. It is interesting to note that those who need God the most are the ones we drive away from Him. It is remarkable how people who have never been in church before appear in church for the first time and they are harassed over their appearance. Sometimes people gather together saying they are in church but Jesus is not there because many of the people who gather in church would not go where Jesus would want to go and would not be willing to hang-out with the kind of people Jesus would like to hang-out with. Jesus was accused of being a friend of tax collectors and sinners; He was called a glutton and a winebibber.
God’s love is all inclusive; the people that society rejected were the people Jesus accepted. The people who find it difficult to accept others are hypocrites; they use themselves as standards for everybody else but who said their standard is right. Whatever it is God gives any man is just a small part of what God has and God thrives in variety. When relating with anyone, the first thing to do is not to criticize and judge. The important thing is, when we love the way God loves, we don’t discriminate. You win the capacity to influence people when you genuinely love, care for them and accept them.
If we’ll fulfill our destinies in Christ let’s break free from our prejudices. God’s love is not exclusive, it is inclusive. In Christ we are new creatures and old things have passed away.
