I want you to meet my cat, Shadow. This is the only way you will see him. If you come to my house he will hide and you can look the house over and you'll not find him. I took him in as a very young ferrel kitten and he came preprogrammed not to trust strange people and dogs.
Notice I called him MY cat. My husband hates cats. He has hated them in the past, he hates them now, and will probably hate them in the future. The funny thing is that he seems to attract cats like a cat magnet. Whether it is Shadow or a perfectly strange cat like the ones that hang around the bed and breakfasts we like to frequent, they all want to rub up against him and try to get him to pet them.
He claims they know he doesn't like them and they are trying to drive him crazy. Well, I don't believe that. I believe that the cats sense his real gentle nature that he hides under that crusty shell he walks around with. Because they sense that gentleness, they know he is safe to approach.
My husband has softened some in his old age. Just lately, he and Shadow have begun to get along well enough that the cat doesn't run at the sight of him. In fact, Shadow allows him to pet him and my husband will actually stop voluntarily and pet the cat.
You know, Jesus was kind of like my husband. Jesus was brought up a Jew and taught all the prejudices and hatred that goes with that upbringing. But it just seemed that Jesus seemed to attract those hated by the Jews. They, also, could see his loving, compassionate nature.
For example, Mark 7:26;29-30: Now the woman was Greek, a Syrophoenician by birth [a Gentile], and she kept asking Him to drive the demon out of her daughter.... Then He told her, 'Because of this reply you may go. The demon has gone out of your daughter.' When she went back to her home, she found her child lying on the bed and the demon was gone." The Gentile were so hated that they could not enter the temple and if a Jew had contact with them, he was suppose to cleanse himself before HE could enter the temple. I wonder if the Jews thought that the Gentiles had cooties or something.
The Jew had no empathy for the sinners in their community either. The sinners were "unclean" too. In Luke 7: 36ff tells the story of a sinful woman (some say a prostitute) came to Jesus and poured fragrant oil on his feet, washed them with her tears, dried them with her hair and kissed them repeatedly. The Pharisee who invited him had offered no water to wash his feet. The Pharisee's had something to say about that, "When the Pharisee who had invited Him saw this, he said to himself, 'This man, if He were a prophet, would know who and what kind of woman this is who is touching Him- she's a sinner!'" But after conversing with the Pharisee a while longer Jesus said, "'Your faith has saved you. Go in peace."
Jews also had nothing to do with Samaritan and NEVER went to Samaria. The Samaritans were a kind of Jewish half-breed and the hatred was mutual. But Jesus kind of astounded the disciples by wanting to go through Samaria in John 4. He came to Sychar and decided to rest at Jacob's well. There was only one woman drawing water there because it was the heat of the day(water was generally drawn early in the morning or in the evening because it was cooler), and Jesus asked her for a drink. She was totally SHOCKED that He had even spoken to her more or less asked for a drink of her water. He engaged her in conversation, another shocker, and told her everything she had ever done. When the disciples showed up, they were typical Jews and were hostile to the woman, but it was too late. Jesus had touched her heart and she went through Sychar telling everyone she met about Jesus.
It's amazing isn't it. Like my husband, we grow up with certain prejudices. Then, just like with the cat, we touch it; we experience it; we "pet" it, and we find out that it is not so bad. We begin to talk to the "rejects" of society, just like Jesus, and we find that not only can we help them, we can with God's help, lead them to salvation and hope.
I believe that my husband will continue to pet the cat. A purring cat can be an addicting thing. Who knows, someday he may even let the cat sit with him (He won't even let the dogs do that). All it took was for him to reach out to the cat. The same way we need to reach out to the addicted, the convicted, the homeless, the adulterers, and the rest of the socially unacceptable and show them the same love Christ had for them. We won't be perfect, but we can keep trying until we get so used to it that we no longer harbor our pet prejudices and see them as God's creation.
Well, I need to try and find Shadow. I haven't seen him since the grandchildren came over last night. He's not in any of his usual hiding places. Maybe I'll get my husband to help me.
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