GOD PICKS THE UNLOVABLE ONES

Anne Lamott described a time when a fellow church member told about adopting her son through an organization called A.S.K. -- Adopt Special Kids.

Part of the adoption process included filling out a questionnaire checking "yes" or "no" for one's willingness to adopt babies that had been born addicted, disabled or terminally ill. The couple had checked down the list.

Their pastor was helping them to work through the process, and he later told their church that God, too, is like an adoptive parent who says, "Sure, I'll take the kids who are addicted or terminal. I pick all the handicapped kids. And of course the sadists, too, the selfish one, the liars, -- I choose them.

I choose the disobedient ones and the terrified ones, the self-indulged ones and the trouble-makers, the damaged ones and the unlovable ones. In love, I choose them all. I will be a parent to them all. I will end their separation and bring them home to me."

That is the power of the cross of Jesus Christ!

(From a sermon by Rick Crandall, Go Tell Your World, 5/25/2011)