Do We Smell Like Sinners?
I titled the lesson “Do We Smell Like Sinners?” There’s a book titled “Do They Smell Like Sheep” which was written for church leadership and you can probably figure out the gist of the book from the title.
But, I want to challenge each of us to smell like sinners. Let me explain before you get up in arms.
Jesus during His ministry here on earth spent His time with sinners. He knew that it was the sinner who needed Him more than anyone else. In Mark 2:17 Jesus said “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
In Matthew 11:19 Jesus acknowledges that He is known as a friend of sinners. The verse says “The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’”
You see Jesus spent so much time with sinners that the religious leaders, the church going people, accused Him of being a friend of sinners.
Let’s go back to Mark 2 and read the whole story, let’s read verse 13-17.
Mark 2:13-17
New International Version (NIV)
13 Once again Jesus went out beside the lake. A large crowd came to him, and he began to teach them. 14 As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.
15 While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. 16 When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
17 On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
So, here we have a story of Jesus calling a tax collector to follow Him. We all know the reputation tax collectors had back then and how much people despised them. Then Jesus goes even further. He goes to Levi’s house and many of Levi’s friends who were also sinners and tax collectors were there too. Jesus was having dinner at a sinner’s house and the sinner had all of his sinner buddies over. I can only imagine the comments I would hear if one of our brethren was seen in such a situation. I imagine some of us might react pretty much the same way the Pharisees reacted when they saw Jesus hanging out with sinners. We would question their Christianity and talk to all of church friends about what we saw. Well, Jesus overhead the Pharisees asking His disciples why he was eating with sinners and Jesus took the opportunity to teach them a lesson. He responded that it is the sick who need a doctor, not the healthy and that He didn’t come to call the righteous, but the sinners. You see with Jesus it’s always about the heart.
It’s not our mission to sit inside the walls of the church building and cast stones at those who don’t live the way we think they should. I doubt a single one of them would ever desire to know Jesus if all they ever heard from us was condemnation. Our mission is to imitate Christ and go out into the community of unbelievers and share the gospel message with them. It’s our job to love them and serve them so they can see the love of God through our actions. Then through our acts of service and love they might desire to know the source of our love.
As I drive through Rockdale I can’t help but notice that there are a lot of people who appear to be in need of a Savior. There are a lot of people who have many addictions. There are lots of people who are poor and hurting. There are many who have just never been told the story of God’s love for them and how Jesus died so they could have eternal life. Many people are searching for something to fill the emptiness they are experiencing in their lives and they think it can be found in the things of this world. They think sleeping in on Sunday mornings, playing golf, going fishing, or making lots of money will fill that emptiness, but what they don’t know is that there’s nothing of this world that can fill that emptiness because we weren’t made for this world. The only thing that can fill that emptiness is a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. The problem is that most of us, me included, or too busy sitting inside the church building wondering why our numbers are dwindling instead of going out and delivering the soul saving message of God’s love to a fallen world. Maybe it’s time that we stop smelling like sheep all the time and start smelling a little more like sinners. Maybe we need to spend more time being out in the community serving those who are in need of a relationship with Jesus.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to come to the end of my life and stand in judgment and have to answer as to why I didn’t try harder to reach those around me with the gospel message. I don’t want my answer to be, “well I gave money to missions and I tithed to help support our paid preacher so he could go out and share the gospel”. I don’t remember reading anywhere in the bible where Jesus said we could sub out our duties as a Christian. We’ve all been given the job of bringing others to Him.
Our time here together with our fellow believers is important because we need this time to study the word to prepare ourselves for the mission we’ve been given. We need to spend time worshipping the Creator of all things, and we need to spend time encouraging each other, especially when we have a hard week. But, then our mission is to go and make disciples. Our time spent together here is to prepare us for that job.
We need to follow the example Jesus gave us. We have to stop standing in judgment of those who don’t know Jesus and we have to start loving and serving them and welcoming them into our church family. Sure they might not know how to act when they first start coming. There’s a maturing process and a learning process when it comes to being a disciple. We can’t expect someone who wasn’t raised in the church to know how to act and what to do over night. It’s our job as part of making disciples to teach them what the bible says and encourage them to stay true to the word of God.
Those people who don’t know Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior will never know of the grace offered them unless someone tells them and they might not give us the opportunity to tell them unless we first show them that we truly care about them through our actions.
We just have to make sure that when we go out into this fallen world and serve sinners that we act like a diode.
What in the world do I mean by that?
Who in here knows what a diode is and what its function is?
A diode restricts the flow of electric current to only one direction to protect the circuitry of the component.
What I mean by that illustration is that we can only allow the influence to flow in one direction. We must be the one who influences others for Jesus and never allow the things of the world to influence us. If we’re not spiritually mature enough to resist the temptations that might be present in certain situations we need to stay away from that situation, or take someone who is stronger in the faith along with us. I suggest that having a partner in Christ might always be a good idea when you’re taking the gospel message to a fallen world.
My challenge to each of us individually and collectively as the body of Christ is to focus more on our mission, which will probably cause us to smell a little less like sheep and little more like sinners. If we will change our attitudes and our involvement in serving the people of Rockdale to be more in alignment with Jesus’ example we might find our numbers increasing instead of decreasing.
While we embark on our mission to lead those in our community to Jesus we will without doubt have times when we’re discouraged and we’ll have weeks when we have sorrow and hurt. That’s why it’s important for us to have the gatherings like this as the body of Christ and encourage each other and spur each other on to good works. We have to remember what the bible tells us in 1 Thessalonians 5:11. It says “Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing”.
Take the time to offer words of encouragement and perform acts of kindness for your brothers and sisters in Christ. We live in a fallen world and life gets hard from time to time. We need to make sure that we don’t all become discouraged. When we become discouraged and give up Satan has the upper hand and we never want give him the upper hand. If we all come here and encourage each other throughout the week we will be better equipped for facing the world around us.
Let’s encourage each other this week and every week. Let’s go out into the community around us and spend enough time with the spiritually sick that we start smelling more like a sinner and in turn they just might start smelling a little more like a sheep.
I want to close by reading the lyrics to one of my favorite songs by Casting Crowns. Listen to the words and let them speak to your heart:
Jesus Friend of sinners we have strayed so far away
We cut down people in your name but the sword was never ours to
swing
Jesus friend of sinners the truth's become so hard to see
The world is on their way to You but they're tripping over me
Always looking around but never looking up I'm so double minded
A plank eyed saint with dirty hands and a heart divided
Oh Jesus friend of sinners
Open our eyes to the world at the end of our pointing fingers
Let our hearts be led by mercy
Help us reach with open hearts and open doors
Oh Jesus friend of sinners break our hearts for what breaks yours
Jesus friend of sinners the one who's writing in the sand
Make the righteous turn away and the stones fall from their hands
Help us to remember we are all the least of thieves
Let the memory of Your mercy bring your people to their knees
Nobody knows what we're for only what we're against when we
judge the wounded
What if we put down our signs crossed over the lines and love like
You did
Oh Jesus friend of sinners
Open our eyes to the world at the end of our pointing fingers
Let our hearts be led by mercy
Help us reach with open hearts and open doors
Oh Jesus friend of sinners break our hearts for what breaks yours
You love every lost cause; you reach for the outcast
For the leper and the lame; they're the reason that You came
Lord I was that lost cause and I was the outcast
But you died for sinners just like me a grateful leper at Your feet
'Cause You are good, You are good And Your love endures forever
You are good, You are good and Your love endures forever
Oh Jesus friend of sinners
Open our eyes to the world at the end of our pointing fingers
Let our hearts be led by mercy
Help us reach with open hearts and open doors
Oh Jesus friend of sinners break our hearts for what breaks Yours
And I was the lost cause and I was the outcast
You died for sinners just like me, a grateful leper at Your feet
