Loving the Unlovable to Display Jesus’ Beauty

This generation takes up the cause of those easy to champion because of the approval of the crowds while the Father so loves the world - including foolish, difficult to love, despised by the crowds. Jesus genuinely loved ones like Matthew, the traitor to his people.

Jesus loved those who offered no tangible benefit to Him in loving them. We depersonalize people and reduce them to icons for our current causes. Jesus loved the unpopular and rejected "behind the scenes" without regard for His reputation or personal gain.

Jesus loved His weak and broken disciples just prior to His own painful and gruesome death on the eve of His suffering! With no regard for Himself, He washes the feet of His friends, comforts them in their confusion and disorientation, and prepares them for what is to come.

As Christians, we must stop taking our cues from one another under the current pressures of the day regarding what it looks like to love one another. Our love currently bears little resemblance to the model of love that Jesus was beckoning us to dive deep into and get lost in.

I believe that we will - I am confident that the Lord is going to help us extract from the spirit of the age and the seduction of the self-righteous "appearance of love" and thrust us by grace into the genuine joy of His fiery, jealous, sacrificial love for real, rejected people.

The Church has a profound opportunity for the gospel and the display of the love of Jesus in the midst of the current "cancel culture" - we get to pursue, fight for, and love with great mercy the "cancelled" and the despised and rejected of society. What an honor!