Loving Protection

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem! Your people have killed the prophets and have stoned the messengers who were sent to you. I have often wanted to gather your people, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings. But you wouldn’t let me.” Luke 13:34

Was there ever a more poignant cry? Jesus love for the city of Jerusalem is transparent, from the twice repeated name, to the expressed desire to protect them as a mother hen does her chicks. Jesus’ affection for Jerusalem is all the more moving, considering He acknowledges up front that they have killed the prophets and messengers God had sent them.

He knew quite well that He, too, would die within the great city’s walls. Here He is, the Savior of the world, sent to the Jews first as the promised Messiah, pouring out His love as He looked over the city. He longed to bless Jerusalem. Luke’s gospel along with the book of Acts record God’s love for the world’s great cities: Jerusalem, Antioch, Ephesus, Athens, Corinth, Rome. He loves the cities because they house people who He longs to reach with His grace through the gospel.

Can we hear His cry down across the centuries? Can we hear Him personally calling to each of us as individuals? Can we feel the depth of love that longs to protect us, nurture us, and preserve us from harm?

Sadly, the city of Jerusalem that Jesus loved so deeply became the stage of Jesus’ rejection. How often do we also, reject Jesus’ beautiful message? How often does He reach out to us, but, just as Jerusalem, we won’t let Him in! We refuse to receive His strong and kind message of God’s forgiveness to all?

If only we understood God’s desire to take us under His wing. If we fully comprehended the vastness of His love, as well as its personal nature, how could we turn down such love? Yet we do, all over our globe. Many, like Jerusalem, are offered the tender love of Christ and simply will not allow His love near.

But there is another class who believe that once I “accept” Jesus, or “let Him in”, or am “born again”, that I am no longer like those who refuse His overtures. We equate “eternal security” with a sort of walk that has no requirements. We have been freely saved by His love, and, strangely, we feel no compunction to examine how we ought to love Him back.

So, we love Him by making up our own commands, and living by them. If I don’t want to wait until marriage to have sex with someone, I make up a new command about God not caring so much about a piece of paper. And then I go off to Bible study without a single thought about it.

If I don’t like church very much, I ignore the fact that Jesus actually asked 12 people to follow Him around together, sharing their lives with each other, and assume He doesn’t care if I never meet with other followers. I’d prefer my sleep, or my football. God understands. And I know He sees my heart.

I expect Him to support my political views, to hate illegal aliens, abortionists, gays and Mormons; or corporations, capitalism and poverty. The bottom line is that I’ll bend His words just enough that I won’t have to bend much myself.

Or, I expect Him to Him to get me the best parking places, to never let my car break down, and grant me special circumstances when I don’t always measure up. And, the church should grow even though I can parcel out only a sleepy hour a week. It’s His church, not mine.

We went to an altar, or prayed the “sinner’s prayer.” We haven’t rejected His offer of love because we can point to the date we were born again. It’s right inside our Bible.

But what if insisting that “I pray every night”, or that “I’ve known Jesus for a while”, are actually smokescreens that keep us from responding to this incredible love of Christ.

Imagine you were an orphan, days away from starvation. Your clothing is tattered, stained and muddy from the streets. You have not bathed in so long you smell like a cattle stall. Your feet are eaten up from the asphalt and cold. You are barely even a bag of bones. Your eyes are bleary, burning from so little nutrition and sleep.

Imagine someone finds you, takes you in, and makes you their eldest child! The richest person in the world lavishes all they have on you. You are granted full rights and access to everything your new parent owns; the exquisite pool, the antique cars, the personal jet, and the best food and care you can imagine.

Now imagine if someone asks you about your relationship with this person. “Oh, we talk occasionally.” Or, “I became his son when he brought me in, but other than that, we don’t do much.” Or, “No, I’ve never given any thought at all to asking if he would like me to help out around the place. Why would I do that?”

You see, God does give us His grace, and He requires no more. But, if we say we “love” Him and our actions say otherwise, we are talking about something altogether different. What have you done with His overture of love? Have you ruled out accepting at all? Or, having once accepted it, have you never considered what response of love you could give?

We may be saved, but I hesitate to call myself “Christian” (i.e. “little Christ”), if I am not at least asking the question, “What does following Him really, and truly, look like?”