“…I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” Matthew 25:35b

One of the things that fills me with joy is my son’s desire to welcome people.  Jackson has “never met a stranger.”  He has a welcoming heart and is unafraid of reaching out to the stranger.  I wish I could take credit for that, but he didn’t get that from me or from Denise.  It is just part of his wonderful God-given personality…has been for several years.

And yet, I’d be lying if I said that his welcoming personality doesn’t worry me at times.  Conversations about “stranger danger” seem to go in one ear and out the other with him.  He is blissfully ignorant of the fallenness of this world.

The truth is, I really don’t want him to be afraid of strangers.  I don’t want to create anxiety that everyone he meets could try to harm him.  It pains me to condition my kids to fear strangers because there are some who could hurt them.

I sometimes wonder if that kind of conditioning doesn’t carry over into adulthood.  That we can somehow become oblivious to the stranger.  It’s not that we’re afraid of them, we just don’t “see” them. We get so absorbed in our own world that there is no room to welcome the stranger.  There is no margin, no time.

And yet as Jesus fleshes out the implications of living life in His kingdom in Matthew 25, he doesn’t give qualifications.  He doesn’t limit welcoming the stranger to those who have margin in their schedule or who have the gift of hospitality.  It’s not something we do for spiritual extra credit. It’s something that all Christians are to do.

Furthermore, He says that to welcome the stranger is to welcome me.  Jesus is saying that to welcome the stranger is not to welcome them for me.  It is to welcome me as if I was the stranger.

So who is the stranger that Jesus is talking about?  What does he mean by that term?  The Greek word for stranger here is xenos.  It can also be translated, foreigner.  Our English word, xenophobia, which is the intense or irrational fear of foreigners, comes from that Greek root.  A stranger is someone who has moved into a new town or neighborhood or school or job and they lack relational connection.  They likely don’t know the particular culture of the community they’ve moved into.  They are very much on the outside looking in.

The truth is, we have all been strangers at one time or another.  We were the ones on the outside looking in…the ones without the relational connections we once enjoyed before.  We were strangers, adrift in an unfamiliar sea looking for a friendly port to dock our life in.

And then someone (hopefully) welcomed us.  They invited us in.  They helped us make connections. They helped us understand the new culture we were entering into.  Our discomfort began to ease and we felt more connected and comfortable in our new community.

And yet we aren’t just physical strangers who need one another’s welcome.  We are also spiritual strangers, who need Christ’s welcome. During our worship service at Rivermont EPC, we have what we call, the Fellowship of the Peace of Christ.  It’s a minute where we intentionally stop and welcome one another in Christ’s name.  This practice in informed by the Apostle Paul’s command in Romans 15:7 to, “welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you.”

What does it mean that “Christ has welcomed us?”  It first must mean that we were strangers.  We were strangers to things of God. But it’s more than that.  We we were estranged from God.  We were cut off from God’s presence because of our sin.  We were outsiders.

But God did not leave us as strangers.  He sent Jesus Christ to welcome us out of the misery, separation and condemnation our sin produced.  Make no mistake, His was a costly welcome…one that required Jesus to become a stranger himself by taking the punishment our sins deserved upon the cross.  He took on our estrangement, which was reflected in his cry, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” so that we would never know estrangement again…so that we would forever know God’s welcome.

We welcome the stranger because we have been welcomed by Christ…welcomed into his family as an adopted son or daughter.  Who needs to receive that same welcome from you this week?