but to save the world through him

It seems like we always become anxious around strangers, asking in our mind, “Who’s this person?”.

That level of anxiety may double if we’re the same gender as the stranger. It may triple if the person is of a different skin tone. It may even quadruple if the person is in a uniform identifying his or her authority. And if the person either dresses or talks in a manner so different from ours, that person to us seems to be from another planet.

What if we know whose son or daughter that person is? That police officer pulling us over, what if we know whose husband he is, will he seem less threatening? How about the driver? As a police officer, if we could identify him as the father of our child’s classmate, will we take better time to have a conversation about the infraction that just occurred?

What if we know whose father or mother that person is? What if we know whose husband or wife or guardian or partner such a person it, will it make our job easier? Will such person seem more amicable, more “acceptable”?

A Biology professor once said that if the brain had never had seen a particular image, at the very first sight it would experience tremendous fright overwhelming the mind of that person seeking for answers or prior knowledge where none actually exist in that person’s memory.

Mary dropped to her knees when Angel Gabriel visited her about the Son of God she was to carry, Jesus.

Jesus came in the body of mankind to not be such a fright to those he came to save. He spoke their language. He felt their pains. He ate with them. He cried with them. He died with them.

For most of us, the inclination to seek seeing beyond what our eyes allow is a natural trait. Clairvoyance. Seeing someone and seeking to tell much about such a person always seem to occupy most of our time.

We ought to know much about everyone, but we can’t because we’re not allowed to. Humans are so complex that only God can tell what goes on in the mind and heart of a human being. Yet, what we’re allowed to know which is applicable to every single human being walking this earth is that we are loved by God.

We see someone with tattoos all over and totally start putting together the “typical” profile of such a person. And then we hear a small voice calling that person, “Daddy!!”

We hear someone speaking a foreign language which we may not understand, and then we hear that person seamlessly transition to our language to have a respectful conversation with us.

It’s good to get to know each other, not to sow judgment, but to sow comfort and appreciation of each other’s presence, appreciation for the love of God manifested equally toward one another.

“God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8)

We are the treasures of God. We are to see ourselves and others as the treasures of God, redeemed by the love of God, redeemed by the blood of Jesus for all mankind.

“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” (John 3:17)

Jesus came to save us from the judgment that stood against us, the judgment that stood against sin which our grandfather Adam became a slave of, the judgment of death. Jesus, without sin, agreed to become sin and received the blow that sin deserved. Since sin the slavemaster died on the cross, its slavery practice actually died as well, and all its slaves, mankind, are now free. Jesus set us free by becoming sin and dying as sin. Our slave lives ended on the cross.

“For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.” (Romans 6:14)

“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Corinthians 5:21)

Free from the fear of death because Jesus is the resurrection.

“For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.” (John 6:40)