Jesus, Friend Of Sinners

Good morning and welcome to Our Daily Walk.

Audio version at http://tinyurl.com/24qlep

“What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear.” So opens the very popular and wonderful hymn that reminds us of the marvelous blessing we have in Jesus as our friend.

Often we think of Jesus as our Savior and as our friend and example as we live a Christian life. But Jesus isn’t just a friend when times are good. He’s also a friend when times are bad and especially when we feel that there are no other friends to be found.

SEQ CHAPTER \h \r 1What a friend we have in Jesus. Joseph Scriven, the author of that song lost his fiancée as she drowned on the eve of their wedding. Years later his mother was distressed and he penned these words to comfort her. Again he found a prospective wife but she died of tuberculosis before they could marry. This poem found its way to a songwriter and was in use as a hymn for 10 years before Joseph Scriven ever knew that anyone but his mother had read it.

Out of the adversity of one man’s life came these wonderful and encouraging lyrics. Jesus wants to be a friend to all. He said in John 15:12-14, “This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you.”

In Luke 15:1-2, we find Jesus once again being confronted by the Pharisees. They are very critical of Jesus and they seem to never cease looking for things with which to accuse Him. Here is that passage. “Then all the tax collectors and the sinners drew near to Him to hear Him. And the Pharisees and scribes complained, saying, “This Man receives sinners and eats with them.’”

What they did not want to accept was that it was the purpose of Jesus to reach out to the entire world, not just to the religious zealots of the day. At the end of the discourse with Zacchaeus in Luke 19:10, Jesus said, “for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” It was His purpose to interact with all sinners.

Paul understood this in 1 Timothy 1:15 when he said, “This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.” Paul is also the one who reminds us in Romans 3:23 that no one is without sin. We all fall short of what God expects.

Jesus didn’t spend all of His time rubbing elbows with the religious leaders of the day. Just the opposite. We find Jesus taking care of the downtrodden, the ones who have lost hope or never had it in the first place. We find Jesus offering to be a true friend to people that certainly didn’t deserve that friendship, but nonetheless, many accepted it.

Just think for a moment of some of the people that Jesus was with in His ministry. Matthew and Zacchaeus were both tax collectors. One He called to be an apostle; the other He went to his house. The woman at the well in John 4 was a Samaritan and was despised by the Jews. Yet He spoke with her and she led her entire city to follow Jesus.

Why would Jesus want to be friends with people who were sinners? Because that was the will of the Father.

John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

Romans 5:8, “For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

“Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so.” What a friend we have in Jesus! The world around Jesus didn’t understand why He would associate with people who didn’t deserve His time. Unfortunately, the world around us today still has difficulty in seeing this as well.

Why does Jesus want to be our friend? Because He came to seek and save the lost which is the state we were in when He found us. What a friend to have!

On Our Daily Walk today, may we be less concerned about what the world thinks of our actions and be more focused on doing the will of our Savior while we are still here. May we reach out today to those who are weak or hurting, those struggling with sin, those in need of hope. And may we help introduce them to the best friend anyone could have—Jesus.

Our thought for the day: “He is your friend who pushes you nearer to God.”

May God bless you on your daily walk.

© Our Daily Walk, Mike Baker, 2007. Permission is granted to copy these articles provided they are not sold and the author's name and copyright are included.