9TH OCTOBER
TAKE THEM IN
“I was a stranger and you took me in.”
(Matthew 25: 35)
In our world of today, it might be a dangerous venture to just go out into the
streets and literally take strangers into our home. To “take in”, as used in our text, may mean to accept, admit, receive, allow to join, gather in, assemble, and the likes.
I remember that, after my traditional wedding, I was taken first to my husband’s family home. The very next day, my own family was coming for their first traditional visit, called imaunò. That night, there were lots of people in the compound but everyone was busy preparing food, arranging chairs and other things. No one seemed to realise this but I felt like a stranger, lonely and dejected. One of my husband’s dear cousins came to me and “took me in”.
We talked and both carried out the assignment she was given. And, in a short while, I felt different: welcomed, admitted, received, gathered in and allowed to join the family.
Sometimes, even in the body of Christ, we greet and hug those we know after a meeting and the newcomers are left feeling unwanted. We need to be sensitive to the feelings of people around us and make them feel welcomed.
We also need to assist in building homes for the homeless. Many times in The Roses we have had to intervene financially to pay rents for helpless widows.
We show love in our actions, attitude and words. We comfort and counsel the hurting. That is taking in!
We always need to remember that we were born in sin, once considered
Gentiles and ceremonially unclean. Without Christ, we were aliens from the
commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, we who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ (Ephesians 2: 11-13 Jesus took us in with our dirt and cleansed us in His blood.
ACTION: Sow a seed by taking someone in. Make someone feel loved and
wanted.
PRAYER: O Lord, grant me grace, to make myself available to make a positive difference in the lives of the alienated and to love in words and actions.