Most Christians, especially those of us who are life-long Christians, may have a hard time identifying with Saul of Tarsus, but we have a lot in common with Ananias. Instead of assuming or expecting a road-to-Damascus experience, we are called to be on the lookout for a stranger-in-Damascus experience. And we are meant to be the ones to welcome that stranger for Christ’s own sake.
We are meant to open our homes to someone whose life experience is not like ours. We are meant to show hospitality to someone whose history is frightening to us. We are meant to welcome the one who differs from us greatly and yet whom Christ loves and for whom Christ died.
I am not saying we are meant to knowingly endanger our families, but we are meant to take some risks for the sake of the gospel. We are meant to have conversion experiences, again and again. These experiences are the ones in which Jesus speaks to us, moves us, compels us to do the thing that surprises us and yet is absolutely necessary for the sake of the world.
This message is excerpted from “Ananias all along” by Julia Seymour in the July/August 2021 Gather magazine.
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