Just As I Am

How to Approach Jesus? 
Sometimes we tell people that approach us ‘Just pray, God will take care of the rest’. But, do they know how to pray? Are we giving them sufficient guidelines to help them pray?

 We all often have this assumption that we are not worthy to go in front of Christ because of all our shortcomings. We continue to fall into sin, say the wrong thing, do the wrong thing. We are often riddled with guilt, even going to the extent of questioning God's existence and how we can ever approach him. To understand and dissect this conundrum a bit more, I ran through the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. I tried to understand how people approached Jesus. The social strata they belonged to, the way they approached him and such. Today I will present before you the insights I garnered. 

Most of the people who came to Jesus during his time on Earth were Jews, the chosen people of God. God chose Jews to bless and save the nations through them. This does not mean that God is partial to a certain group of people. He has chosen each of us to be channels of blessings to the rest of the world. When we humble ourselves before him, this calling becomes a possibility. The coincidence in this situation is that the Jewish priests and religious leaders, even though they were among the chosen people of God, failed to come before the Lord in the right way. They often asked him trick questions and tried to trap and harm him. However, ordinary people, the Gentiles came before Jesus and were blessed. I’m going to bring before you certain events and incidents from the book of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. We will focus on certain characters and how they approached Jesus and the way in which Jesus dealt with them. This will help us understand how we can be humble and bring ourselves before Christ. 

Our Jesus is very simple though He is the most complex personality that ever lived in history. We can approach Jesus in a very simple way. The problem lies in the wrong theology and assumptions that we have garnered over the years from people around us. For example, when I was a child I believed that God is very strict and cruel. Our God is so holy that he will not let even a small mistake pass by and will throw us into the inferno of eternal hell. This imagery was etched in my heart as at one point of time a Sunday school teacher taught me this. My picture of Jesus is that of an unsympathetic God. Another instance that is commonly seen is saying that God will punish you, if you don’t finish your plate of food in front of you. People use God's name to bring a sense of fear. Such distorted images are placed in our hearts as we grow up. This makes us afraid of God and scared to approach him. We cannot fully come to God without taking God out of the theological box that we can create around him. 

As we read the scriptures we realise that people from a non-Jewish background such as Gentiles received more healing and miracles from Jesus than the chosen people themselves. The Jewish people learned Torah since they were kids and are trained in the habit of giving 10% of their earnings/ produce to the Church. They fasted and followed all the rules that were dictated as per the Old Testament. However they did all these in a religious way without truly giving their heart to Jesus. I’m not dismissing any religion, but know that God does not have any membership in any religion, not even Christian religion. Jesus has an individuality of his own, he is sympathetic, empathetic and hears our prayers. Even though the Jewish people followed all the religious rules and rites, they failed to properly come before God. In Matthew 11:28 Jesus says, ‘“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.’

God urges all who are weary, tired and burdened to come to him for rest. Here, Jesus is not talking about exhaustion after a long day's work, but he is talking about those who are tired and weary of the hurdles that life is throwing at them. Our God welcomes all with open arms. And who reaped this benefit? The sick, lepers, blind, deaf, possessed, those financially struggling, those from broken homes, those without children. They came and received the blessings from Jesus. 

Hebrews 4:16 says, ‘Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.’

To receive help in our time of need, we must approach God's throne in grace and confidence without any fear. Jesus’s last words on the cross were “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?" Just then the curtains covering the Holy place in the temple were torn in half, representing how the divide was torn and anyone could approach God in his Holy place and before this Holy throne. It is not because of your merits but because of the sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross of Calvary. However a lot of other things also hinder us from approaching this throne of grace, such as sins, unbelief and wrong assumptions. Today, when we go before God we are approaching him as our Father, as us as his children. While we approach him, he knows that are mere dust and that the sinful nature is in us. Yet he chose to forgive us and show us mercy in our shortcomings. God's mighty ocean of mercy never dries up. He gives us grace over grace and mercy over mercy. 

Imagine our beggar approaching the gates of our homes. The beggar, begs for food and money. However, our children run into our homes and open the refrigerator to feast on the food stored for them. This is the difference. We should not approach the throne room of God as beggars but as children of the mighty God. 

Many many decades ago, there was a lady called Charlotte Elliott. She had a big question on her mind - how should she or how can she come before God? Just then she met a Swiss preacher and she asked him her question. He said ‘Come to him just as you are’. This same lady wrote a song later in her years that is very popular now. ‘Just As I Am’. It’s a classic song that was often sung by the Billy Graham choir during the altar call. Charlotte wrote this song inspired by the words of the Swiss preacher, even when she was living in sin and in flesh just as any of us are. The lyrics show how God will accept anyone in whatever condition or state that we might be in our lives. This song is so powerful that even today it brings and leads so many into Christ's loving arms.