Street Child
I watched Street Child by Elan today.
It got me thinking about the homeless, the drug addicts, the alcoholics, the prostitutes. All the people Jesus hung out with.
Jesus says in John 13:34 & 35 "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know you are my disciples, if you love one another."
So who did Jesus hang out with? Apart from his disciples he seemed to spend a bit of time amongst the poor, women, Samaritans, lepers, children, prostitutes and tax collectors. Or in today's world, the poor, disadvantaged (eg Aborigines), people from different cultures / countries, children, prostitutes, drug addicts and alcoholics.
How many of these people have I hung out with recently? I walk through Redfern every weekday to get to uni. I walk past mentally disturbed people in Burwood every day. I've done this for years and yet how many of them have I initiated a conversation with? How is this showing my love for them as a Christian? Do I even love them or am I too caught up in my own self-centredness to care?
My question is now, how do I change this?
It got me thinking about the homeless, the drug addicts, the alcoholics, the prostitutes. All the people Jesus hung out with.
Jesus says in John 13:34 & 35 "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know you are my disciples, if you love one another."
So who did Jesus hang out with? Apart from his disciples he seemed to spend a bit of time amongst the poor, women, Samaritans, lepers, children, prostitutes and tax collectors. Or in today's world, the poor, disadvantaged (eg Aborigines), people from different cultures / countries, children, prostitutes, drug addicts and alcoholics.
How many of these people have I hung out with recently? I walk through Redfern every weekday to get to uni. I walk past mentally disturbed people in Burwood every day. I've done this for years and yet how many of them have I initiated a conversation with? How is this showing my love for them as a Christian? Do I even love them or am I too caught up in my own self-centredness to care?
My question is now, how do I change this?
posted by - Matt at 15:55
1 Comments:
Do you know, I sometimes ponder a similar question, although from a humanist, rather than specifically Christian perspective. I have been walking through Redfern for almost 10 years now, and have seen a couple of disturbing incidents, but on the whole it is not the den of iniquity that the media proports it to be.
I love watching message stick on the ABC and appreciating modern indigenous culure and achievements. I think that we don't do enough as a society to address the disparities in living conditions and respect.
Despite this, I admit to being fearful many times when I walk to Redfern station, and being suspicious of random aborigines that are using the streets like any other member of this society. And this shames me.
So what do we do? I thought of popping down Eveleigh St during NAIDOC week, there were some markets on, but I ran out of time. I'm sure there are other cultural events on that would give an avenue to meet people. Picking up the Koori News might also have some ideas.
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