AIDS

This post is from the defunct blog "Dying Church"

I found this through Mike Todd, and it's got me thinking of what the church should look like in relation to AIDS. From Tony Campolo:

It is important for us to note that Jesus had a special spot in his heart to lepers. He embraced them. He touched them and certainly did not view the disease as some kind of special punishment that had been rained down on them by the Heavenly Father. Jesus reached out to them in love, which was contrary to the legalistic pietism of religious leaders in His day. He touched them as He healed them, in spite of the fact that touching them would render Him ceremoniously unclean to the custodians of the temple religion. The Jesus of scripture calls upon us to see His presence in people with AIDS. Mother Theresa once said, "Whenever I look into the eyes of someone dying of AIDS, I have an eerie awareness that Jesus is staring back at me." Indeed, that is the case! No one can say that he or she loves Jesus without embracing the Jesus who waits to be embraced in those who have this torturous disease.

A church that's dying to itself and is following the heart of Jesus has got to care about AIDS, and it's got to be more than theory.

Comments

[unknown]

This is an easy thing to post and quote but an entirely different thing to live. If they come your church as you know it will be ruined. You as you know you will be ruined. It's one thing to read about it but an entirely different thing to hold a loved one in your arms and watch them waste away. Nice, clean, comfortable people do not want to be "contaminated" and I assure you they will get angry at the lepers who try to draw near. And those who are willing to reach out will be "contaminated" - by the broken lives of those they reach out to by broken hearts filled with compassion and the love of God. If you open your doors to them you WILL ruin your church and your life as you know it and that may very well be a good thing.