living outside of the bubble

1 Corinthians 9:19,22-23

Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some. I do ALL this for the sake of the gospel...

i love that Jesus hung out with sinners. 

as far as inclusive terms go - "sinners" is pretty up there. we might as well say that jesus hung out with every human that walked the planet. the other day me and eleanor were having a sweet old reminisce (is that a word?) about moving down, and i actually had to have a little chuckle because it was so cringe thinking about februaryKate. but hey - every year i seem to reflect back on my younger self and want to fall into a hole when i think about how lame, or clueless i was - so no changes there. i'm sure i'll look back on myself now in another few months and be like lolseptemberkate - how cool were you. but anywaaaaay, i remember someone saying to me this year - at all times in your life you've got to look at the people around you and make sure that you have at least a couple of good christian friends, but just as importantly - a few non-christian friends too. what is the point of being built up and encouraged by friends that love Jesus - if you have nobody to love on or impact. God has to always stay number 1, but he can't be the only one. you can't hide from the world, and sit in a church filling yourself or waiting for the broken to come to you. you have to love him first, but also love his people and the world he created. i honestly believe that he wants us out there more than we know - he wants us to see the brokenness, and see the pain so we get passionate about helping him fix it. he wants us to live church not just go to church - and lol me saying that cause i've always known it, but never really known it until now. being the church isn't about being so caught up in doing the more acceptable thing that we miss opportunities to love nor is it about being so holy that we can't be seen with the drunkards, or love on those that are so broken that they're just a mess. we need to jump into their mess, with the cleanest motives and a surrendered heart to God and lift them out. if we can do that, we can change the world one person at a time. he doesn't want us sitting on our high unicorn (so much cooler than a horse) looking down on the sinners, he wants us to stoop down - to jump off our unicorn and lift them up. 

to be in the world, but not of it.