By Grace Oji
"Matthew 11:28 (KJV) Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."
Jesus said we should come with our burdens to Him and He will give us rest. Note, He didn't say we should find a way to get rid of the burdens before coming to Him. So we come as we are but we don't remain as we came. He desires us to be clean and purified, so we come to Him dirty but we don't remain dirty.
It is not a strange thing that one will be advised to walk with people who are in the same situation as he is. An example is for the rich to walk with the rich, the brilliant to walk with the brilliant, etc. It is believed that the people around you influence you to become like them, yet if this is true it means we can influence others to become like us. So you see instead of driving anyone off who is not in the same 'league' with you, you can help them improve and become the people God has willed them to be.
Jesus is holy and desires for us to be so too. He came and gave His blood and body to wash us clean and make us whole, He didn't keep His distance. Nothing stops you from teaching your fellow students or coworkers how to be better in their fields, nothing stops you from showing your old friend how to run a successful business, nothing stops you from helping that lady closeby to build her marriage.
It is not so profitable to always create classes in communities and mark some names as people whose living is worthless, who are 'failures', or who have nothing worthy to add to the society. Especially if you were once like them. Try not to unwaveringly insist that everyone who comes close to you must attain a certain level in wealth, influence, knowledge, and more. Welcome them into your space and groom them as much as possible.
ONE THING REMAINS: There is one condition that can make the above mentioned ways of building bonds impossible. That is if someone is unwilling to accept whatever help or company you have to offer.
With all the fullness and riches of God's grace many souls still languish away, never knowing what it means to fellowship with God. They have rejected God's gift of salvation, thus they can never bask in God's light as long as they remain in unbelief.
Matthew 13:58 (KJV) And he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief.
Hebrews 4:6 (KJV) Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief:
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