Jesus Disciples: The Criticized Misfits!

Jesus Disciples: The Criticized Misfits!                                    Kelly Durant 4-27-25

Luke 5:27 After these things He went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax office. And He said to him, “Follow Me.” 28 So he left all, rose up, and followed Him.29 Then Levi gave Him a great feast in his own house. And there were a great number of tax collectors and others who sat down with them. 30 And their scribes and the Pharisees complained against His disciples, saying, “Why do You eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”31 Jesus answered and said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. 32 I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.”

2. How many of you have had or have unusual friends? People whom are not usually liked? Let’s do a test right now and raise your hands, how many of you have ever befriended (though Jesus with no bad intentions) a prostitute?  Or a drug addict or alcoholic?  Or a Hedonistic partier? Or an extremely poor person living in a very poor house or homeless? What about vulgar people, ex-cons, and misfits? 

Well, these are just a few of the extreme types I have befriended in my life! That is the beauty of Jesus, you and I are able to mingle and converse with all kinds of people and by friendship lead them to grow spiritually and live a better life once they are saved!  

Here is my unusual circumstance; I have been friends most of my adult life with people who do not even speak English but rather Spanish, Portuguese, or sign language! I have had several friends dying of cancer, friends with artificial limbs, mentally challenged friends, friends who had no friends at all; plus thousands have been immigrant strangers living outside their country of origin. I have ministered to people in the markets in Bolivia who made less than $10 a day, and then in the afternoon walked into million dollar mansions of rich factory owners to tutor their children. Through the years I have had opportunity to spend hours in the homes of professional musicians, converse in parties with governors, senators, and mayors, and experience friendships with an extreme mix of cultural, racial, and social status backgrounds. How is this possible? Because Jesus led me into it for His mission! I just pray to adapt and relate! I thank God all the time for the wealth I have, and have had, in friendships of all kinds!  

3. Here is the circumstance: many people forget that Christian Churches, especially the Salvation Army ones, are places where all the misfits and sinners are welcomed without question. William Booth our Founder said, “Go for souls, and go for the worst!” And I have tried my best to do that, but I know not everyone accepts that, nor does that their selves, but that is the mission! It should be the mission of everyone who is saved, we are saved to serve.

I recall in one Corps I attended that there were just a few families that came for years and the Corps Officers were trying to recruit new people. It turned out that over time a new homeless shelter was opened up and all the folks from there started coming in. I was happy to see that, but not all of them there were! It turned out many of them smoked and right after service there would be half a dozen people smoking right in front of the Corps and many were very unhappy and gave them ugly looks! The unwelcomed looks, were harmful!

As you can imagine many complained that we cannot have smokers around like that, others said nothing hoping it would go away, and I looked upon it as just one of those challenges we face when we include new people with the love of Christ!  The contradictory thing is that I, along with some others there, had even smoked in our ancient past, so we were no one to throw stones. Some people stopped coming due to the ugly vibes and in transition people were constantly moving on, but I never will forget that some long time Christians did have a problem accepting new people which were not up to their expected standard. We must all remember from whence we came as David, Psalm 40:2 He also brought me up out of a horrible pit, Out of the miry clay, And set my feet upon a rock, And established my steps.

4. I’ll share with you this, I have a problem with modern day churches that do not include others, be they misfits, immigrants, or the poor. When we were Cadets everyone in the school went to visit a few mega-churches in Atlanta as a group (an experience for writing a lesson) and we got to ask questions to some of the leaders there so we could redact what we observed.

My wife asked one of them, “In your area here 1 in every 3 people are Hispanic, what services do you offer them?” Do you know what the response was? The reply was that their church was focused only on the baby-boomer audience (the middle aged white class with money) and that they did not see a need to reach out to the Hispanics as that was not in their mission objectives?! Their mission did not include helping the poor either, and their church was very rich.

It is sad but there is discrimination in the church today and some of it comes from the majorities, and some of it comes from the minorities as well. That’s why I had been studying the 7 churches in Revelation with you, the church today is no better off today than what they were in their beginnings; the people still are committing mistakes that they are blind to. Those that know me know that no one can ever accuse me of not trying to mix all kinds of people together for the greater good of God’s kingdom! But I am embarrassed by some other Christian denominations that are either too closed minded, or too open minded as they are accepting certain sins as just part of the trends we need to accommodate. Not all mixing is correct to do.

5. So what about Jesus and his motley crew of sinners? The verses of today in Luke 5:27 reveal that people were very offended that he partied with the tax collectors and sinners.  Jesus put the self-righteous ones in their place and stopped their negative judgement by letting them know He was there for the sinners, that sinners are people who are hurting and needed healing. He was not going down to their level but rather bringing them up to His.

Jesus is the great physician, and thank God Jesus does heal all kinds of people, even the worst of sinners such as the thieves and prostitutes.  We see that God and Jesus gives people second and third chances but we as humans are not so holy in this regard. It is natural that when someone has taken advantage of you or me (such as a tax collector, customs official, or a dishonest repair shopman) that we are not so forgiving. We want restitution and justice!

It is hard, it hurts, but you and I have to let grudges go. If we see God is doing a work in someone’s life, no matter how low our concept of that person, we must conform to the fact that God is doing the work we cannot do and just get out of the way and let Him work.

6. We can allow certain heathen, pagans or sinners practicing sin, in our midst for a time to see if they are people searching for God’s truth for a new start, or see if they are just people hanging around because they like our kindness towards them. Anyone who comes to Jesus must start showing fruits of repentance, or if not, that person is just playing with God and everyone else, and that is unacceptable. 

From this verse we learn we are to show tolerance and patience, so that they might learn God’s truth and gain salvation. 2 Timothy 2:25 in humility correcting those who are in opposition, if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth,

On the flip side, those who remain unrepentant, in other words they show no progress of improvement in behavior, character, or deeds of kindness and no increased love for Jesus, if they prove that they have their own ideas and opinions and they are not willing to allow their total transformation of heart and mind through the Holy Spirit, then there comes a time we must show them the door.

7. Here, in these verses below, are some harsh words for those who want to hang with us but their motives are to remain being their same old sinful self.  

2 Peter 2:12 But these, like natural brute beasts made to be caught and destroyed, speak evil of the things they do not understand, and will utterly perish in their own corruption, 13 and will receive the wages of unrighteousness, as those who count it pleasure to carouse in the daytime. They are spots and blemishes, carousing in their own deceptions while they feast with you, 14 having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable souls. They have a heart trained in covetous practices, and are accursed children.

There comes a moment in time when we all must evaluate if a person is in Christ, or in their own rebellion. But I have even more to say about this.

8. I have known people that have been in our alcohol and drug rehab programs that have pretended to be good for a while, but then leaving they to go back to their old sins again but wait to hear the full story. You know how the word describes this?  We are in 2 Peter still. 2 Peter 2:22 But it has happened to them according to the true proverb: “A dog returns to his own vomit,” and, “a sow, having washed, to her wallowing in the mire.”

But despite the ugliness, foul smell, and repugnance we get from seeing people go back to their horrible sins destroying them and others around them, we still must have a certain level of patience. 

So here is where I was going, some people have been in and out of our rehab programs lasting 6 months up to three times and then finally after the third time get a breakthrough and then remain clean 10 or 20 years (or the rest of their lives) ever since. 

9. So be open to mix with all kinds having the vision that one day they might accept Jesus and start a new life, living in purity and holiness as you did.  People can be drinking, smoking, and cursing around you and you are just letting it ride because in the end you are not going down to their level, you are on a higher level on the Rock, Jesus, that cannot be moved. 

Most people resist change, and if any church or Corps is going to grow, they must be willing to take in new people that are like new born children.  And babies grow to be toddlers who fall down and wreck the house, they spill food all over the furniture, and they scream when they don’t like something, but we still help them along to grow into adults. 

So be mature in your inclusive love!  Some things like your race, social status, and character you and I are just born with! But a positive change in Jesus can occur when a person realizes that the standard the of the world, of doing all of what your partying friends are doing,  is not the standard of Jesus. When Jesus (Jesus in you!) is in the house (or party) then those who realize their lives are a big mess and need Him get awestruck by His transforming words and love. How well do you represent Jesus to others? And representing Him to others you may not even like?  

 

Discrimination & Discernment: Who Accuses Who? You Discern!

Discrimination & Discernment: Who Accuses Who? You Discern!          Kelly Durant 1-15-12 Re 1-14-24

Matthew 12:23-25  And all the people were amazed, and said, Is not this the son of David?24But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, This fellow doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub the prince of the devils. 25 And Jesus knew their thoughts, and said unto them, “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand.”

2.There is a saying that if you don’t love someone, they can’t even walk across the room without you finding fault with it!  So many times, in school I recall there were some kids, that had never met me before, but for some reason they just immediately didn’t like me! How many times in your life have you had that experience in your job, or amongst your blood family, or in the neighborhood?  It is often from people of your own race too!

This is the Cultural Reconciliation Sunday, or in essence an anti-discrimination promotion emphasis which includes the memory of Dr. MLK, Jr., a preacher who fought for marginalized people to be respected and he made a lot of progress from what was happening in the 1960s. He exposed an evil in society called “prejudice” which is a pre-judging, discrimination, or disqualifying of a person without giving them a deserving respect proportioned by God.  

Prejudice people are actually displaying ignorance, a pride of I am better than you, and abuse of power and the universal love and right that God gave to all people, that we are created equal no matter if our talents and outward shades of skin are different.  There is a fine line between being discerning, which is a good thing to discern from wrong behavior, and being prejudice, which is an unfair ignorant judgment. How do we as Christians know how to discern and not discriminate then? We must learn as many are erring in this point because of horrible anti-Christian educational indoctrination!

3. To start, don’t repeat stories or attitudes that others impart. Since there are many political debates going on this year, and they are going to continue, I thought I would use these influencers, or tale bearers as examples. Be warned, tale bearers is mentioned in Proverbs 26:20 Where no wood is, there the fire goes out: so where there is no talebearer, the strife ceases.  The purpose of some people is to start fires by lies! See James chapter 3 on the tongue!

Discerning Christian people see clearly how prejudice influencers and tale bearers control other people’s decision making. In the world it is the blind leading the blind! Christians must be equipped with a filter, and it is the Holy Ghost in us, however the people of the world love to swallow the lie and the spicy, but we are to be the opposite and reject gossip and lies.

It is time today to acknowledge that these wrong influencers might be persuading you or me contrary to the things that are of the Holy ways of God! Satan inspires discrimination as He is the prince of the air waves, and today many are blown to and fro like a ship on a stormy sea by the wind of the news media.

4. It very IMPORTANT to examine our own thinking processes. Ask God for the Holy Spirit to renew you each day in your decision making. We are to be conformed to the mind of Christ. 1 Corinthians 2:16  For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? but we have the mind of Christ

We as Christians must take decisions how a holiness Christian person should in all ways, in how we think, respond, and react to the influences around us., the media, our friends & family. We must govern ourselves with the, “what ‘did’ Jesus do” way of life. We must be aware of the subtle and covert tricks that deceive our minds and pray for wisdom. 

There is an expression to “demonize” and this term refers to portray a targeted person as evil and demon possessed. For example, any and everything the labeled person does, it doesn’t matter how good or bad, it will always be communicated by an opposing group as something bad, wrong, or unpopular by all. Evil discrimination is currently alive and active under the guise of information! 

5. Do you know of a person in your family who discriminates or demonizes another?  Prejudging-ism includes more than race issues, it is motivated by jealousy, envy, pride & evil intentions.  I think all families experience it! Let’s look at a common scenario, when Juanito gives a $50 bill to help his mother once a month, the other brothers instead of praising Him for helping and doing something good, all turn it into something bad, that Juanito is conniving something. The others might accuse, “Oh, he is trying to get in good with her so she will give him most of the inheritance. Or oh he does that because he is trying get her to keep a secret because he must have done something bad in his past. So, the one doing good, as in Juanito’s case, gets attacked and everyone hates him, yet he is doing no wrong, so isn’t it criminal this type of discriminatory gossip? 

The point is of the matter is that whatever Juanito does, the others motivated by envy, hate, or prejudice will always demonize him, and they never see it for its face value that he is just doing something good to be helpful.

It is the most unfair character assignation tools that exists. Amongst families & in the news media one person may get their personal appearance made fun of, their children ridiculed, their personal lives attacked while another person gets away with scandals concerning money having horrible friends with horrible abusive exploitive reputations, yet this is passed along as normal and acceptable, that he or she is the good one!? 

6. Pray to be free of discrimination because at its core is hypocrisy and this is the sin that caused Jesus to get fighting mad!  One way to determine the reality of things is you should believe in the people who are most similar to Jesus Christ, not by their words, but in their practice of their values, lifestyle, and integrity.  Jesus discerned the ways of governing politicians; he labeled Herod as a fox. And how does a fox live? By being sneaky and stealing and hiding! And the Pharisees were a brood of vipers!  

Luke 13:31-33 The same day there came certain of the Pharisees, saying unto him, Get thee out, and depart hence: for Herod will kill thee.(Their motive was just to get rid of Jesus as everyone wanted to follow Him and not them) 32And he said unto them, Go ye, and tell that fox, Behold, I cast out devils, and I do cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I shall be perfected.   Jesus fought back! He was not intimidated!

7. Refuse to be labeled or discriminated against! I hate how politicians address Latinos & other minority groups as if they are going to win their vote just over what they assume is their ‘self-interest‘ in voting.  Good Christian leadership has higher standards such as the conservation of family values, the practice of equality & justice for all (no 2 tiered courts), and respect for Christian Biblical standards.

Discrimination is flawed in its reasoning & justifications! Some people make the mistake of keeping a fruitless tree in leadership! And observe that CEOs, government officials, and even some pastors get away with convincing others that they are better than the rest! Jesus said that all trees are known by their fruits, and if a vine has no fruit, then it is only good to be cut down and burned. If one does have some good fruit, then it is usually labeled by the fruitless as bad, having too little and not enough, but the misconstruction of prejudice is when the one producing nothing has others lying saying all is good. Ask yourself and get informed, who has good fruit and who has bad or no fruit?

8. Discrimination is the persuasion weapon used by leaders to war against you with their opposing worldviews; it is more about whose codes of conduct, philosophy, and principles one will abide by.  It is an issue of producing submission more than it is about race or country of origin. The Pharisees and Jesus were both Jews and clashed. We must try the spirits!

For example, Jesus, when he cast out a demon, it was a good act, right? People with demons produce fear as they will do violence to anyone when they will. But recall it was not a good thing that Jesus cast out a demon for the Pharisees! (who were Jews as Jesus was a Jew) For them his liberating power freeing others from Satan was bad, it meant that He was the chief of the demons, and this is how he had the power. (Matt 12:24) Really? How does that make sense? You cannot divide your own house and stand? Discrimination always has no logic!

I assume some of the crowd bought into that story, they believed the hypocrite Pharisees, so this is why we all need to pray always and try the spirits, because not all things that people say are true, and we must be careful that we judge righteous judgment being discerning in what we conclude. And because Jesus was not submitting to their hypocritical Pharisaical order, they hated him because they wanted to control everything, especially Him!  But since they had no power over demons or Him, they were full of hate and just wanted to destroy Him! 

9. Prejudg-ism and discernment in Jesus’ time was the same as it is today. Discernment for me is a very important gift of the Holy Spirit! Each of us must pray to discern the spirits as we are instructed in 1 John 4:1 Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.” 

To discern what opinions we form, we must take into account who we are listening to and why we are listening to them, are they a source with an alternative agenda or just the plain truth. Consider that often the people feeding us information may not even be Christian and they may have motives completely opposed to what we know as truth. They may also even have no conscience whatsoever about telling lies to achieve their goals of persuasion as Hitler said, “When you tell a lie, tell a big one, because little ones no one will believe!’  His lie was the Jews were evil while he was totally Satanic and evil and destroyed millions! People everywhere in our families or in the media channels are continuously either making a person look great, amazing and charismatic, or terrible like a demon.  So, who do you listen to?

People often discriminate and hate others due to their envy of their abilities, authority, and true goodness or holiness which exposes their lack of it! (repeat) Do you dislike someone right now, check what is in your heart! We may dislike something God favors. You may mistakenly persecute the good!

10. Matthew 5:10-12  10 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.11 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.12Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you. In other words, Blessed are the ones discriminated against!

Jesus did good and healed on the Sabbath and cast out demons, but instead of admiring the fact that miracles took place, that something good had happened and that the church and everyone should honor and thank Jesus, these discriminators were angry and accused Him wanting him to go to jail and be killed for blasphemy. The lesson: Don’t listen to spin, good is good no matter, and bad is bad no matter.

As Christians we are all on the same team. But discrimination happens to Captains and preachers as well.  There are Corps where the Officers can start up new programs, go out into the community and attend all the Chambers and Club meetings, but because he is not doing what certain church members want, because the few that want to control things are not getting the control, then whatever the Officer/Pastor does or says, it is never enough and there is always a negative comment.  I have been discriminated against at times amongst our own and those outside, but I forgive people anyway as any of us may make the mistake of listening to the wrong opinions and the wrong people at times.  But in the end what does Jesus teach on the matter?

11. John 7:24 Judge not according to the appearance but judge righteous judgment.

Amongst Christians in general there is a lot of discrimination about which church has the most Holy Ghost power as if this alone implies having discernment. Sadly, many superficial Christians judge by appearance only not by sound doctrine and good fruit. Some think it is those with the most Holy Ghost power yell and praise the loudest, or speak in unknown tongues, or those who make others fall down on the floor have the most power and anointing, but these are only outward things. 

Think about it, any of these things can be imitated and not be real at all!  The most important gifts are the ones displayed by good works, feeding the hungry, and preaching salvation and good will and love towards others.  Discernment, the opposite of prejud-ism, should be at the top of your list for what you want in life because without it you will choose the wrong things, and be missing the mark and that is sin. 

My wife already visited a few churches in Bolivia with people and she commented to me that there are so many people mislead by false teachers who claim they have the exclusive only church & Holy Ghost power. Since there is no outside authority present to correct any of them, people just blindly obey and believe whatever the preacher says, turning over great sums of money which they do not have but went into debt for to please the church leaders.  This is oppression & deception!

People get trapped by these harmful divisive things not taught in the Bible by evil influencers. These are the same as the Pharisaical hypocrites who accuse, judge and condemn, and practice prejud-ism and discrimination on other churches claiming they are false! 

12. In the past I have even heard hypocrites accuse The Salvation Army of being false and not having the spirit! The good fruit in 133 countries reveals that these false Christian pretenders are wrong! All of their words are just a ploy to lead people into their trap so they can fleece the sheep of all of their wool. And I am angry and sad to see that so many people fall into this spiritual slavery, and they use Jesus name be able to exploit and to enslave others! I fear the Judgment of hell awaits them! 

To learn to not discriminate simply do not judge others but discern wisely! 24 Judge not according to the appearance but judge righteous judgment. It was the principle of turning the finger back on the person Matthew 7:1 Judge not, that ye be not judged. Just as Paul stated in Romans 2: 1 Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judges: for wherein thou judges another, thou condemns thyself; for thou that judges does the same things. Don’t do their same things!

The next time you hear anyone from your family, the church, or from the politicians accuse something, you & I need to immediately wake up out of our sleep like a Pavlov bell sounding and see that that is an invitation to activate the control instrument of trying the spirits. If a person accuses another person that they do their job or mission poorly then ask them, “How much have you dedicated lately? Where is it evident something was done good or bad”? 

13. Forget what others say about you! Learn to hear from God on what he thinks about you! We need to take a conscious effort to develop discernment to combat discrimination to judge righteous judgment. One person may be imperfect, but the other one speaking up might be lacking a lot more.

What we learned from the experience of Jesus encounter with the hypocritical Pharisees that their prejudice, their passing of judgment, their discrimination against him, not only was immature and motivated by jealousy and power, it was embarrassingly Satanically evil! 

We capture this truth; we must discriminate or prejudge our own selves first.  We invite in judgment to ourselves when we judge, and we should have conviction to discern the good and eschew the evil; a discrimination which is never to be confused with the good judgment of discernment. 

From now on when something makes you upset, check your own heart that it is not motivated by pride, jealousy, or envy, or the contrary, motivated by a thirst for God’s standards of goodness & righteousness. We are not perfect nor totally holy yet so we all must love but also reprove ourselves and others when we see prejudice. Prayer…