Transforming Love

Last night at the college ministry Collette Michal (she's the InterVarsity staff that has been working on the NDSCS campus for several years now) shared on Luke 7 where it talks about the woman that was a "sinner" and came and washed Jesus' feet with expensive perfume mixed with her tears and then dried it up with her hair. There are many different things that we could have focused on from that passage, like her using her "glory" to wipe his feet, or the extravagant worship she showed, or hypocrisy of those who saw her worship. Instead Collette led the group in digging into the transforming power of God's love. How she was a new person who left that place not only forgiven by Jesus, but also validated. Imagine the sense you would have when the Messiah acknowledges your worship, forgives your sin AND dismisses the judgments and labels that had been put on her by the world and the religious!
I think a lot of times we forget where God has brought us from and we are like the Pharisees that judged the woman for her past life. How many times do we pounce on people for their sin, but rationalize our own? How many sins are we "against" as a church while we dismiss or ignore those things in our own life? Do you judge a person who has not experienced the love and grace of God more harshly than you judge yourself? I know I have. God help us to be more like YOU!