An Invitation

“Come near to God and he will come near to you.” (James 4:8)

By Anne Tanner - When I was growing up, I remember I would sometimes ask a friend to come over to my house, or come bike riding with me, or come to band practice early, or wait for me after school, or any number of variations all meaning the same thing: “Come …”  I invited my friend to come because I wanted her to be with me, and I wanted to be with her.

I thought then of these words from Jesus,  “Come and you will see. So they went and saw where he was staying, and they spent the day with Him” (John 1:39). Perhaps Jesus said, “Come” for the same reason I asked friends to come, because He wanted them to be with Him, and He wanted to be with them. He specifically wanted them to come HOME with Him.

Part of Jesus’ mission on earth included inviting all to COME to him, COME with him, COME see him. If we are following Him, then is that not part of our mission also? To those of you who are reading these words, you likely are already in one of the groups of his followers, but what about those who are not? In John 1:39, Jesus invited them to come see where he was staying (his home), not so different from inviting a friend to come see us, is it? 

If we truly want others to become part of the larger group of followers of Jesus, we can start with a simple invitation to our homes or to meet us for lunch or coffee, or go for a walk with us, or go fishing with us, or go shopping with us. Jesus didn’t use billboards and movies, he just invited folks to hang out with him. And I think it’s pretty obvious who benefitted most from accepting his invitations to “COME.” Jesus reached out first, and so can we.