“And great crowds came to him, bringing with them the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute, and many others, and they put them at his feet, and he healed them, so that the crowd wondered, when they saw the mute speaking, the crippled healthy, the lame walking, and the blind seeing. And they glorified the God of Israel.” – Matthew 15:30-31
What’s remarkable about this passage isn’t the comprehensive healing and numerous miracles being worked. These are the signs of Messiah and the work of the Kingdom of God which Jesus has been doing since chapter 4! What’s remarkable is that this group doesn’t give glory to God, they give glory to the God of Israel. This is a group of Gentiles, foreigners, non-Jews who don’t yet know YHWH of Israel.
By these actions, Jesus makes clear that Messiah has come for all who will believe in Him, Jew and Gentile alike. The Kingdom of God is open to all people, all nations, and all backgrounds, not just the select few born in ethnic Israel. This was God’s ancient promise and yet it was completely unexpected to the people of the time!
In the same way, we can forget the breathtaking scope of God’s desire to seek and save the lost today. As followers of Jesus, we must share the good news of Jesus Christ indiscriminately rather than pre-screening people based on whether they are “our kind of people” or “likely to believe in Jesus”. We must love and share with those who are similar to us and those completely unlike us. We must love and share with those actively seeking God and those who seem very far from God. We must do the work of the Kingdom in all places of the world, not just the “good” places and we must offer the Kingdom to all without exception as Jesus Himself did.