Jesus is not a germophobe

My name is Rick and I hate germs. When people sneeze in public, I hold my breath until I can move away from them. I open public restroom doors with a paper towel in my hand. When someone brings me cookies that they and their kids baked, I don’t eat them. (kids touch things that I am not interested in eating). I don’t like germs.

At Holy Communion on Sunday, I told the worshipers that Jesus is not a germophobe. In other words, He is not afraid of being contaminated by us. He never cringes when we come to Him with our dirtiness. He doesn’t hold His breath when we walk by coughing. In fact, He calls us and embraces us when we are at our worst. We are sick and diseased and contagious with sin. And Jesus loves it when we let Him embrace us.

I caught a cold this week. Some scoundrel at one of our services heard me talk about how I hate it when I am being hugged and then the person says, “I have been sick as a dog!”. Gee thanks, whoever you are.

Jesus takes our colds and pains and hurts and diseases and sins. He is not afraid of our ugliness. He takes all of our stuff and nails it to the cross. “Christ had no sin, but God made him become sin so that in Christ we could become right with God.” II Corinthians 5:21 (NCV)