When We Receive One Another - John MacArthur

 When we receive one another it should be with gladness, not with condescension, not with reluctance. I remember when I was in the south in Mendenhall, Mississippi, a pastor of a church there, white fellow, opened his heart to teach the Bible to a black man. And I remember driving by the church and seeing the sign, "Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest," this was the sign in front of the church. A black man came who was heavy laden and who was laboring and who needed help. And this pastor began to disciple this black man and the church told him to stop because he was creating a racial problem.

And the pastor continued to do it and so he couldn't buy gas at the gas station, groceries in the grocery store, cancelled his insurance policy, they harassed his children. This is at the church that says, "Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest." And finally he had a total nervous breakdown, they put him in a hospital in Jackson, Mississippi. And the second day he dove out of the third floor and killed himself. I was...extreme trauma, I don't know all of the dynamics that made him take his life, I can't know what built up all of that and I do not commend what he did, obviously, it's a tragedy of tragedies, but it's illustrative of the fact that we can have a theology and can even hold it out as if it's the identifying mark of our fellowship, and in our hearts be living something in the exact opposite realm. We are to receive one another, not reluctantly, not condescendingly, but with gladness, with gladness.

Secondly, Christ not only receives sinners with gladness but he receives sinners in spite of their sin. He receives them in spite of their sin. They don't have to clean up their act first. God doesn't say, "Look, if you can get your life cleaned up I'll take you." No, that's heresy. Not for a minute do we believe that there are some pre-salvation works which man can do for himself to make him receptive....uh, receivable, if you will, to make him acceptable to Christ. He receives sinners in spite of their sin. That's the beauty of grace, that's the wonder of Christ's attitude. Go back to Matthew and back to the house, many tax collectors, many sinners sitting down and Jesus is there.... He receives them in spite of their sin, not because they clean their act up.