In the gospels, there are a lot of people who get saved in strange ways. A woman sneaks up behind Jesus, touches his cloak, and gets healed from a chronic condition. Jesus says to her, “Your faith has saved you.”
Jesus heals 10 men from leprosy, and one former leper, unlike his 9 similarly healed friends, comes back to thank Jesus, and Jesus says, “Your faith has saved you.”
A man is told by Jesus to climb out of a tree, because he’s coming over for dinner. On the way, he promises to give away half his stuff, and repay 4 times anyone that he cheated. Jesus says, “Today salvation has come to this house.”
A paralyzed man’s four friends carry him up to the roof of house, dig a hole in the roof and lower their friend down, and Jesus (“seeing their faith”) tells him “Your sins are forgiven.”
In Luke chapter 7, there’s another, particularly gripping set of actions that leads to salvation:
Now one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to have dinner with him, so he went to the Pharisee's house and reclined at the table. When a woman who had lived a sinful life in that town learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee's house, she brought an alabaster jar of perfume, and as she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.
When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, "If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner."
Jesus tells the Pharisee a little parable about two debtors whose debts were canceled, and the Pharisee correctly deduces that the one who was forgiven the larger amount would be much more excited about the debt cancellation.
Then Jesus said to her, "Your sins are forgiven." The other guests began to say among themselves, "Who is this who even forgives sins?" Jesus said to the woman, "Your faith has saved you; go in peace."
Now there’s a plan of salvation! Crash a party at a Pharisees’ house where Jesus is eating, pour perfume and cry on his feet, and then wipe his feet with your hair. Don’t say a single word the whole time. And bingo, your sins are forgiven and you’re saved.
Interestingly, the Pharisee is more offended at Jesus than the spectacle going on at his dinner table. Miracles and wise teaching aside, letting prostitutes touch you clearly indicates that you are not speaking on behalf of God, in this Pharisee’s informed opinion.
And then Jesus forgives her! It’s important to note that there was already a system in place for this woman to seek forgiveness – and this wasn’t it. Sacrifices would need to be made. Made at the temple, administered by officials, everything checked and dated a recorded in the daily log. This effusive, bizarre offering is way outside the ‘normal’ way of being saved. I think it would still be considered outside the boundaries of polite society for prostitutes to interrupt a religious leader’s dinner party to cry on someone’s feet.
It’s very interesting to me how many of these acts of salvation in the gospels occur not only on the initiative of the people seeking salvation, but on their invasion of Jesus’ personal space. Sneaking up behind people and grabbing their clothes is rude. A gang of ten lepers coming at you would normally send people the other direction. Digging a hole in someone’s roof is not typically acceptable behavior.
These stories excite me – I still believe Jesus is powerfully attractive to those who we would normally consider outsiders. The sick, the unclean, the immoral – even the godless fatcats. But they challenge me as well. What if these people try to reach Jesus in a way that’s outside my preferred system? What if Jesus tries to reach them outside my preferred system? What if they invade MY personal space, expecting by some miracle to meet Jesus through me? What if they dig a hole in MY roof, or my churches’ roof? How will I explain that to the finance committee?
Will we be able to see Jesus working outside the system?
