A Lesson from Jesus Freaks

  A Lesson from Jesus Freaks

Jesus said,

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged.  

For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” Matthew 7:1,2

Way back in the seventies I met up with a group of Christians that to say the least were outside the norm of the day, Jesus Freaks, the hippy version of Christianity. Meeting them changed the direction of my life.

They were odd an odd lot, at least from the mainstream churches. In the fact they, when it came to worshipping God they did things that were in some churches taboo. They worshipped God in dance, they sang and praised God using guitars, tambourines, drums and any other instruments they could play. They sang songs that were not in the hymnals. And they did all this while in blue jeans and tee shirts. Quite the opposite to many churches who expected people to come in their Sunday best outfits.

The Jesus Freaks I hung out with were young most of us in our late teens to late twenties. They accepted everyone at face value. Loving them and teaching them about Jesus. Something many church congregations at the time did not do, unless you conformed to unimportant things like wearing your Sunday best clothing and following a carved in stone ritual.

Above all they didn’t judge anyone. They let Holy Spirit convict people of their sins. All they did was Love and present the word of God.

They believed the words of Jesus who said,

“So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” Matthew 7:12.

And the two most important things when it comes to doing to others as you would have them do to you, they and I today believe is to show and present the Love of God to those around you without judging them.

As the late American Evangelist Billy Graham put it.

“It is the Holy Spirits Job to Convict, 

God’s job to judge

 and my job to love,” 

                                   Billy Graham

This is a lesson that individual Christians and church congregations today can learn from the whole Jesus freak movement of the past.

Please think about it.