Welcoming Strangers

Like every kid in America, I knew that it was a bad idea to talk to strangers. We watched these creepy videos in school of bearded men in oversized sedans pulling up to little kids to offer them candy, and we all knew that the correct response to that hypothetical situation was to run away.

While telling one’s children not to talk to strangers is probably good parenting practice, John gives the church somewhat different advice in his third letter. In fact, he commends them for doing just the opposite: giving support to strangers. You can imagine how this scene might have unfolded. Demetrius shows up in a small town in Asia Minor and wants to be involved in the church. He’s some kind of traveling missionary who claims to know John, but no one in the church has ever met him. One group in the church wants to welcome and support him and another group is more reserved. Perhaps they’re concerned that he might teach something false or put the congregation in danger (Christianity is not exactly popular among the Romans at this time). Whatever their reason, this group, led by Diotrephes, takes a stand, refusing to welcome the strangers and trying to kick them out of the church. In our safety-conscious culture, we can understand their caution. John, however, sides with the first group, saying that they ought to welcome and support even strangers in order to be co-workers in truth with them.

After telling this congregation to welcome strangers, John makes another surprising statement. He writes to the congregation that they should imitate what is good, not what is evil. (No surprise there.) He goes on to say that whoever does good is from God (still no surprise), and whoever does evil has not seen God. He does not say whoever does evil is not from God, or whoever does evil is from the Devil, or whoever does evil ought to be kicked out. He simply says whoever does evil has not seen God, implying that what evildoers really need is not to be feared and shunned, but to have an encounter with our God. And what better place exists for that to happen than inside the doors of a church.

Tera