Took Me for a Satan Worshipper

Years ago, a fellow evangelist gave me a birthday present, a black leather jacket that he bought at Walmart. Typically, I don't wear black leather jackets, but my friend gave me that jacket, and to honor him, I wore it to a preaching engagement of his he had that night in a rural church in Mississippi. Before I got to the church, my evangelist friend gave me a prayer request.

He said that the pastor of the church was worried that a troublemaker may attend the service that night, a local young man who was a suspected drug dealer who was also suspected to be a Satan worshiper that was the prayer request to pray God's protection over the congregation that particular night. Well, I pulled up to that church as a stranger to them, and I was wearing my black leather jacket in honor of my friend. I arrived after the service had already begun, so I took my seat about four rows up from the back of the church.

Across the aisle, seated directly opposite me, was a young man in a black leather jacket sitting by himself, and as I looked over to my evangelist friend, he nodded to me and glanced quickly at the man as if to say, that's the Satan worshiper. So I kept my eye on him the whole time my friend was preaching. I kept glancing over at him because if any trouble broke out, I was going to jump up and deal with him since I was a trained martial artist and kung fu.

If he moved a little in his seat, I moved a little in my seat. As I kept glancing over at him, well, the service ended, and the young man in the black leather jacket who was a supposed Satan worshiper got up and slowly went out the back door of the church without any incident. But as I stood there waiting for my friend, I noticed the people around me were avoiding me.

No one said hello, and they avoided eye contact when I looked at them. No one shook my hand or even smiled at me. They just looked nervous.

Finally, my friend came by and threw his arms around me and hugged me and smiled and thanked me for coming. He said I look sharp in my new black leather jacket. Somebody near him asked him if he knew me.

He told them I was a fellow evangelist. All of a sudden, there was a great sigh of relief in the room and people began to laugh because I was dressed the way I was and because I kept glancing over at the Satan worshiper. They thought I was in league with him, that I too was a Satan worshiper, and I'd come to make trouble that night.

I was just waiting for the right signal. That's why I kept looking over at him. Those Baptists thought I was a Satan worshiper.

But after the laugh was over, I thought about it. No one there had reached out to the other visitor that night who had come there alone to hear a simple gospel message. All the while he sat there, when I looked over at him, that young man seemed apparently interested in the sermon, and he was paying attention.

But everyone in that church avoided him like the plague. Who knows? Maybe he was ready to turn his life over to Christ that night, but the icy blast he received from that church just drove him away. When a visitor comes into our assembly, we tend to judge that person by the way they look.

If they meet our standards of acceptance, then we might reach out to them and greet them. If their physical appearance turns us off, then we probably will avoid them. But God looks on the heart.

In 1 Samuel 16, 7 we read, But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature, because I have refused him. For the Lord seeth not as man seeth. For man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.

The apostle Paul, scholars tell us, was a short, physically repulsive man, and it is doubtful that he would be the interest of a pastor's search committee today. We tend to choose pastors who look like handsome football quarterbacks. But that young man, in the leather jacket, left that church that night, and he never came back again, because everyone there avoided him.

When another young man came, inquiring about Jesus, years ago, we are told in Mark's Gospel in chapter 10 and verse 21, Then Jesus, beholding him, loved him. Maybe we should just be more like Jesus, and start loving folks more.