Dirty wee tramps...

Our Gomar had gone home...Emma and I where just sitting, talking, watching and waiting...it was raining, we were wet.

I had just asked Emma, how do we become a Gomar, without actually becoming a Gomar...how do we become acquainted with their grief? I realise today that what I asked Emma on Thursday night was actually to tell me of Jesus...

There was nothing attractive about Him, nothing to cause us to take a second look. He was looked down on and passed over, a man who suffered, who knew pain firsthand. One look at Him and people turned away. We looked down on Him, thought He was scum. But the fact is, it was our pains He carried— our disfigurements, all the things wrong with us. We thought He brought it on Himself, that God was punishing Him for His own failures. But it was our sins that did that to Him, that ripped and tore and crushed Him—our sins! He took the punishment, and that made us whole. Through His bruises we get healed.

A car with four girls came down the street...as they drove past, they slowed down, winding down the window of their car...'dirty wee tramps'...they shouted. Ive never been called a dirty wee tramp before. As the girls drove off, Charlie came round the corner...he wondered what I was offering and how much it would cost...I told him I wasn't working, he said fair enough. As this lonely older gentleman walked off, Emma and I offered him conversation...he wondered how much that cost too...I could hear his silent pleading, I could feel his desperation. His desolate sorrow echoed in my head. I didn't know how to respond to Charlie...communication had failed me...any efforts to reach across this great gulf where beyond me.

To crush Him with pain. The plan was that He give Himself as an offering for sin so that He would see life come from it—life, life, and more life.
And God's plan will deeply prosper through Him.
Out of that terrible travail of soul, He will see that it's worth it and be glad He did it.
Through what He experienced, The righteous one, The servant, will make many "righteous ones," as He himself carries the burden of their sins.

Those girls in that car, looked down on us and thought we were scum. It surprised me how much could be conveyed through their words. The emotional territory of a marginalised people becoming very real to me. May it be our Gomar's pain that we carry— May Your plan Father deeply prosper through us, Your dirty wee tramps.