No person is ever so low they can not reach Jesus.

The Son of God spent three years in His earthly ministry. During that time Jesus instructed and demonstrated His love to Israel. Jesus never turned His back on anyone. This includes people the Israelites themselves looked down upon. The same people the Pharisees, a highly respected religious group, chose to disregard as petty, low-life or worthless.

Jesus chose to have personal contact with sinners, foreigners, outcasts, the poor, women and criminals. His contact was not a mere passing “Good day.” Or  “How’s the family?” No, Jesus  was seen to interact with them on a personal level.

Sinners

Matthew 9:9-13 As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ 

Jesus then declared a profound fact: For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” We are all brought down, or “sick” with sin. And Jesus is here to redeem us.

Foreigners

On a trip to Galilee with His disciples, Jesus stopped to rest by Jacob’s well in Samaria.

When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” John 4:7-10

Jesus then proclaimed how intimately knew this Samaritan woman. He acknowledged her five husbands and the sixth man she was living with. Then He declared “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.” – the Messiah she was one day expecting. The woman was so excited, she rushed back to town, leaving her water jar behind.

Outcasts

Mark 5:1-20 tells the story of a man who was often chained because he was possessed by demons. The demons knew who Jesus was, and asked Him not to send them away. So Jesus gave them permission to enter a herd of 2,000 pigs. After entering the pigs, the demon possessed herd rushed into a lake.

As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged to go with him. Jesus did not let him, but said, “Go home to your own people and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.” Mark 5:18-19

Jesus is here to help us all. By sending the previously outcast man home, he would be seen as a walking, talking miracle of the Christ.

So the man went away and began to tell in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him. And all the people were amazed. Mark 5:20

The Poor

Luke 7:11-15 tells the story of Jesus interacting with a poor widow in Nain, walking with the bearers caring her now dead son. With both men in her life dead, who would care for her? His [Jesus] heart went out to her and he said “Don’t cry.”  Then Jesus touched the bier. “Young man, I say to you, get up!” And with those words, the dead son rose. Jesus gave him back to his mother.

 The distraught widow’s son is the first of three people Jesus raises from the dead. The other two are Jairus’ daughter Luke 8:49-56, and Lazarus John 11:43-44

Women

After this, Jesus traveled about from one town and village to another, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God. The Twelve were with him, and also some women who had been cured of evil spirits and diseases: Mary (called Magdalene) from whom seven demons had come out; Joanna the wife of Chuza, the manager of Herod’s household; Susanna; and many others. These women were helping to support them out of their own means. Luke 8:1-3

In ancient Jewish culture according to their law, women were low, inferior to men and under their authority. They were very confined. Here we see Jesus allowed women to travel with Him and the disciples. The women trusted and believed in Jesus while supporting His ministry. At times, Mary had more faith than most of the twelve. She was with Him at The Cross.

Criminals

While Jesus (though He committed no crimes) hung nailed to a cross between two convicted criminals, He still ministered to the eternity of those who believe.

But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.  Luke 23:40-43

The criminal hanging on Jesus’ left taunted Jesus: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” But the criminal on Jesus’ right had faith. Most of the disciples had scattered for their own safety. But this condemned man believed, and Jesus offered him true love.

Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

The criminal on Jesus’ right was obviously at his lowest point in life, as he too hung on a cross to die. Yet when he reached out to Jesus in faith, Jesus answered him with the promise of eternal love.