Saint City

     Being born and raised in this city called Sin, I've never questioned what that meant for the people within it.  Yet I've more than survived through the trying times and strife of a family doing life here.  This city that markets, What Happens in Vegas STAYS in Vegas, gives off the idea of an atmosphere with forgetful times and toxic debauchery..  Sin City.  Its where strip clubs are marketed by size and quality of women, and Adult Superstores are as common as Walmarts and 7-11's.  Notorious for our windowless, clockless, casinos with paycheck cashing counters, childcare, and champagne brunches.  It's no wonder people dub Las Vegas as Sin City.  But I challenge you to look outside the neon signs, plastic surgery, and 24-hour breakfasts and into the community.  Jesus, being fully God and fully man, could have spent His time here on earth in the presence of ANYONE...religious leaders, aristocrats, the kingly, the dignified, the upright, the sophisticated, the "worthy", and the list goes on and on.  Who was drawn to Jesus, whose table did He sit at?  Jesus made company with the tax collectors, the sinners, the thieves and adulterers.  He revealed Himself to the wicked and the lost.  He gave strength to the weak and hope to the hopeless.  He made the poor rich and the rich poor.  He was a "refuge for His people" (Joel 3:16) and "a shade from the heat" (Isa. 25:4).  He called himself the "defender of the widows" (Ps. 68:5) and "Father to the fatherless" (Ps. 68:5).  Jesus could have rightfully kept company with any person at all, regardless of who it was, none of us were worthy of his divine grace and glory.  Rather than sitting with proud, wealthy leaders and public icons, Jesus came into the world and sought out the ones who needed him most. JESUS SAVED THE SINNERS SO THAT HE COULD CALL THEM SAINTS.   So where is He in this city called Sin? Jesus is an omnipresent Lord, but its stands to reason that if Jesus kept company with sinners, and called them saints in His name, that He is ever-present in this city full of Saints....rightfully re-dubbed: Saint City. 

"The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more." -Romans 5:20