the other side

Jesus often went to the other side.  To prepare for His public ministry, Jesus left the relative security of Nazareth to go to the other side of the Jordan into the wilderness, where John was baptizing and would baptize Him.  The Spirit drove Him further in to the other side, into the deep wilderness for forty days, tested by wild animals and by the tempter.  Later, all four gospels record His going to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, the western side.  Here, He would encounter strange things, such as in the region of the Gadarenes, with its wildly naked demon-possessed man, or in the region of the Decapolis, with its ten Greek-minded cities, or in Bethsaida, the hometown of Andrew, Peter, and Philip, which nonetheless refused to believe in Him.  So these other sides weren't hospitable places for the Nazarene, but He went there anyway, at His Father's command.  And on the night before He died, Jesus left Jerusalem to go to the other side of the Kidron Valley, where He yielded Himself to arrest and eventual death.  Jesus went to the other side to seek and save the lost, including you and me.

In less than a week, an election will be pitched between two sides, each predicting doom and gloom if the "other side" wins.  I wonder if Jesus might be commanding us to join Him in going to the "other side," where He lives just as surely as He lives on our side.  Could we at least go to the other side with Jesus in prayer for those whom we may believe are our enemies? Or could we reach out more personally, trying to understand, reconcile, or even embrace?  

Or will we be like the Levite and the Priest and just pass by, on the other side?