June 12, 2006

Hello. Welcome to a new week of our church growth, mission, and evangelism blog. Be sure to check out our sponsor's newly redesigned web page at: www.thegreatcommissionchurch.org. We thank them for their support.

We have changed the production schedule for our companion church growth, mission, and evangelism podcast. I will now be producing two podcasts a week on Tuesday and Friday evenings. The podcasts will continue to be in the same format, just shorter. I am hoping that a shorter podcast will be easier to listen to and will be easier to redo if I run into production problems.

Let's continue our search for peace with God:

The Christian looks through the eyes of Christ at the race question. We have let the sports world; the entertainment field, politics, the armed forces, education, and industry outstrip us. The church should have been the pace-setter. The only real solution will be when we come together at the foot of the cross where we come together in brotherly love. The ground is level at the foot of the cross.

 

The Christian attitude should prevail in the matter of economics. We can possess nothing-no property and no person-along the way. It is God who owns everything, and we are but stewards of His property during the brief time we are on earth. No matter what we get, we can’t take it with us. The Bible makes it clear that God expects us to do the best we can with the talents, the abilities, and the situations with which life endows us. And remember the tithe.

 

A Christian will be concerned about suffering humanity around him or her. The great slum areas of your country will become a burden to you. The poverty and suffering of thousands of people in your own neighborhood will become a concern to you. Many people spend so much time in lofty enterprises that they make no contribution to suffering immediately at hand.

 

The Christian will be interested in helping build and develop hospitals, orphanages, old people’s homes, and other charitable institutions that are trying to help the less fortunate. The  Christian will be interested in doing his part to help share the great wealth of this country with the needy in other parts of the world.

 

Nowhere in the Bible does it teach us to withdraw from society. It teaches quite the contrary. We are to join with others who are working to good purpose to help lift the unfortunate. The Christian has a special obligation to fellow Christians. We are to love our enemies, but the greatest of our human love is for those other believers. We are told to serve one another.

 

Our obligation to each other as Christians is such that we should be examples to each other. We are to forgive one another. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, and forgiving one another. We are not to judge one another, but be subject to one another. As Christians we are to bear one another’s burdens. But we are not to worry about our burdens, as we are to roll them onto God’s shoulders.

 

We are to be generous with each other. Christians ought to be gracious. Our commendable intolerance of sin too often develops into a deplorable intolerance of sinners. Jesus was willing to talk to and exchange ideas with anyone. Even his followers decried some of the people that he was seen with in public, but this did not lessen the compassion that Jesus felt for all the members of poor, blinded, and struggling humanity.

 

His own inner conviction was so strong, so firm, so unswerving that He could afford to mingle with any group secure in the knowledge that He would net be contaminated. It is fear that makes us unwilling to listen to another’s point of view, fear that our own ideas may be attacked. Jesus knew the difference between graciousness and compromise.

 

The Christian cannot withdraw himself as a hermit and live a solitary life. He is a member of society. The teachings of Jesus deal frequently with our attitudes toward our fellow men. Study the Bible and then live by it. Only then can you demonstrate to a confused world the transforming power of Christ!

That does it for today. Please send me your comments and suggestions at: [e-mail]. We exist to bring the word of God and Christ to others, but we  need your help to produce the finest product.

 

Until tomorrow, thanks and God bless.

 

Pastor Bob Emery