Thu, 8 June 2006 Hello Thanks for joining us at the church growth, mission, and evangelism blog. We are always glad you are here! Today we continue with gaining peace with God: Man is a social animal, gregarious by nature, and finds his greatest sense of security and satisfaction in the company of others who share his interests and attitudes. Man needs to find comfort and reassurance in the company of others who approve of his way of life, because their way of life is similar. No where has man found this comfort, this reassurance, this peace to the extent that he has found it in the church.
The word church is an English translation of the Greek word ecclesia which means an assembly of people. In the first century, the word church would suggest to the Greek a self-governing, democratic society; to the Jew, a theocratic society whose members were the subjects of God.
Jesus Christ himself founded the church. He proclaimed himself to be the founder of the church, the builder of the church, and the church belongs to Him and to Him alone. The church is God himself living with, and in, ordinary men and women who are members of His church.
You are called upon to obey Christ, and if you obey Christ, you will follow his example of joining with others in the worship of God. Perfection does not exist among human beings, and the institutions they create to the greater glory of God are filled with these same flaws.
A stable church is built up when the members of the congregation recognize that it is their own mutual love of Jesus Christ and the sincere desire to follow in His steps that hold them together. The church should be the means of channeling your funds for Christian work and the needs of fellow Christians. Generosity should motivate us in all things. As far as possible, one should give inconspicuously and quietly.
It is impossible for you to become a soul winner unless you are prepared to give something of yourself. Not only your money, but your time, your talents, your very self-everything is to be given to the service of Christ. We give back to Him in return for the great love He has bestowed on us, and in that way we spread His love abroad.
The Christian should also share in community responsibilities as time and money allow. As Christians, we believe the Lord would have us assist our community as we are able. Be careful that you don’t become guilty of the sin of robbing God. The Gospel is free, but it costs money to buy the pails in which to carry the water of salvation. Ten percent of our income belongs to God.
The church is for the spreading of the gospel. The basic and primary mission of the church is to proclaim Christ to the lost. The world is sending forth its SOS, asking the church to come to its help. The world is being overcome by social, moral, and economic problems. Its people are going down, swept under the waves of crime and shame. The world needs Christ. The mission of the church is to throw the lifeline to perishing sinners everywhere.
Sixty five percent of this world has yet to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. In this generation we have failed miserably to fulfill our mission to evangelize the world. The early church had no Bibles, no seminaries, no printing presses, no literature, no educational institutions, no radio, no television, no automobiles, no airplanes, and yet within one generation the gospel had been spread to most of the known world. The secret of this spread was the power of the Holy Spirit.
Today in the face of vastly improved methods of communication the power of the Holy Spirit is still the same. This is the mission of the church. We may use visitation evangelism, educational evangelism, preaching missions, industrial evangelism, cell evangelism, radio or television evangelism, movie evangelism, or so-called mass evangelism. Today starts a new cycle of material for our podcast. I am toying with the idea of changing from one fourty minute podcast each week to two twenty minute podcasts on say Wednesday and Friday. It would make it so that I wouldn't have to spend so much time on one podcast and if I run into technical problems, it wouldn't take me so long to redo the program. Also doing the podcasts more frequently would hopefully make things run more smoothly. Once a week is too infrequent for those of us with poor memories! Please let me know what you think! I can be reached at: bob@thegreatcommissionchurch.org. Until tomorrow, thanks and God Bless. Pastor Bob Category: Religion -- posted at: 7:53 PM Comments[0] |
