All tagged church
The world is comprised of approximately 8.3 billion people, and of those, 2.6 billion are Christian, or to simplify this a bit... over 30% of all the people in the world are Christian. This is an amazing statistic, especially if you listen to the press on the subject. However, the press corps is not the only detractor or naysayer when it comes to the state of the Christion Church... Christians also preach the demise of the Church from the pulpit. Why is this so? Why are we so self-deprecating?
As Christians, do we love one another, or do we divide ourselves so completely in our perceived love for Jesus, that we distance ourselves from each other? I look around Christendom and see one head and many bodies. I see one cup, one bread, and one table, being bitterly contested over and claimed by each body to the point of refusing to serve another family member at the one table that Jesus set and provided for. Is this the way He meant for us to behave?
Are we alone with God when we pray or is it good to pray with others? Well, it is important to pray alone, and in secret, because that provides us with the degree of intimacy that our soul’s relationship with God longs for, but are there times when we need to pray together with others? The answer to this question regarding praying with others is a resounding “Yes!” There is power in joining together in certain times of prayer, whether we are physically together, or praying in unison from the far corners of the earth. A common cause prayed for by many carries much weight before the throne of God.
Are we confused when asked to both love and hate those around us? Let's take a few moments and consider our own lives and the faith we proclaim. Let’s consider what it means when we are told to hate and love our families in various passages of scripture and then come to realize that we are also a family in our church.
I wrote much of this morning's devotional offering a few years ago, but after reading it again, I thought I would share it with all the readers of my morning devotional thoughts... it speaks of my journey, of prayer, and of God's hand in our lives, and it deals with something that is all but lost in the church today. So, this morning we will deal with praying from a broad base of experience, and with a heightened sense of compassion that years of living, and suffering, give us. This is our contemplation and was also the subject of my morning devotional reading
Today's topic regarding discipline within the Church is one of those very difficult and touchy subjects. The end result could be the separation of someone from a church (or as the Church knows it... Excommunication), or the removal of a local church from the greater Church. As I read my morning devotional, Pastor E. M. Bounds spoke of discipline within our churches like this:
This morning let’s discuss experiencing private prayer during times of public worship. I have attended many churches during my life and have felt varying degrees of private prayer being welcomed during a service. On the one extreme I have prayed loudly and demonstratively beside Pentecostal brethren, prayed private prayers in a more subdued manner in my current church, and attended "high church" in Churches where very little private prayer is evident or encouraged. However, in each case private prayer does occur… it simply erupts from embattled souls across the sanctuary as believers adorn themselves in the armor of God and enter into personal states of worship, thankfulness, and distress.
Our devotional study this morning is on what our church should be called, and it is centered on the words Jesus spoke as He was throwing the money changers from the temple...
When we speak of consecration, or declaring someone, or something, sacred, who, or what, comes first? Are we dedicating ourselves to the sacred service of the Church, to the defense of religion, or to God Himself? Scripture gives us a clear understanding of how we should focus our consecrated life...
In Paul's letter to the Romans he presents a list of greetings to the church in order to insure unity within the newly forming bride of Christ, and he warns them to separate themselves from those who would bring discord within the Church. Paul was concerned about the Church moving away from the true gospel of Jesus, and becoming fractured. We should be equally concerned about this today.
A couple of days ago we discussed the topic of praying for our pastors, but today let’s turn our attention to our churches themselves. My devotional reading this morning was titled "The Church Equals Its Leaders" and the message, although not a hard one to grasp, warrants our attention, and has been a difficult one for me to write about. In my reading there were a couple of thoughts I felt worth repeating... "Preachers are pre-eminently God's leaders... They shape a church’s character and give tone and direction to its life.", and... "The church is divine, the treasure it holds is heavenly. But it bears the imprint of the human. The treasure is in earthen vessels."
This coming Sunday being Palm Sunday makes today’s lesson all the more pertinent. There are three Sunday's when people attend church who don't typically come, and this is one of them. This is not a time to judge them, or look down our noses on them in pious condemnation of their faith, but to rejoice in their presence there with us, and embrace them. This is the time to open our hearts to them, and to smell the aroma of their religion and God as they are drawn back to the Church to seek, believe, and worship. May they fill the church pews, and the scent of their devotion waft over us on these holy days. They are the temple just as we, who might come to church every Sunday, are the temple… beware lest we destroy God’s Temple and destroy ourselves.
In the book of Revelation the church at Philadelphia was told to hold fast to what they believed, and the faith they had. They were warned that if they did not then someone might seize their crown. These warnings are just as valid for us today, because the glory, and the danger of having it snatched from us is just as real. The dark one is still in the earth, and he rages with the same determined intensity. Even today he snarls and reveals his teeth, and his appetite for souls remains insatiable. Are we holding fast to the hand of Christ, and guarding our own crown as if Satan himself were trying to rip it from us?
Many Christians today have a defeatist mentality; they look at how the dark forces of the world have turned against God, Jesus, and the Church , and in their despair they proceed to wring their hands. So what are we to do when faced with such seemingly overwhelming odds? God’s Word tells us that we are to pray, and lean faithfully on Him. What we see today is not the first time that Satan has mustered his forces and marched against the Church. The history of Christianity is filled with such moments as these, and has always emerged triumphant. Are we praying as we should, or leaning sadly on our own misunderstanding of today’s events?
There are many challenges that face the Church today, but none so great as those that have risen up within it. Pastors that are not called by God, but are thieves who see the Church as vulnerable, and its children to be easily abused and taken advantage of. False prophets who desire notoriety, and serve only themselves. Men of God who fall victim to their own lusts; having forgotten God, and how to pray. These, and others, have breached the Holy walls of the Church, put God’s people to shame, have dishonored Him, and stand as obstacles to the salvation of many.