What would happen…
What would happen if pastors, preachers, leaders, ministers and whatever other titles their maybe be for church leaders would put aside whatever they are teaching and focus on getting the message of God’s amazing grace and love across? Is it just me or are those topics somehow avoided?
Personally, I think if this would actually happen, with the full inspiration of the God’s Spirit of course, amazing things would happen. The churches would grow and mature so fast that they would have to expand drastically, Christians would put aside their egoism and self-centered pleasures of wealth and “toys” and focus totally on HIM.
OK, so what’s to stop this from happening? ummmmm… it’s aahh, well…yeah…OK, it’s Satan.
Oh, but it isn’t not nearly so direct as it sounds, he’s rather subtle… making leaders and their churches slip into the rut of organized religion, legalism and conformism, of course, with the occasional shove if it’s not to his likening. He especially loves it if the poisoned people get really mad at the ones that aren’t conforming to their type of lifestyle. Sing the same songs, same topics, same falling asleep to boring sermons heard for the upteench time about “thou shalt not do this and that”.
Now, let’s say there’s a group of people within the church that isn’t happy with how it is… I don’t mean the music worship style or songs or even the style of clothing or if we kneel, sit, stand or jump and shout when worshipping him in prayer. I’m talking about the subtle waves of feeling boxed-in in church, the sermons themes planned weeks, months or even a year ago, the not giving the Holy Spirit room to work, the demeaning looks of congregants when someone lifts up their hands in prayer or tells an experience that takes longer that two minutes to tell. I’m talking about youth attendance dropping as fast as their parents let them make up their own choice to go or not, about almost zero participation in Sunday schools, about old mister Y falling asleep every Sunday, about making a big deal for weeks if some local talent does a rap song in church, about condemning people that don’t come on Sunday without even knowing the reason why they didn’t coming, about… OK, you get the idea, I hope.
Now this is what I’ve experienced, not all in the same church, but definitely a feeling I’ve felt in different churches. I would sooner go to math class in a kilt than feel comfortable enough to share something with everyone in the church I go to.
Ain’t it sad? Now, a lot of the stuff I mentioned has to do with my own experience, but not only, a lot of friends of mine feel the same way. The services are planned, first a song, than a scripture reading followed by a short prayer and another song. Than Sunday School, followed by announcements and sharing by the congregation (usually the same people every Sunday), than another song or two, followed by the sermon and a prayer with an ending song and then WOOOOOOOOHHHHOOOOOO!! IT’S DONE!!! The fact I can precisely tell you how it works is because it doesn’t change, never with extremely remote chances of being different than like that.
So, putting the negatives aside… I’ve learned not to be ticked off to much, I mean, look at history and you’ll see there has always been some killjoys along the way. No, just keep your focus on Jesus, showing his love and grace to the people you encounter whenever. All it takes is a smile, a word of encouragement, helping them with some project or inviting them over for terere (tee, coffee, coke, water, etc.) and just show them (doesn’t take much effort on your part) God’s love and let his Holy Spirit inspire you. YOU WILL BE AMAZED!
Live it! Live HIM!
Buncha Butterflies
How fast time flies… Just a week ago I posted on here and now it looks like it’s time again to write.
Yesterday, Monday, we had a great time of prayer, worship and sharing. Not everyone of the group came, but God made up for them. What was really cool was that one of the newer guys said he wanted us to pray over him so that God would give him wisdom and teach him. We did and he was so happy! The guy has tons of talents and I’m sure God has big plans for him.
I’m learning tons every day, cause hey, I have the best teacher in the world! Ans I think I can speak for all of the others in saying that HIS grace and love has never been so real. There is nothing to be afraid of with the Holy Spirit at the wheel of your and my life!
It all come down to this… letting yourself be changed by the creator, being molded. Asking him to do with you as he pleases. But be careful, great things will happen, God will use you and you will see everything similarly to the way He does. So yeah, if your still wanting to be your own master, you’ll probably not want to take that leap of faith. Then again.
How hard we make it on ourselves… I, for one, have tried and tried to “be like Jesus” but it doesn’t work. It’s impossible. The answer is so much simpler, let him mold you and you will become more like him. Stop trying to gain you salvation by works, let him create you into something new and beautiful for all to see and admire. Your life will be a beacon of hope and will make many see how empty their lives are without Jesus.
Now think about that for a while. Ignore this post, if you must, but don’t avoid the teacher.
Bloomin’ flowers
How great is our God!
Wow, that is so inexpressive. If you were here and you heard me say it there is no way you couldn’t keep from joining in! How great is our God!
Yesterday was amazing, so is today, but it just started, anyways… Our prayer group came together yesterday, first time without girls there, so it was a bit different than normal… First came the jokes and dis-attention. Then my buddy and I who had started these evening in the first place took leadership and it turned out to be an amazing time! The two other guys just came for the second time and their so spiritually hungry and we were more than happy to share our experiences and joys with Jesus. We prayed for rain (it’s raining right now), we prayed that we would be filled with the Holy Spirit of Jesus (we still are), we prayed for different friends that are struggling spiritually (I’m going to talk to one of them today). See a theme going on here?
Well, at the end we decided we should go to the “Youth building” (an old church were the youth generally meet every week) to pray over the building and declare it a holy place were no darkness may reign and that the fire of God may illuminate everybody that gathers there. We were huddled together in front of the building, praying… cars past by… we continued praying. It really hit me that these guys didn’t care what the passerby’s were thinking. We finished and one of the “newcomers” said, the building is good now, meaning whatever your imagination can come up with…
God is doing amazing things. Preparing leaders, spreading his love and grace to this community. I know that wherever we go, God’s light will shine and darkness and fear will flee. “Darkness tries to hide, and trembles at His voice… How great is our God!”
This is what it looks like outside right now
And this flower decided to bloom quite nicely today, if only everybody that calls themselves followers of Christ would bloom without fear…
–Cory
Youth leadership…Are you ready?
OK, just to clarify were I’m going on this topic, I have to tell you where I heard it. Yesterday, Friday, I attended a Youth Leadership conference in the city of Caaguazu. Today I attended a Youth conference. The speaker at both events was Dr. Jeffrey de Leon (PhD) from Miami and he definitely has a most interesting way of portraying how a Youth ministry can be better “managed” nowadays. Here’s what I have learned:
First of all, let’s dispense with the title of “Youth Ministry” if it keeps the youth from feeling welcome. It’s may not seem important to us, but to someone that turns around at the word “ministry”, it can be quite important.
Let’s get rid of the whole idea of having OUR church that includes OUR christian principles, language and mannerisms. Let’s be what Jesus intended us to be, a BODY! The churches make up the body of Christ, as do it’s members. What do we do when someone in church sins? Do we send them home and tell them to give up their membership? That would be like taking a knife and cutting off your finger because it was hurting and swollen. That’s stupid. Rather let’s help heal the wound, the person that has sinned, that has brought shame to himself. Let’s act like the body we are. If the finger hurts, you can feel it. Being sensitive to the hurts and needs within the body is something every church needs to learn.
OK, now back to youth. Give them leading responsibilities. Jesus gave responsibilities to his immature followers. Take Judas, Jesus trusted him as a treasurer. If that 15-year old is interested in leading worship, let him lead worship. If someone appears to have good entertaining skills with her choreography, let her do it. Giving the youth responsibilities, giving them the power to lead, will help them mature and grow a LOT more than if the Youth leaders go nuts coming up with ideas try to entertain them. With time it will become less awkward and more and more people will get involved and if the Lord is behind it, as well as the prayers of the prayer warriors then “If God is for us, who can be against us?”
There is alot of goodness within all of us, that’s what Hollywood keeps telling us. We just have to let it out. And all that rubbish about looking within yourself to find answers, it won’t help. Your the one who’s confused…
OK, so why all the emphasis on teaching Youth to lead? You tell me how all the big wars would have been faught without them, and the revolutions and different movements… Hitler trained Youth to fight, it was mostly young people that made the ruccus in the states in the 60’s, most of the army’s of the world are made up of a great percentage of people under 20.
Now to the point of preaching. Why do we have the leaders on a stage behind a pulpit preaching “at” the congregation? How many sermons can you name right now, by name, that you have heard this year? Jesus didn’t put himself on a stand, he washed his disciples feet and taught them on a whole lot more personal level that can ever be accomplished from behind a pulpit. I’m not condemning the pulpit or anything, just think about it… Let’s not let the titles of “Pastor”, “Deacon”, “Reverend” and others come between the teachers and the students. Again, let’s look at what the ultimate teacher did when he was on this earth as a human being.
Let’s get past the idea that the pulpit is a “medium”. TV, the Internet, movies and radio are “mediums”, the pulpit just ain’t. You know why? I quote “The medium has become the message”. TV isn’t just a bunch of shows, it’s a message, it doesn’t just transmit the thoughts of the writers and producers, the thing in itself is a message. The pulpit isn’t a medium because it doesn’t transmit the message, we are just hiding behind it. This is kinda hard to wrap you mind around and I don’t fully understand it myself. I’m not condemning and of the things mentioned, as almost anything, they can be used for good and bad.
Our faith doesn’t validate the Bible. I don’t know were some of us have gotten the idea, but it doesn’t. Just because I believe that it’s true doesn’t make it true. Jesus’ resurection does though. That in itself encompases the whole bible, it validates it, because of all the prophesies and things that were fullfilled through Jesus, especially the resurection. An example of this concept is that the Bible is like a lion, we don’t need to defend it, it’ll defent itself.
How many times do we condemn things saying they come from Satan? Some music styles, tattoos, piercings, movies, TV, Internet, some books… They do not belong to the devil, he never owned them. Let’s stop giving to him what does not belong to him. Those are all human ways of expresing themselves. Not Satans way.
Young people are having a hard time deciding what is good and bad. Some don’t even know the difference. As leaders, we are responsible to give them the tools they need to find out (to differentiate) for themselves what is right and wrong. This applies to so many things, from music to lifestyles.
Did you know that the definition of “tolerance” has changed over the years? It used to mean “to bear”. That meant, I could sit beside a homosexual and tolerate him, meaning bearing but not accepting his choice. Today, tolerance means to accept the beliefs, lyfestyle, etc. Jesus wasn’t tolerant by any of the above definitions. He didn’t “bear” or “accept” the lifestyles of the “sinners” he met. He told the woman that had commited adultery to “go and sin no more”.
Let’s get to know the auther behind the Bible. It wasn’t Paul, Moses, John or any of the writer. They were the writers, but not the authers, same as with this Blog. God is the auther, he is behind the Bible. Let’s not just read the Bible, let’s read “between the lines” to get to know Jesus.
Think about it…
