Wise Words on Obedience

One of the primary reasons that I like reading the work of David Platt is the fact that the man pulls no punches. Although he is a man that exudes Christian love from every pore in his body, he is not reluctant to slam Christian traditionalists right in the kisser when such a blow is needed. For example, in his excellent book Follow Me, he calls the church to task for watering down the teachings of Jesus:

With good intentions and sincere desires to reach as many people as possible for Jesus, we have subtly and deceptively minimized the magnitude of what it means to follow him. We’ve replaced challenging words from Christ with trite phrases in the church. We’ve taken the lifeblood out of Christianity and put Kool-Aid in its place so that it tastes better to the crowds, and the consequences are catastrophic. Multitudes of men and women at this moment think that they are saved from their sins when they are not. Scores of people around the world culturally think that they are Christians when biblically they are not.

Wise Words for Today

Stained glass at St John the Baptist’s Anglican Church http://www.stjohnsashfield.org.au, Ashfield, New South Wales. Illustrates Jesus’ description of himself “I am the Good Shepherd” (from the Gospel of John, chapter 10, verse 11). This version of the image shows the detail of his face. The memorial window is also captioned: “To the Glory of God and in Loving Memory of William Wright. Died 6th November, 1932. Aged 70 Yrs.” (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I am convinced that as Christians we’re not about programs. We’re not about bigger or better blessings. We’re about responding to people who call for help because their world is falling apart. These individuals aren’t looking to be converted – – they’re looking for help! Being their help – – by being the presence of Christ in their lives – – is the only thing we’re about. Everything else we do is secondary and can even detour us from carrying out the true purpose of the church.

Jerry Cook

(from The Monday Morning Church)

Wise Words for Today

Poverty stands right in front of you (Photo credit: torephoto)

Power is both the means and the end of politics in Washington, DC, but God’s politics is most concerned with the powerless – the least of those among us, whose interests are the most absent in election years and yet are the very ones Jesus would always have us “voting” for. This means we must care most about what happens to the poor and vulnerable, especially when both parties will make their appeals to the middle class voters and wealthy donors they desperately need. It means protecting human life and dignity and promoting the actual health and well-being of families instead of just substituting rhetorical devices around hot-button social issues in the pursuit of votes.

It means lifting up the people who have no political influence: undocumented immigrants, who are the “strangers” among us living in the shadows of a broken immigration system; low-income families and children, who face losing their nutritional and health-care support because others want to protect the subsidies and benefits to the wealthy people and interests that fund all political campaigns; and the poorest of the poor globally, who will die of hunger and preventable diseases such as malaria, HIV/AIDS, and tuberculosis because of cuts in foreign aid programs . . . . . . .

Jim Wallis

(from On God’s Side: What Religion Forgets and Politics Hasn’t Learned About 

Serving the Common Good).

Wise Words for Today

Ronald Reagan in Dixon, Illinois. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The character that takes command in moments of crucial choices has already been determined by a thousand other choices made earlier in seemingly unimportant moments. It has been determined by all the “little” choices of years past – by all those times when the voice of conscience was at war with the voice of temptation . . .whispering the lie that “it really doesn’t matter.” It has been determined by all the day-to-day decisions made when life seemed easy and crises seemed far away  – the decisions that, piece by piece, bit by bit, developed habits of discipline or of laziness; habits of self-sacrifice or self-indulgence; habits of duty and honor and integrity – or dishonor and shame. 

Ronald Reagan

(quotation from his speech at the Commencement exercises at The Citadel in 1993)

Wise Words for Today

Cover via Amazon

What if the Christian faith is supposed to exist in a variety of forms rather than just one imperial one? What if it is both more stable and more agile – more responsive to the Holy Spirit – when it exists in these many forms? And what if, instead of arguing about which form is correct and legitimate, we were to honor, appreciate, and validate one another and see ourselves as servants of one grander mission, apostles of one greater message, seekers one ultimate quest? That, I’d say, sounds like a new kind of Christianity.

But what would that one mission, message, and quest be? Around what one grand endeavor can we rally? What one great danger do people need to be saved from and, more positively, what one great purpose do they need to be saved for? Around what melody can we harmonize without trying to homogenize? Of many possible answers, there is one to which I am continually drawn, embarrassingly obvious and simple to understand, but also embarrassingly challenging to do: the church exist to form Christlike people, people of Christlike love. It exists to save them from the great danger of wasting their lives, becoming something less than and other than they were intended be, gaining the world but losing their souls.

Brian McLaren

(from A New Kind of Christianity)

Wise Words for Today

Revelation (Photo credit: parker yo!)

When you have inquired of God and received a revelation of what you can become, you have a place to focus your faith. Be solid and fearless in what the Lord has revealed to you and he will bring it to pass. He says you will live by His faith.

God is your source! You have no ability to bring the revelation to pass, so don’t worry about how your revelation will happen. God is fully aware that it’s impossible for you. Even though you have no proof, your faithfulness and commitment to Him assure the manifestation of the revelation. Believe steadfastly and keep seeking Him first. 

Bishop James Lowe

Wise Words for Today

Dream Center service at Angelus Temple (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Life is much simpler than we make it.

God’s objective is for you to live an outward-looking life – that is, not worried about yourself, but focused on the needs of others and how you can respond to those needs. When you embrace that mind-set, you are on the precipice of influence and success because that’s a perspective that God will bless. As soon as you start thinking about the needs and burdens of others, and what you can do to alleviate them, or how you can bless and build up others, you begin to establish a new identity for yourself – your true identity.

It doesn’t take a person with unusual training or ability to change the world. All it takes is a heart that cares, a mind that’s determined, a spirit that’s willing, a cause that matters, and a person to help. 

Matthew Barnett

(from The Cause Within You)

Wise Words for Today

English: Holy Spirit Seminary, HOng Kong 中文: 香港聖神修院 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In the original Greek, the word edify literally means “to erect a building or construct a house.” This language gives us a powerful word picture of praying in the Spirit; when we speak in tongues, we are building within our spirits a house where we can experience communion with God. We are actually increasing our capacity to contain the glory of the Holy Spirit.

The call to edification is the call to build ourselves. Today the church is consumed with building platforms and influence; our ministries have grown large, but our hearts have grown small. We have spent our time and energy on external realities and have neglected the building of our inner selves. I believe that the Lord is releasing a prophetic call to the Body of Christ, and it is and exhortation to edification. If we begin to build ourselves, then the Lord will watch over our spheres of influence. The Body of Christ has traded depth for width; we have become horizontally focused at the expense of cultivating interior realities and at the expense of our lives, our marriages, and our families. For too long we have focused only on what we can see, but there is an entire world alive inside us. 

Corey Russell

(from The Glory Within)

Wise Words for Today

English: Roe Road and the start of Hypocrite Lane (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Many times we never get to the doing, and it’s in the doing of our faith that things start to change. Only when we do what we know we should do will we start to honestly live what we say we believe. That’s simple enough, right? This is kindergarten theology. Do what God tells you to do. It’s not enough to just believe. Those who don’t live what they believe are hypocrites. None of us like hypocrites.

The doing is the water sprayed onto the blooming flowers by a caring gardener. It is the salt added to bland food. It’s the remodeling of an old house. It’s the difference between a hypocrite and an authentic believer. It’s when belief conceives. . . . . . .And it’s a matter of spiritual life and death. All the spiritual passion and activity we can muster will be totally useless if we never decide to submit to that truth and practice it in our daily lives.

Johnnie Moore

(from Honestly: Really Living What We Say We Believe)

Wise Words for Today

Mid-flight (Photo credit: williamhartz)

No one can force this on you, nor can it be anyone else’s ambition for your life. It has to come from within you. Sometimes it takes a menagerie of different experiences to bring us to it. Some of us will insist on going through tremendous pain, disappointment, and failure before we come to it. Eventually we have to be able to look at ourselves in the mirror and decide there’s someone else that we want to see there. But everyone who’s going to make this particular trek has to pass through the same gauntlet that has brought me and so many others to that place where in the deafening silence we hear the cry of our own soul screaming, “I want to change!”

Erwin Raphael McManus