DEMONSTRATING THE GOSPEL

Jesus said to His disciples, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.”  (Mark 16:15 NIV)

Anyone wanting to proclaim the glory of Christ to the ends of the earth must consider not only how to declare the gospel verbally but also how to demonstrate the gospel visibly in a world where so many are urgently hungry. If I am going to address urgent spiritual need by sharing the gospel of Christ or building up the body of Christ around the world, then I cannot overlook dire physical need in the process. 

-- David Platt

#5585

SPIRITUAL POVERTY

“Jesus answered them and said, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Do not work for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you, for on Him the Father, God, has set His seal.’”  (John 6:26-27)

There’s no end to the stuff that can be conceived. We go into debt to buy more and more of it. So why do we still feel empty? Your garage, your basement, and your storage unit may all be packed, and still you feel empty. It’s a little like eating a big meal. You feel full at first, but it’s not going to last. You’ll always need the next meal, the next purchase, the next jolt of brief fullness.

We’re trying to fill the cavity of the soul with things that won’t fit. Mother Teresa once said, “The spiritual poverty of the Western world is much greater than the physical poverty of our people in Calcutta. You in the West have millions of people who suffer such terrible loneliness and emptiness… These people are not hungry in the physical sense, but they are in another way. They know they need something more than money, yet they don’t know what it is. What they are missing really is a living relationship with God.” (from “Life in the Spirit: Reflections, Meditations, Prayers”) 

-- Kyle Idleman in “The End of Me: Where Real Life in the Upside-Down Ways of Jesus Begins”

#5041

STARVING FOR CHRIST

“Those who accepted Peter’s message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day. They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.” (Acts 2:41-42)

People by the thousands became Christians because they saw Simon Peter's commitment to the church.  Peter was devoted to the church, and with good reason.  There is no institution in the world that serves people better than the church does.  There is no institution in the world that helps families more than the church does.  There is no institution in the world that redeems lives like the church.  There is no institution in the world that teaches love like the church.  There is no institution in the world that lifts God up and inspires righteousness like the church does.  There is no institution in the world that cultivates goodness like the church does.

But even more than that, the church has Jesus Christ!  The world is starving to death for Jesus Christ, and we have Him.  We are here to share Jesus Christ with a needy world, and everything we do is for that purpose… so that we can share the love of Christ; so that we can tell people about Him.

--  James W. Moore in “When You're a Christian, the Whole World is from Missouri"

#5039

THE TIME IS SHORT

You who are letting miserable misunderstandings run on from year to year, meaning to clear them up some day;

You who are keeping wretched quarrels alive because you cannot quite make up your mind the day to sacrifice your pride and end them;

You who are passing others sullenly upon the street, not speaking to them out of some silly spite, and yet knowing that it would fill you with shame and remorse if you heard that one of these were dead tomorrow morning;

You who are letting your neighbor starve, till you hear that he is dying of starvation;

Or letting your friend’s heart ache for a word of forgiveness, appreciation or sympathy, which you mean to give her some day;

If only you could know and see and feel, all of a sudden, that “the time is short,” how it would break the spell! How you would go instantly and do the thing which you might never have another chance to do. 

-- Adapted from Phillips Brooks in “The Purpose and Use of Comfort,” 1906

#4875