Month: July 2015

Over 500 years ago, Thomas a Kempis wrote:
To many, the saying, “Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Me” (Matt. 16:24), seems hard, but it will be much harder to hear that final word: “Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire” (Mat 25:41). Those who hear the word of the cross and follow it willingly now, need not fear that they will hear of eternal damnation on the day of judgment.
–Thomas à Kempis

These words are just as true today as they were 500 years ago and they were just as true 500 years ago as they were when they were written about 1500 years before that. And they will remain true 500 years into the future and 1500 years into the future. Because God’s Word – the Bible – is true.

I hope you are convinced of the truth of God’s Holy Bible. It has been tested, tried, researched, examined, critiqued… and what we find is that it stands the test of time, the test of internal evidence, the test of external evidence, and the manuscript/bibliography test. What we hold in our hands in the form of the Bible is the Word of God that He has preserved for us so that He could reveal Himself and His truths to us.

And if this is the case (and it is!), then according to God’s Word, there are only two choices – to choose For Jesus or to reject Jesus – one way is narrow and one way is broad, but only one leads to God and to heaven. There is exclusivity in the gospel message of Jesus – but that is OK, because there are some answers that are very narrow. 2+2 only has one answer. How do you get to heaven to live with God also has only one answer. Jesus himself said: I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father but by Me. Therefore the ultimate question is have you chosen the narrow Way of belief in Jesus? And the next is are you sharing the truth of this one narrow Way with anyone else?

We proclaim the good news of what God has done primarily through the telling of the gospel. But the gospel is also proclaimed when we tell our story of salvation, for our conversion story illustrates the power of the gospel. Therefore, our task is to tell “his” story and “our” story in the hope that it may one day be “their” story.
–Rebecca Pippert

I hope you will say this same prayer I am praying for today:
God, give me an opportunity to tell the story of my salvation to someone today so I can share with them how your story intersected, interrupted, and totally transformed my story. Let me share this story with someone with the hopes that they would want their story to be intersected, interrupted, and totally transformed as well.

The gospel is not a help-wanted ad.
It is a help-available ad.
God is not looking for people to work for Him
but people who let Him work mightily in and through them.
–John Piper

Amen.
God, please work mightily in and through me.

Our misery comes precisely from placing ourselves at the center of the universe. The biblical understanding of what it means to be human is that we exist for God, and when we fail to put him first, our hearts will always be restless.
–Rebecca Pippert

Jesus, help me to put you first. Help me to place you at the center, so that my restlessness will end as I learn to exist completely for you.

The Bible makes it plain that God’s will is for his people to be scattered like salt and light among the whole range of secular vocations. Enclaves of Christians living only with Christians and working only with Christians would not accomplish God’s whole purpose in the world. That does not mean Christian orders or ministries or mission outposts are wrong. It means they are exceptional. The vast majority of Christians are meant to live in the world and work among unbelievers. This is their “office,” their “calling,” as Luther would say.
–John Piper

Have you taken the idea that you are to be a “Workplace Pastor” with your fellow co-workers?
Have you realized that God set you in your occupation to be the chaplain to them?

Your “office” is to be a missionary at your office – to share Christ’s love with those in your sphere of influence. Your pastor isn’t going to be able to do it.
God hasn’t called another missionary into your field.
You are it.
You are His man or His woman who He has placed “for such a time as this” in your specific role to make a Kingdom-difference in the lives of those around you. Don’t mess it up by failing to step up and step into the role He has chosen for you!