{"id":217,"date":"2016-05-29T03:37:03","date_gmt":"2016-05-29T03:37:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/?p=217"},"modified":"2017-07-08T19:53:19","modified_gmt":"2017-07-08T19:53:19","slug":"are-we-missing-our-mission","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/?p=217","title":{"rendered":"Are We Missing Our Mission?"},"content":{"rendered":"

While it may be easy to think that very many have heard the name\u00a0Jesus<\/em> as in\u00a0The Lord Jesus Christ,\u00a0<\/em>I wonder how many have had a chance to know anything true and meaningful about him.<\/p>\n

Where would they hear such a thing? It seems it would be a rare thing in the “public square”. Why? Anything that receives funding from the government: schools and all of the events that go along with them–sporting events, for example, courthouses, and the like prohibit any kind of public prayer, Bible reading or the like to occur as these create the appearance government sponsorship of a particular religion.<\/p>\n

Do you think somebody is just going to wander into a church? Let’s see. If that is not part of my already established world view, how likely is it that somebody is going to get up early on a Sunday morning and go into a strange place with a bunch of strangers to hang out for an hour or two?<\/p>\n

God had some interesting things to say to the early churches: the Galatians, Corinthians, Colossians, and so on. Things like “You foolish Galatians…!” (now to paraphrase)\u00a0you came to salvation through faith in Jesus Christ, now what are you doing?<\/em> What would God say to the churches in the United States of America or Europe right now?<\/p>\n

Perhaps he would say:\u00a0you have come to saving faith in me through the word of God. The world around you leaves no room for that word. People are not going to just go read the Bible. People are not just going to start going to church. How are these people going to even hear about the\u00a0real<\/strong> me? Maybe those nicely dressed people going from door to door will handle it for us? (sarcasm)<\/em><\/p>\n

If those nicely dressed people going from door to door are making converts that means people are really hungry and very much unfed. All you out there who call yourselves Christians, what is the\u00a0Great\u00a0<\/em>Commission<\/i>? (I say this to myself) do your friends, coworkers, neighbors even know you are a Christian? If they do, do they have any idea what that means? Why are we even here, just to be saved ourselves while our friends, coworkers, and neighbors drive onward at full speed toward despair–eternal separation from a loving God who gave us\u00a0all the tools you need to fulfill your first and most important job? Aren’t we here to share that love, that\u00a0good news<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Do we really believe that Jesus Christ is the only way to eternal life? If this is so, can we not drum up the courage to share what he has done in our life now and how he has made clear to us that if there was any other way he would have done that instead. Can we pray to that great big God to ask him to soften hearts for us and lead us to the right people at the right time? Can we set aside pleasures and entertainments and can we set aside work that yields only temporal benefits now and again to do\u00a0job #1<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Here’s some good advice.<\/p>\n

I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Luke 16:9<\/p>\n

This post is here because it is a call I hear and find myself failing at so often. Help me to help you to help me do better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While it may be easy to think that very many have heard the name\u00a0Jesus as in\u00a0The Lord Jesus Christ,\u00a0I wonder how many have had a chance to know anything true and meaningful about him. Where would they hear such a thing? It seems it would be a rare thing in the “public square”. Why? Anything […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=217"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":274,"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217\/revisions\/274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marklandbenson.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}