1 John 3:16


"By this we perceive the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren."

Monday 7 June 2010

Involvement

Rejoice and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you. You are the salt of the earth: but if the salt has lost its savour, wherewith shall it be salted? It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out and to be trodden under foot of men. You are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. (Matt 5:12-14).

Jesus was speaking here about us holding forth the gospel and the word of life wherever we are. This would mean that we are to speak out and be more concerned about the truth than about our prosperity, or our careers.

It would also mean that our mandate is to be an influence. Fatalistic ideas about the rapture or the end of the world are counter-productive to the mission that Jesus gave to us. To see the troubles in the world today as “signs of the times” is damaging to our calling. Things have been worse before and things now will continue to get worse as long we do nothing.

“Evil rises when good men do nothing”. This is the situation we face now in many cultures.

Going back 500 years we find Puritans such as John Owen, George Fox, John Knox and Oliver Cromwell. The Puritans did not get everything right and often made mistakes. They did have a vision for the future and gave their lives to give many a better heritage in the things of God.

Looking forward they saw nations that served God in freedom and the gospel going out to all the earth. They worked hard and loved not their own lives to death and God blessed their labours with the fruit that many still enjoy today. They had a clear vision for the future and for what they wanted to achieve on our behalf that live today.

They prayed as the Lord worked in them. Knox prayed constantly, “Lord give me Scotland or I die.”. Their whole life was a prayer. They called on king and parliament. If this was not enough they raised armies. The point is they meant business. They were involved. This is the point that we Christians must come to today. We cannot go on living like Hezekiah, saying “Thank God the trouble will not come in my time.”.

Islam is one of the major challenges that we face. The answer is not clamping down on immigration: a fortress mentality. It is too late for that in many places. We have the answer in the gospel, so it is not time for us to retreat. Some say the Muslims have an agenda to take over the West. No doubt that is true, but God has an agenda to convert them. The nations belong to the Lord and to His Christ (Psalm 2).

Terrorism is not the main issue. Greed, decadence, moral depravity and indifference of Christians are the greatest challenges today. We should defend our nations against the enemy, but the main threat against our nations is within. Nations cannot defend themselves if they depart from God. Rising debt, family break down and rising ungodly values in society will render democracy inoperable.

So how do we turn this around? We must be involved. The answer in the past has been to retreat and look after number one. This will not do. If the nation loses its saltiness (its Christian witness) it is trodden under foot by men. The church is God’s voice to the nation. We must speak and be heard.

We should roll up our sleeves and become part of the solution. We need to get involved in the education problems, in the economic problems, in the political problems, at grass roots and at all levels, to help work and find the answers for hospitals, moral issues, the environment, security, social challenges and theology.

Enough is enough. We have given too much room to the enemy. What is our vision for the next 500 years, if the Lord tarries? It is the turning around of Christian nations, that have been going away from God and it is the conversion of the Muslims to Christ. God loves them. They are not the enemy, they have been entrapped by the enemy and the gospel of Jesus Christ will set them free.

The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness of it, the world and they that dwell therein. (Ps 24:1).

Our heart and call is to live in God’s love and free acceptance, working out His salvation with all diligence, in our own hearts and lives, at home, in church, trusting that He be honoured in all we do. Our heart is to preach, teach and heal, to reach every soul with the good news of Jesus. Judgement must start in the house of the Lord: what we teach and how we live. We love not our own lives.

We must pray and call upon God as one people, with love for one another in the church, with hearts filled with His Spirit, asking Him to turn things around, to put godliness in the hearts of all people. We put aside works prayer and pray with gratefulness for the freedom God has given us, with joy.

God has given us such freedom to call upon Him with all boldness. How dare we not use it? How can we have faith that God is good and will act strongly and not use this faith to call upon Him? The enemy wants to silence the church: silence us before God and silence us before men. But our hearts forbid. We open our mouths to both.

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