A few years back my best friend's house caught fire. An electrical short in the wall burned up most of the downstairs before the fire company put it out. Everything was dusted in black, even the upstairs from the smoke that rose. Once the house was cleared the family was permitted to enter, to gather up some possessions and try to salvage whatever they could. When they entered the master bedroom, they found one white spot on the carpet, in the shape of their black lab, Rocco. He laid directly in front of the closed closet door. When they opened the closet, they found two more spots, not so distinguishable because the other two dogs had cuddled up next to each other inside. As if Rocco knew his destiny, somehow he led them into the closet, nudged the door closed, and lay down his life.
Jesus is lamenting over Jerusalem's rejection. He came for them! He will soon be laying down His life, all He asks is that they would spare themselves by believing in Him. Jesus is on His knees hopelessly pleading with Jerusalem to stop, think, and believe. He knew what the outcome would be however, so he bids them a sour farewell.
Do we see the smoke rising as the fires of life burn around us? People are eternally dying. How can we lay down our dignity, pride, and money to attempt to spare their eternal lives?
Mandy
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4 comments:
Great job Mandy!
I really like the question that you posed here; "How can we lay down our dignity, pride, and money to attempt to spare their eternal lives?"
I think the biggest hindrance to achieving this goal if you will is the fact that our life in Christ tends to shift. We can be either academic, full of head knowledge or we can be completely practical and all application. I think that rarely do we just simply live in Christ. We rarely make Him our life. We often can make Him our speech or our study. The greatest challenge of Christians has been and always will be serving. The best way to let go of your pride and possessions I believe is to make yourself serve another person.
You painted a humbling picture. "Jesus is on His knees hopelessly pleading with Jerusalem to stop, think, and believe." When he returned to heaven he asked us to plead with them on His behalf to be reconciled to Him. He still wants to see people repent, but he needs our voice, our hands and feet to reach them with the gospel.
Mandy, when i read your post there was a story that i heard not long ago of how the church should be.
This story gave an example of the church as a hospital where sick people come in and get treated with the right kind of medicine and with doctors and nurses who are ready to help the sick. The question is how do this sick people get to the hospital...there are many ways...but one is ambulance, friends, relatives...etc:sick people can't come to the hospital by themselves...the same way the people from the church have to go out to bring in spiritually sick people...they need our help..God can and will use us when we surrender to HIM!
Great questions Mandy! I've been observing over the past few weeks who Victory Ranch reaches out to. Unfortunately it leaves me puzzled and slightly discouraged.
Even though I haven't seen many retreats or summer camps in action yet, the director daily reminds me that we only serve certain churches, groups, etc. It's hard to take this in because of the camp I used to work at.
Skyview desired to reach out into the community and those who are lost. Even if we were only serving them their Christmas company dinner.
How frustrating it is to be a "Christian" organization with blinders on to only serving the church when there is so much opportunity to reach the lost!!!
~Shannon~
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