The Gospel Unifies the Church

My dad used to tell me, “Do as I say, don’t do as I do.” Now, my dad is not a man of low character and values, he was just pointing out the difficulty we all have living out our perceived values. As Christians, we all struggle with the fact that our actions and words don’t always line up.
Churches have many struggles with internal conflict.  As a friend of mine once noted, “not everyone will always see eye-to-eye on things, but those things should not split up a church”. This is true, but what is it that still causes churches to have splits when this should not happen?  As the body of Christ, we lose sight of the cross. The “I am right, you are wrong” mentality certainly permeates our churches and the end result is a lack of compassion and mercy; and a growing sense of pride when humility should be at the core of our hearts. This leads to division and a fracturing of relationships; resulting in splits and broken relationships.
When Christians stand at the foot of the cross, we are all reminded of who we really are without Christ; lost, blind, dead and hopelessly unable to find our way.  As we stand closer to the cross, we will begin to smell the sweat of the Roman soldiers and hear the clanging of the hammer upon the nails being driven into our Savior. We all need to stand close to the cross so we can be reminded of who is holding the hammer; you and me.
It is vitally important to the health of the church to apply a rich understanding of the gospel of Christ to every part of our lives.  It is not our good works or programs that maintain unity in the fellowship, it is recognizing the shed blood of our Savior and His free gift of grace and applying it to every part of our mind, body and soul.

Grace and Mercy,
Tommy

Genesis Calls Us To Remember

After the death of Moses, Joshua became the leader of Israel; in some of his first words to these people he said, “Remember the word that Moses the servant of the LORD commanded you…”  Genesis is relevant for many things, but most of all it should cause us to remember who we are and where we have come from.  Created in the image of God with purpose and value; this reminder should never be missed, and yet…

In some of the most disappointing words spoken in the Bible, “And the people of Israel did not remember the LORD their God, who had delivered them from the hand of all their enemies on every side…”  Forget God, how could the Israelites forget God?  He made them a people through Abraham, He brought them through a famine in Egypt and He parted the Red Sea as a way of escape from Pharoah’s chariots; how could they forget?
Moses recognized the nature of the human heart with his cry to “remember the days of old”.  He recognized nature of the human heart; it is self-serving to the core.  As much as God did for His chosen people, they lost their focus.  You could say they took their eyes off of the prize and in doing so,they rejected God.
 
In our nation, in our homes and even in some cases; our churches, we have forgotten who we are, we have forgotten upon what foundation we were called to stand upon.  Remember Genesis, it is the bedrock of who we are and a picture of the nature of God.  You are a unique and special creation of God; Genesis should serve as a great reminder of all that we are and to whom we belong.

Remember Genesis, Remember God