"Anybody coming under the lordship of Christ automatically has a God-given DNA to be on mission with their Lord to touch a lost world," Blackaby said. "It's not a matter of trying to get our churches back on the program of the Great Commission, but rather into the relationship with the living Lord who is on mission in our world."
The entire article this quote came from is on the Blackaby site. Click here to go there. Go to the bottom of the page.
Another thought on this...
I have been thinking about what Blackaby said in this article and I see in Scripture what he is saying. Look at what Jesus said, “Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will make you fishers of men.” (Matthew 4:19)
Look at what Jesus invites us to do. Look at what Jesus does, when we respond in faith. Look at what we become.
Jesus invites us to come follow Him. We can lay down our old life and surrender to Jesus. In His grace He pardons us by paying our sin debt and bringing us into a right relationship with Himself. We become His friends, His brothers, His disciples, His great love. This relationship changes us.
So when we come to faith in Christ and seek to live in relationship with Jesus, that relationship changes us. We get remade. Jesus said “and I will make you". It is the presence of Jesus in our lives that transforms us. It is not a program. It is not will power. By talking with Jesus, living under the authority of Jesus, learning more about Jesus, and mimicking Jesus in our personal relationships we are changed. We are remade.
We are made into something different. We are no longer fishers of personal power, pleasure, popularity, or possessions. Being with Jesus makes us like Jesus, which makes us other focused. We seek to do what serves others and God most. We do not work to catch some comfort. We look to our leader and seek to serve the needs of others, as He has served and is serving us and those we are seeking to serve. We becomes fishers of men. We seek others out so we can show them the love of our Lord and introduce them to Him so they can be with Him, be like Him, and be on mission for Him to give love, healing, and hope to the world.
That makes a lot of sense to me. We need to focus on our relationship with Jesus. Being with Jesus will change us. When Jesus is in the process of changing us, He will work through us to change the world.
Hebrews 12:1-8 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. 2Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. 4In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. 5And you have forgotten that word of encouragement that addresses you as sons: “My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, 6because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son.” 7Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father? 8If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons.
1 comment:
Verse 7 really hits home with me. I often find myself asking why I am going through a hard situation in my life. When I look back on it later, I can see that I was usually making choices that led up to that hardship. And like I tell my own children, the Lord is telling me that I must suffer the consequences of my own actions so that I might learn to make better choices in the future. If I would just put more faith in Jesus, I wouldn't get in those messes in the first place. I try to remember the lines from the Footprints poem..."Why when I needed you the most, you have not been there for me? The Lord replied, The times when you have seen only one set of footprints in the sand, is when I carried you."
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