For thought and meditation

[rl69]

Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated and untrained men, they marveled. And they realized that they had been with Jesus.

—Acts 4:13

There are a lot of people running around today who are what we might describe as kind-of Christians. I know that isn’t theologically correct, because according to the Bible, either you are a Christian or you are not.

I’m talking about these people whom we’re not really sure about. We see some things in their lives that make us believe they might be followers of Jesus. They attend church, and they talk about God periodically. Maybe they even pray before meals. But then there are other things in their lives that seem to contradict that, and it makes us wonder.

I think there are a lot of people who believe they are Christians when they probably aren’t. And one of the reasons for that is a lot of shallow, anemic preaching in churches today. I’m afraid there may be a generation of people who think they really know God when they don’t know Him at all. They have been told to believe, but they have never been told to repent. They have been promised the hope of Heaven, but they have never been warned about the reality of Hell.

I question whether most Americans have ever heard the authentic gospel message. I know we’ve heard a lot of preaching. I know we’ve heard a lot of sermons. But have most Americans really heard the gospel? And do they have even a basic understanding of it?

Seven out of ten American adults have no clue what John 3:16 means, and barely one-third of all adults know the meaning of the term “the gospel.”

What we need today are people who walk and talk with Jesus Christ, people who, through their godly lifestyles, have in effect earned the right to be heard. What we need are people who have been with Jesus.

[USMC87]

Amen, Thanks for a great lesson.

[Wayne Smith]

Reminds me both of the parable of the sower and the statement of Jesus that in the end times many would come to him saying 'Lord, Lord, I cast out demons in your name' and he will turn them away saying 'I do not know you'. Their whole focus was on what they were doing, the Name of Jesus was just a tool, like you and I use a hammer. There was no relationship. They may have been the ones who fell on shallow ground, got a little and ran with it, but no depth of relationship.

[claude]

(Matthew 24:4-5) "And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. {5} For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many."......

[Blackwater]

Wow! Strong medicine indeed! And yet .... so terribly, terribly true! A dear friend died Wednesday, and I've never seen anyone in my 68 years on this earth, seek to know Christ more and more fully than Mike did. Contrast his determined, diligent, focused, sincere and unrelenting search to understand the Lord, with the general blandness that we see so typically in so many today, and ..... well, it's not very reassuring of where the country is going. And if our nation abandons the Lord, and all the principles, instructions and advice He left for us, we can't sustain ourselves, and will eventually fall, and fall VERY hard, just as all nations who've abandoned God have done throughout history. A true and huge revival, the likes of which no one has seen before, may well be our nation's only hope now. PC theology has wormed its tireless way into so many churches now, that it's supplanted much of the "meat" of the Gospel! We are definitely in trouble, and much of it is OUR fault - we believers'! We've allowed our Faith to be watered down, and we've obeyed PC theology and failed to assert our Faith, and have endured so much, vulgar aspersions, that the unbelievers have seen us as weak, ineffectual, and not even knowing WHY we believe what we do. We didn't "study to show thyself approved," as Christ admonished us to. And in so doing, we have allowed evil to permeate or world, and reproduce itself ad infinitum, to the point we're at now. God help us! It doesn't seem we can help ourselves very effectively any more.

Stay close to the real believers in your life. They are more precious than I think most of us realize! They strengthen us more than we realize, and inspire us to do better than we have before. What an inspiration folks like that are!

[Thundarstick]

Are all Christians the same at the same time? Are we perfect when we come up out of the water (or what ever you believe). No! We are a work in progress! All of us! Is that PC?