Author: remso
Posted Jan 31 2012 09:41:26pm
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Brother, have you been reading the book of Acts again? God is firing you up. I have been reading the Acts of the Apostles and you sound like them. Faith demands action.
Bring it on.
By the way, if they throw me in jail, then I am preaching there also, but even better yet, I have determined to be like Jesus, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed of the devil.
Men like you have lit a fire in me.
Ozzie |
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Author: kreynolds
Posted Feb 01 2012 06:27:19am
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As I read your blog, these words came to mind:
What good is it, dear brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but don't show it by your actions? Can that kind of faith save anyone? Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing, and you say, "Good-bye and have a good day; stay warm and eat well" but then you don't give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do? So you see, faith by itself isn't enough. Unless it produces good deeds, it is dead and useless. Now someone may argue, "Some people have faith; others have good deeds." But I say, "How can you show me your faith if you don't have good deeds? I will show you my faith by my good deeds." You say you have faith, for you believe that there is one God. Good for you! Even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror. How foolish! Can't you see that faith without good deeds is useless? Don't you remember that our ancestor Abraham was shown to be right with God by his actions when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see, his faith and his actions worked together. His actions made his faith complete. And so it happened just as the Scriptures say: "Abraham believed God, and God counted him as righteous because of his faith." He was even called the friend of God. So you see, we are shown to be right with God by what we do, not by faith alone. - James 2:14-26
Blessings!
K  |
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Author: clifrad
Posted Feb 01 2012 11:29:25am
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If we can get the church to see, Jesus will come alive in this country. 224 million people in the US profess Christianity.
I heard from what should be a reliable source, ie big shots of the faith, that 3,500 people leave the church a day. I think this is exaggerated by the way. But lets go with it.
So we should conclude this is due to the mis-preaching and misunderstanding this most basic point: The Gospel. Therefore it is imperative we re-evangelize the church. Thank God we can see the problem. Now we can fix it. But still to few see it.
I communicate on three blogs, have a radio program and visit in my community over this. This is where the work is: the Church.
Thanks for your encouragement and partnership in this most important quest.
In His love,
clifrad |
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Author: clifrad
Posted Feb 01 2012 11:59:32am
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But we can...we have the power of Jesus and His model. Let's move the church. His body is awesome but in a comma. Let us awaken this Body for Jesus and the world.
Thanks.
In His love,
clifradk |
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Author: kogfamily
Posted Feb 01 2012 07:50:20pm
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Falling in love with Jesus and staying in first love with Him is vital. If we love Him we will love who and what He loves and hate what He hates. We will always be seeking to do the things that please Him.
Motive, motive, motive. I Corinthians 13 is the motive key, isn't it? It isn't a matter of how many good works we do because even if we never stop sacrificing even to the giving of our lives, if we don't do it out of a love motive, we are nothing.
We all want so desperately to see the Church moved to action and results. I agree so many of us are like the ape picture above. We are sitting around fat with head knowledge of the Word but doing nothing. I imagine it could be really irritating to a pastor.
What can we do to get the cart(good works) behind the horse (love)? To me it boils down to something I seem to be talking about on CB non stop, the Holy Spirit. Love(right motive) is a fruit of the Holy Spirit. The only way we can exhibit love motivated good works is if we surrender to Him cooperating with Him work through us. If we don't get this right, we will be just like mice in a maze running ourselves around in circles until we just drop from total frustration and exhaustion. We will be like an irritated Martha constantly asking Jesus to "make some of those lazy "Marys" get off their religious behinds and help us". We could end up with a life filled with what we thought was good works only to see much of them burn up like wood, hay and stubble at the Judgment Seat because our motive was not right.
clifradk, I do understand your statement, ".. Let's move the church. His body is awesome but in a comma. Let us awaken this Body for Jesus and the world."
But dear brother, the fire that you want to see ignited to awaken the Body of Jesus can only be set from the inside out by the Holy Spirit. It is the Spirit that works and wills in the body of Christ to do God's good pleasure.
IMO what we have to do is share the love of God and the Word of God as you say in practical ways while doing everything in our power to consistently walk in the Spirit and encourage the Body to understand who the Holy Spirit is, encouraging them to also surrender to Him. Then the example they see in us doing good works in His power while still abiding in the rest and peace of God will prove that it is not a work of the flesh but is a manifestation of the fruit of the Holy Spirit in us by grace through faith. This will go a long way to inspire others to do the same. It will also allow us to show the maximum grace to all the static "Marys" in our lives because we acknowledge that whatever good works we are doing is really the result of God's grace working in us.
God's grace, peace and mercy to you,
kogfamily |
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Author: clifrad
Posted Feb 01 2012 09:59:59pm
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Fair enough but we shouldn't blame the Holy Spirit for our lethargy. While it possible to act to care for others without love, we just need to do it andwith love.
The Holy Spirit is ignored primarily. Why would we hide behind a lot of spiritual talk?.
Faith driven action smothered in love everyday is the Spirits way.
The Spirit uses no whi, He is Love. I can't see Him as inactive as the the church represents.
The church is the only place in our community that not working is not frowned upon. It is actually defended. It is sadly humors.
I do not no why we are babying ourselves. I do not concede we are so feeble. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us, we are more than conquers etc.
We make a mockery of God. Even the community expects more from such faith claims we make and the truth is they have a much lower expectation than they should given the claims we make.
Thanks for the comments. I here these arguments a lot. So I'm eager to talk from this perspective.
In His Active Love and Power,
clifrad |
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Author: kogfamily
Posted Feb 04 2012 07:47:07pm
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Your right clifrad,
We can do all things through Christ and we are more than conquerors! I commend you for sharing such positive messages of reinforcement. I can tell by your blogs that you are actively sharing wherever you go. My question is how are you getting the people in your home church to follow you into activity? Is there something you can share so that we can all give it a try in our churches. It seems pretty common that the 80/20 rule is the standard. At least that has been my experience in most of the churches I have attended over the years.
Thanks in advance,
kogfamily |
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When I thought about this subject all I could think of was "Conundrum." It popped into my head. We speak and live in cognitive dissonance. What is puzzling is that we preach and claim the crucified life, but scripturally we don't seem to match-up. The scriptures mention a few things worth looking at.
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