This post has been strongly affected by LifeChurch.tv’s 30 Days to Live series, which you can watch at this address: http://www.lifechurch.tv/Default.aspx/p/39? SermonID=115&CategoryID=8 I suggest that you take the time to watch those 4 sermons (~30min. each). The basic thought behind the whole series is something like this: Life on earth is just a brief moment. Live your life with God as if you had 30 more days to live. It’s quite an awakening thought as to what is actually important in life. Even more so are the interviews with several people for whom the doctors say have a very limited time with us, as well as some others who have barely made it alive through cancer and other life threatening diseases.
The thought of lost lives has been on my mind for quite some time, but these sermons helped it develop much deeper. Have you ever thought about the lives of people you read about in the news? Where will they end up? Take it a step further – as God’s sent one does it impact you at all? I mean, we’re so used to reading about people dying today in so many ways, that it would take a fairly rare or massive death to shock us or surprise us. And that’s just heart breaking! Have we become so cold towards the human life? Has it totally lost its value? No? Are you thinking No, of course it hasn’t! Well, then why in the world are we just playing Christians… as if it’s a role-playing game for preschool kids?!
I see a Church which struggles. I see a body of believers which is far from being united. I see crippled Christians – lame in their faith, deaf to God’s voice… mute to the call to proclaim the Word which brings life. Where did the faith that move mountains go? When did the everlasting and unchanging God switch to a different mode? When did the voice of God stop calling? What happened to the water that gives life?
Frankly, nothing has changed ever since the Spirit of God hovered over the waters… and then God said Let there be light! And there was light. Where is God’s light today? Surely it isn’t in the latest model of any piece of equipment, neither is it in the discounted clothes. It’s not even in the Church’s financial department. I believe God’s light is right where it is supposed to be, just that we’re often a block before it or a block past it. And it is only when we “accidentally” pass by the right corner that we are elevated to a new level of our faith. Maybe someone turns back to God, another one is baptized… a couple gets married. Have you realized that for most of the Christians you know these are occasions that we call special or extraordinary? Sure there’s extra to all of them, but how low is the mere ordinary then? Are we living a whole life to simply experience a moment or two? Why isn’t the Christian’s life today extraordinary all around?! Well, whatever the reason is, I believe it’s that same thing that is on the way of God’s love and light. Materialism, individualism, selfishness, pure laziness… It sure has a lot of names.
Have you ever imagined what it would be if you could shed God’s light into the lives of the people who have just died? I’m not saying that all of them are lost for good… Who am I to judge? But how much better is it to be certain of the eternal future of those people’s lives? Much, much better! And the price for it – you and I living a true Christian life. Simple.
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