Monday, March 15, 2010

You Have But Little Power

Okay, so it's 12:05 a.m. which technically makes this Monday, but I'm still new to the life of a blogger so I'm more entitled to mess up and get away with it.

I enjoy Sundays. Okay, I love Sundays. They're the most exhausting day of the week, but I love them. It isn't because I get to stand before a group of people and chastise them, mainly because I don't. Well, there is the occasional sermon that involves a rebuke, but that's a different blog post. I enjoy Sundays because I get to learn more. Yes, I am the one that stands before everyone and teaches the Bible Study class, but I am blessed to be working with a congregation that teaches me back...except they get to do it while sitting down. Fort Valley is great about discussing that which are studying, no matter what it might be.

We've been studying Revelation on Sunday mornings and are slowly making our way through the seven churches in chapter two and three. This morning we finished looking at Sardis and started into Philadelphia. Philadelphia was the congregation that I've really enjoyed studying because it reminds me a lot of the congregation where I preach, and that was what we discussed at the end of class this morning. The following is the segment we studied this morning:

"And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: 'The words of the holy one,the true one, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, who shuts and no one opens.I know your works. Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut. I know that you have but little power, and yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name' (Rev. 3:7-8)."

Fort Valley is a small congregation, though our numbers have been rising. We usually see between 40-50 for worship on Sunday morning. We also have a good number of older members who can't always be as physically active in the work of the church. It can be a discouragement. Not just to me, but to all of us here. We would love to have more youth at the moment to help. These two verses reminded me of something though. Christ said they had but little power. Maybe they were small in number, maybe they were from the lower class or maybe they didn't have all of the money to use as they would have liked. In the end, that didn't matter. Christ said He had set a open door before them. Sure, we might not be able to out number denominations or out spend them, but that's not important. The strength of the pure Gospel wasn't determined by number or money or social status, it was strong because Christ was behind it. Whatever the situation might have been, if those in Philadelphia were willing to do the work, Christ was going to be there to give them opportunities to do it.

It's easy for any Christian, preacher included, to get discouraged when he looks at the situation from the view of the world. In the world, number, power and money get you everywhere and everything. It's not the same for a life viewed from the Christian point of few.

Love you all,
Carl

2 comments:

  1. Too often we get sidetracked by numbers. We get so bogged down in counting heads and counting money that we forget what we're here to do and the responsibility of the church. This happens both on congregational levels and on individual levels.

    How is this discussion going in your class? Are they understanding what you're saying?

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  2. Somehow they are. Sometimes I feel like I'm more confusing than Revelation is. Of course, we haven't gotten into the REALLY strange stuff yet.

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