Yesterday I had the privilege of sitting with three representatives of SIM and to chat candidly about the issue of missions and the local church. We talked about the reasons for the decline in missions in the North American church. We talked about the usual suspects: things are too comfortable here, we don't pray enough, we don't talk about missions enough, etc. I then suggested that one reason was there was too much competition between churches. Churches feel that they have to put on a better show than the church down the street in order to keep their people. Shows cost money - hence less money for missions. Those around the table then discussed the latest mega-church plant coming to Brantford. It was then that one of SIM's people described this type of church plant. He called it a "non-evangelistic church plant." Missionaries say the darnedest things.
We picture death as coming to destroy; let us rather picture Christ as coming to save. We think of death as ending; let us rather think of life as beginning, and that more abundantly. We think of losing; let us think of gaining. We think of parting; let us think of meeting. We think of going away; let us think of arriving. And as the voice of death whispers, "You must go from earth," Let us hear the voice of Christ saying, "You are but coming to me." Norman Macleod
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