Destroying Christian Unity

Mike Livingstone writes an excellent reminder about the petty things which can destroy Christian unity. I found number 4 particularly significant.

4. Refusing to forgive

Bitterness and resentment are poisons. Unforgiveness poisons the soul and it poisons the body of Christ.

The church is, by nature, a fellowship rooted in forgiveness. What does that mean, practically speaking? 17th-century Puritan Thomas Watson said forgiveness looks like this: you don’t seek revenge when someone offends you, you wish him well, you grieve at his calamities, you pray for him, you seek reconciliation, and show yourself willing to come to his aid. That’s what forgiveness looks like, and that’s what it takes to maintain unity.

Read the others HERE

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Quotation of the Week

“Avoid trivial pursuits. You are a child of God, destined for glory, and called to do great things in His Name. Do not waste your life on hobbies, sports, and other recreational pursuits. Do not throw away the precious moments of your life on entertainment, movies, and video games. Though some of these things can properly have a 'small place' in the Christian’s life, we must be careful not to give undue attention to temporal and fruitless activities. Do not waste your life. Employ the time of your youth in developing the character and skills necessary to be a useful servant of God.” Paul Washer

Mystery Meat

How many of you would buy a package of meat advertised in this way? How did they even know how much to charge if the meat is unknown? There is no way that most of us would consider putting that into our bodies. And yet, if we put a generic label of Christian on a product we have all kinds of people who will uncritically make it a part of their life. We don't know where it comes from, what the people producing it believe, what their goal is and yet it's labelled Christian so we give it the benefit of the doubt. Ought we not to be taking at least the same care with our spiritual diet that we do with our physical diet?

Why don't People Sing - Maybe the Fault is Ours

Enough! When will we stop? We’ve minimized the congregation’s role. We’ve changed our focus from disciplined, intentional music-making to creating emotional responses. We’ve stopped training musicians. We’ve chosen songs written for solo performance. We’ve stopped giving the musicians among us the resources they need to apply their abilities. We’ve chosen instrumentation that doesn’t support a congregation. We’ve stopped leading and started performing. So let’s stop asking why people aren’t singing anymore. It really shouldn’t be a surprise, since we’ve done nearly everything we can to kill congregational singing. Maybe it’s time to rethink our strategies. Read the whole article HERE

The Plodding Preacher

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