Grow in Christ

This is a little disturbing. According to an article on CNN, some of the megachurches around the country are planning to close their doors based on their thoughts that attendance would be low. Well, so what if it is low. Open the doors for all who will attend.

Our church will be having a service on Christmas Day and my family will be there to celebrate the birth of Jesus.

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Have you ever had someone come up to you and ask for your help by giving them some money? What was your first thought? Hey, I used to tell people that I did not have any money, because I figured that I knew what they were going to use that money for.

During homecoming, the sermon that was given by the visiting pastor struck me pretty hard. He told a story about a time when he and a friend were approached by someone wanting some money. The pastor’s friend told the man no and started to walk away. The pastor reached in his pocked, pulled out ten dollars and handed to the man.

His friend looked at him a bit later and asked him why he did that. He was sure that the man was just going to use the money for drugs or alcohol.

As the pastor told the story about how he explained to his friend that it isn’t our place to judge, I thought about things that I have done like this in the past. I have told people that I did not have any money knowing full well that I did.

The pastor is right, it is not our place to judge what people will do with our help. God just asks us to help others. He will take care of the judging part down the road.

This leads me to my point. I had a man approach me and my wife the other night after we had eaten dinner. We had paid for dinner with a debit card and scraped everything we had left in our pockets to give for a tip which really was not enough.

Anyway, I felt so bad when I had to tell the man that I did not have any money to give to him. It did not get any better when my wife started to drive away from the restaurant and we saw an ATM about a block away.

I did not give the man any money because my wife and I did not have a single penny on our person at that very point in time. Should I have gone back to try and find the man when I saw the ATM, however? This has weighed heavily on me the past few days.

At this point, all I can do is ask God to forgive me for anything that I may have done wrong and ask that he bless this man and take care of his needs the best way that He knows how.

I came across a blog post on a blog that I just started reading this week. It is short, but it really hits home to what it means to put your trust in God.

http://biscotti_brain.blogspot.com/2005/08/butt-first.html

I heard a fantastic song today that really makes one think about where they are in their walk with the Lord. The name of the song is “Fifteen” and it is by Greg Long who recently joined Avalon. The song talks about talking to people about Christ. It ponders the idea that if it takes a person 15 times to hear about Jesus before they accept him as their Savior, what if you are number 15?

Wow… now think about that one for a while.

I had never been one to tithe until I was saved back on February 20th. At first, I worried about this and whether or not we could afford it. I know that sounds very secular considering the meaning, but that’s the way I felt.

Anyway, we got our quarterly statement from the church the other day showing how much we had given for the past three months and year-to-date. I just about fell out. I could not believe how much we had given this year to date.

The more you grow in Him, the more he takes care of you. We have gotten to where we do not even think about it. It just one of those things that we do each time we get paid. We have never had any money worries in that six month period.

God is good!

I have found out the hard way lately that not wearing the full coat of armor can actually lead one down the wrong path to a place that I do not want to be again.

I missed a few services at church as of late and the next time I got back to church, I realized what I had been missing. Just being around others in Christ having fellowship and worship helps one grow.

Our work day at the church today was not about worship, but the fellowship with other Christians doing things for God’s house felt good.

God saved me in February 21, 2005. Unfortunately, I have not been where I need to be to grow in Him. I need to spend more time in God’s Word learning and sharing it with others.