I
recently attended a worship service that was almost entirely devoid of Scripture. During the service someone read a few verses
of Scripture. During the sermon the speaker
read a single verse of Scripture and referred in passing to two others. In a twenty-five minute sermon less than 30
seconds were devoted to reading Scripture and perhaps two or three minutes were
dedicated to exposition of that verse.
The balance of the sermon was a saccharine talk that was not sweet on
the tongue, but mildly nauseating to the belly.
It
is absolutely impossible for a Christian or the church to have a maturing walk
with the Lord while at the same time being highly ignorant of the Word of
God. I recall a conversation with a
young man who grew up in a church, went to weekly Sunday School classes and
attended worship with his parents but was stunned to find that sex outside of
marriage was wrong, as in, “the Bible says don’t.” According to research reported by Christianity
Today, almost 80% of Evangelical Christians agree with the statement that Jesus
is the first and greatest created being.[1] How is this possible? This has happened because the vast majority
of the emphasis of the church in American for the last couple of decades has
been on personal fulfillment and growing larger congregations. Not that long ago, if you went to a Christian
bookstore it was dominated by commentaries, theologies, and Biblical study
tools. Those Christian bookstores that
are left today are little more than Christian self-help, Christian
entertainment, and Christian paraphernalia shops.
Even
in my own blog I have seen it. The blogs
that I reported or commented on church-growth related issues were read and
shared most frequently. Those that were
most directly related to discipleship were read less often. I believe that in most churches and for most
church leaders we would rather grow large churches than make disciples. It seems easier, there is more support
material, and it has the potential to be more financially and ego rewarding.
It
is my opinion that the only way forward for the church in our time is the way
back, a return to the study of Scripture.
To that end each week I will be mailing Bible studies that are designed
to call us to discipleship by looking at scripture and finding
application. Please do not read the post
until you have read the passage on which it is based. Use these for devotional purposes, share them
in your network as you see fit, forward them to a friend. I do not care how you
use them as long as people are returning to the Bible. My only request is that if you use them link
your use to www.beyondharan.blogspot.com.
So,
let’s look into Scripture-today is an intentionally short devotion.
Psalm
67 (read Text)
If
you don’t know the proper use for something you will end up abusing it,
misusing it and ultimately losing it. It
is difficult to imagine a case where this is not true. We often ask God for blessings in our lives
without knowing the purpose of those blessings.
As a result many of those blessings are abused, misused and ultimately
lost. This Psalm explains the purpose of
blessings in our lives. The first two
lines in verse 1 are the quintessential Hebrew blessing. But the purpose for blessing is given in
verse 2, namely that God’s way and salvation can be known worldwide. We are blessed to bless others not to acquire
luxury, pleasure, and ease for ourselves.
This Psalm is an evangelistic Psalm and directs that our blessings are
for a testimony and witness to the world.
It is natural that under the new covenant of the Cross and in the
community of evangelism and faith of the church that we would see the support
of missionary and benevolent efforts as the proper use of our blessings.
As
we receive any blessing if we try to keep it only for ourselves and try to use
it only to gain more or to be used to gain selfish pleasure we cut ourselves
off from the purpose of blessing and eventually from the source of
blessing. In contrast to this selfish
attitude we see in verses 5-6 that in the investment in blessing others there
develops a repeating cycle of blessings, so that the earth yields its produce. Stewardship, the Godly use of God-given resources,
extends not just to our money, but also our environment indeed to the whole of
creation. This Psalm concludes with
verse 7’s summation; God’s blessing came to us so all the earth may fear the
one, true God.
[1] https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2018/october/what-do-christians-believe-ligonier-state-theology-heresy.html
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