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| Taken from Lide Magazine |
22 But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. 24 For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. 25 But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.
The rubber meets the road today. The Christian churches in the area were asked several months ago to team up with Greg Laurie Sr. Pastor at Harvest Christian Fellowship, a Calvary chapel affiliate from Riverside California, and support an evangelic outreach event called Seattle Harvest. The event is tonight, tomorrow and Sunday at the Key Arena in downtown Seattle. The event is free, and there will be musical concerts, an awesome array of speakers and guests, and the message of Hope and Salvation to be shared with tens of thousands of people by Pastor Greg.
We look at events like this, sort of a modernized Billy Graham Crusade for those struggling to put a face on the event, and we see this event is geared towards reaching those unreached people for Christ, and it certainly is. But it is so much more. And we’ll get to that in a minute.
This world is an evil and dark place. We have been called to do our part in taking God’s word and making disciples of people from all over the world. While great emphasis and ‘legitimacy’ has been assigned to Christian missionary work over-seas, and around the globe, for the most part domestic evangelism has ceased to be thought of as worthy, legitimate or even serious in comparison. ‘The United States is a Christian nation, why do we need to do domestic evangelism?’ Well excuse me if I hurt your little feelings here, but Christian brothers and sisters, have you looked around you lately? America looks to be far from Christian from here on the ground.
While American Christians have been funding 80% of world missions, we have spend little precious little time and effort or money here in this country. As a result, we are losing America. Not just because of the ride of unbelievers, and the accelerated growth of Islam and the popular cults, but because Christians here are no longer holding to biblical truths as the foundations to their faith. Christianity in America is now setting their faith standards on societal norms or the majorital opinions of their congregation, rather than the inerrant word of God. The bible is no longer truth; it’s just a ‘resource’ of a set of recommended guidelines. Oh, how far we have fallen.
This Harvest event may be designed to reach those for Christ that to this point in their lives have not had the opportunity to do so, to preach the gospel message of hope to a generation that needs it so badly, and it is. But like I said earlier, it is so much more. Seattle Harvest is designed from the ground-up to be an event to reach people for Jesus. That’s the result of that will be found by those who attend the rally as visitors, as those invited by friends and family, by those called and appointed by God to be there to hear the message of Jesus. But what is the effect on the others?
Almost a year ago, Greg asked the churched in this area and it’s members to help him in pulling off this Harvest event to reach the unreached. But what Greg was really asking of us the ‘church’ in this one of the most un-churched areas in the United States, was to put our faith and calling into action; to not be just hearers of the Word but doers of the Word. Greg has asked us to take our life in Christ seriously enough to be there when there is work to be done, to pick up God’s hammer of Grace, to pull the plows of peace, to share the hope that is in us, and to make war – not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.
Greg has asked those of us who call ourselves Christians to prove it.
Talk is CHEAP. Grace is not.
Will you join me?
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