I love…
flying home….
to you, My Love
November 16, 2007
Show & Tell Friday – Thankful
For Show and Tell Friday this week I would like to first of all say that I am thankful for Kelli for hosting every week and my other blogging “neighbors” who participate! I enjoy these times that I can visit all your “homes” and fellowship with all of you in a very special way!
My table is set for Thanksgiving and this year I will not only be thankful for family and friends, but I will also be thankful for this wonderful blogging community. I will save a special place for all of you!
God Bless You All this Thanksgiving Season!
Now head on over to Kelli’s for more Show and Tell Friday!
Crazy Christians
It’s Friday but Sunday’s Coming - the pastor’s sermon preview:
Christians are considered by many to be crazy. And with good reason, as A.W. Tozer notes:
“A real Christian is an odd number anyway. He feels supreme love for One whom he has never seen, talks familiarly every day to Someone he cannot see, expects to go to heaven on the virtue of Another, empties himself in order to be full, admits he is wrong so he can be declared right, goes down in order to get up, is strongest when he is weakest, richest when he is poorest, and happiest when he feels worst. He dies so that he can live, forsakes in order to have, gives away so he can keep, sees the invisible, hears the inaudible, and knows that which passeth knowledge.”
It should not be surprising that at times we are misunderstood. In the text that is before us this week, the Apostle Paul explains how crazy people like us can be effective in reaching a world that has lost its way. It all comes down to the “ministry of reconciliation” emanating from our transformed lives.
2 Corinthians 5:11-21
The Ministry of Reconciliation
11Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others. But what we are is known to God, and I hope it is known also to your conscience. 12We are not commending ourselves to you again but giving you cause to boast about us, so that you may be able to answer those who boast about outward appearance and not about what is in the heart. 13For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. 14For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; 15and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.
16From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. 17Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
The verse that I struggle the most with above is verse 15:
…that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.
Lord, may I truly live for you!
