Eleven men on a Galilean hillside, listening to their leader. Go and tell all the world, i have all authority, and i'll be with you. All the doubts and worries of the last few days seem like a dream...He's alive, and He's coming with us. It's all going to be ok.
Why did Jesus choose just twelve? You know He could have efficiently disciples a thousand times that number. Why twelve when one was a betrayer? Why not disciple all of Israel, and send them out? Now you're a light to the nations.
The church always works when it's the shepherd boy agains the giant. The church is Ruth, starving and looking for mercy, the church is Esther, casting herself on the mercy of the king, the church is Jeremiah preaching from the sewer, the church is the unpopular kids at Corinth High School. And in that way, the church thrives. Jesus loses about twenty thousand followers in a day in John 6, and then turns to His guys and asks if they're leaving too. He doesn't count gain and loss like we do, His ushers aren't in the balcony counting because the Kingdom of God is not a matter of flesh and blood.
The Kingdom advances as Bibles are opened in caves in northern Iraq. Demons flee as the Gospel is proclaimed from makeshift pulpits in primary schools in southern England. The sick are healed as 'thus saith the Lord,' rings out from a multi million dollar campus in Texas.
Trendy music isn't growing the Church. Neither a light show, or the best kids work in town, or the greatest summer camps, or the newest programs, or the biggest offerings. Those things might grow a church, but not the Church.
The Church grows as one man finds other faithful men to find other faithful men. It always has. Not the rich and the famous, but the poor, the weak, the needy. Men like you and me.
No comments:
Post a Comment