Exodus 23,24; Psalms 14; Acts 5
Can We Demand Our Rights? As Believers Our Rights Have Been Yielded Over to Jesus Christ …
Scripture
40 The others accepted his advice. They called in the apostles and had them flogged. Then they ordered them never again to speak in the name of Jesus, and they let them go.
41 The apostles left the high council rejoicing that God had counted them worthy to suffer disgrace for the name of Jesus. 42 And every day, in the Temple and from house to house, they continued to teach and preach this message: “Jesus is the Messiah.”
Observation
Persecution does not stop the work of God in our world today. In fact, in many places in our world where persecution is the worse more and more people are coming to put their faith in Jesus.
If you ever have a chance to go on a mission trip to Cuba or China you can experience this first hand. Hopefully not the persecution part but I would hope you could see how powerful God’s church is in those hostile countries. I haven’t been to China yet, but I have read a lot of books about how the underground church continues to grow there in spite of severe persecution.
We live in a country where we are not going to be flogged or thrown in jail for teaching and preaching the message that “Jesus is the Messiah”. In fact, we have almost total freedom to go house to house in our neighborhoods sharing the Good News about Jesus. Yet, for the most part, we aren’t doing it.
Maybe things need to get worse for believers here in our country before we share our faith like we should. I heard someone say the other day, “Christians need to stand up for their rights; our country is in the shape it is in because we don’t take a stand.” My response to the comment even though I didn’t say it was this, “Christians don’t have rights.”
We have yielded our rights to Jesus Christ. We are slaves to Christ. Yes, I think we should take a stand on moral issues, I think we should take a stand for what we believe, but we aren’t able to demand our rights because those rights have been yielded over to Jesus Christ.
Galatians 2:20 comes to my mind when I think of my rights as a Christian, “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
I know that this is an election year. Florida is bombarded right now with politicians. I am sure that you have your favorite person that you believe that should be in the White House. Let me just encourage you to maintain a balance in your Christian life and remember that sharing the Good News of Jesus should always be our number one priority.
Application
I will look for people that need to hear about Jesus this week and share with them.
Prayer
Heavenly Father, I pray for the right person to be elected to lead our country, a person that has strong moral values and that is honest. I would pray that it would be someone that has a personal relationship with You so that he would be able to call on You for help in leading this great nation. I pray that You give me the opportunity to share Jesus with someone this week. You are a Wonderful Savior. Be glorified today as we worship You in our churches.
No comments:
Post a Comment