A Plethoric Number of Comments
Well, I learned this weekend that my best friend got married before I went to China. I knew he was engaged, but he up and got hitched without even letting me know. Considering the boy was practically a brother, I figured he would've at least called. What bothers me though is that my name is signed to his wedding certificate as a witness even though I was not there. If he asked me, that's one thing, but to sign my name to a document holding me accountable to his marriage without my approval out right ticks me off. I am, right now, flabbergasted at the amount of divorces there are in the church. I am disturbed how many people think divorce is o.k., when God says in Malachi 2:16, "I hate divorce." I just don't get it. Right now, I am leary of his decision. If, and I pray to God that this if never fufills, he gets a divorce, I am held accountable as a witness. My name says that I approved and made sure that the Lord had called them together. But, I haven't done either of the two. So, right now, I'm a little upset with that whole situation for the sake of the gospel.
On the other hand, I was encouraged tremendously by the middle school's report time at Porter last night. They are solid. Wow. They went on a mission trip to share the gospel in 7th and 8th grade. I never did that, well technically I did but not really, until college. I was encouraged by their faith and by their theology. They put on a skit dealing with calvanism as middle schoolers. I was impressed. They are a blessing to Porter, and God allowed me to worship and glorify Him last night even though I didn't get to here a highly anticipated sermon from Hebrews.
Lastly, let's go back to that skit I mentioned. Let me sumarize it. There were 3 characters: an unbeliever and 2 believers. The nonbeliever asked one of the believers why she believed in Jesus. So, that believer went and did research, for 7 months, about her beliefs. She was prepared to defend creationism, calvanism, and other intellectual arguments. Her friend, the other Christian, just answered the unbelievers question, and he became a believer right there. No in depth study, no man-centered argument, no nothing but the Word of God was needed.
That skit hit me like a ton of bricks. I looked at my life and the life of Porter college. When was the last time anyone from Porter led someone to Christ? When was the last time an unbeliever stepped through the doors of our college department? I can't remember it's been so long, and that is pathetic. When was the last time a discussion about calvanism/armenianism was brought up? When was the last time you heard someone argue about the highest form of worship?
When and where did we lose focus? I'm not saying that these "intellectual debates" aren't good, it's just that you will not hear them much out of the U.S. People outside of the U.S. do good to have part of a Bible, much less a chance to argue this stuff. We have let knowledge get in the way of heart. I know I have. I am guiltiest of them all. Two years ago I shared all the time. This past year I barely shared. I read and got smart, but nobody other than me was benefitted. Instead of using what little I knew to make Christ known on campus, I was busy bulding my internal bank of knowledge up so I could argue with someone. I have missed it. God spoke volumes to me last night. I need to stop worrying about books, except the Word, and I need to share. I need to be making disciples for His glory. I need to be about the people and not about myself. Wow. Praise God for opening the eyes of my utterly depraved and sinful heart to the realties of truth I've failed to do.
I'm done.