FOR PASTORS, ON MONDAY
from PreachingToday.com
Crouching Sin, Gathered Grace
A young fellow came to our door the other day selling security systems, including a little camera allowing us to see who is at the door. No matter how good it is, there’s a threat that camera would miss. “Sin is crouching at your door,” God told Cain, with a warning that echoes down to us.
Fingerprints
I confess that I always harbored the hope that one day, if we remained faithful, people would just start coming through our doors in bunches, wide-eyed, whispering, “Can it be true?!” We’d just stand back and be amazed. But when I came to retirement early this year that had never happened.
Remember Who You Are
One effect of this long isolating season is that God’s people start to forget who they are when they can’t be together. Our identity is wrapped up in our Christian family. Churchless Christians develop a kind of spiritual dementia, an amnesia where they forget their identity.
The Parable of the Contractor
This incredibly wealthy man, who clearly wanted the best of everything, required that his house be built from bricks of mud and straw, that the woodwork be of driftwood and salvaged lumber, that the carpets be of woven rags, and the windows crafted from broken glass.
Through the Door
Now this season of the Great Interruption is a good time to step outside to stand by your church’s lampstand and listen. Be quiet. Be humble.
Take Them to the Mountain
Lead your brothers and sisters to this homeland they have never seen. When they feel like they live in dangerous dark alleys, we take them again to Mt. Stronghold, to the heavenly Jerusalem—their “foundation of peace.”