livingwaters “Church is for the assembly of saints. You wont find inviting unbelievers in the Bible, it is a convention that only ‘works’ in non-hostile cultural Christianity areas of the world. Assuming we agree that church is for hearing the Word, fellowship, and prayer (Acts 2:42), then none of that applies to unbelievers since they cannot understand the Word (1 Cor 2), we shouldnt be fellowshipping with them (2 Cor 6), they should not be partaking of the Lords Supper (1 Cor 11) and their prayers are an abomination to God (Prov 28:9). That pretty well sums up the purpose of the Sunday assembly. Again, I say we all agree to Sola Scriptura when it comes to our methodology and things would work out very well even among diverse theological (and evangelistic) perspectives.” J. N. We agree that the Church is for hearing God’s Word, for fellowship, and prayer. As believers we exist to exalt Jesus Christ and Him crucified--through the teaching of God’s Word, through our fellowship in Christ, and we of course pray through Him. He is the Alpha and the Omega of our existence. No matter what avenues of theology down which the preacher travels, he should always come back to the cross of Jesus Christ, because there we see the love of God. At the cross His perfect justice, His righteousness, and His mercy are displayed (see Romans 1:16-17). Charles Spurgeon said, “Is it not a strange thing that the advanced believer, when he reaches to the height of piety, just comes to the place where he started? Do we not begin at the cross, and when we have climbed ever so high, is it not at the cross we end up?” However, continual glorying in the cross is a foreign concept to those preachers who have forgotten that the Church exists as a light for this dark world (see Matthew 5:14). We labor with God to search for the lost sheep, we search for the lost coin, and we continually look for the lost prodigal. Such a spirit of love doesn’t stop because we gather in fellowship. Rather, our evangelistic light should glow brighter. Paul lived for the lost. He became all things to all men that he might by “any means” save some. If we have no concern for the lost—the false converts who sit in our midst (the goats among the sheep, the bad fish among the good, the foolish virgins among the wise and tares among the wheat), then we will be self-absorbed. We will feast sumptuously while Lazarus sits at the gate. We will be the off-duty firefighter who lets people burn, because he’s not in uniform. We are commanded to “go” into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature, and when the world comes into our midst, we are to preach to them also. If you have a pastor after Paul’s heart, he won’t let a sermon pass through his God-fearing lips without reaching out to the unsaved. How could he not! Love isn’t determined by our location. God bless such a pastor; and God bless such a church. To such an environment invite the unsaved...and, may God save them, as He has done with multitudes down through the ages.
Posted on: Wed, 06 Aug 2014 19:00:02 +0000
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