I easily forget

It is so easy to forget the power that comes from speaking the Gospel.  I was thankful to be reminded this past week through a couple intense conversations, in which I SAW that it would only be the supernatural power of Christ's truth that would break through the decades of numbness and denial before me.

I'm so thankful for these conversations and these relationships - though hard - to be reminded that we NEED the power of Christ to wake us up, to break us out of cycles of sin and pain. To be reminded that THIS is why it is CRUCIAL for the Church to be involved in our communities - why it's so important that ALL of us are investing around us. All the other programs and services we can offer people are good and important as well, but the supernatural power of Christ is what is essential to breaking through numbness and walls, to breaking the lost and hurting out of sin's entrapments. 

This is why it is crucial that we go outside of ourselves and our natural friend groups and invest in the hurting and vulnerable in the community in which God has placed us. Speaking the Gospel of Christ brings power, and through living in relationship with the hurting around us, the love of Christ will be seen as well. As we live in relationship, doing life with the lost, going outside our comfort zone and bridging divides, the fullness of life that comes through living in Christ will be seen. This is what will heal broken lifestyles and change broken cultures. Christ did not go out once a month, do a service project for the poor, then go back to His comfortable life. Christ invited the sick He healed, the lost He touched, the sinners He rebuked, into His life. He ate dinner with them, talked with them, hung out with them - ministered to them through doing life with them, showing them what it looks like to love God and live a life that is glorifying to Him. 

In the same way, we as His followers are called to change something about our very American lifestyles so that we are able to walk with the hurting and vulnerable. Not merely handing out food once a month and feeling we have done our part. No, Christ's example was radically, beautifully different. To live as He lived, to do justice, to walk humbly and worship our God looks different than the example we have often been given. Our broken world and dying culture NEEDS to experience the power of the Gospel of Christ. The world needs to see what it looks like to live in Christ's love. And we are the ones called to show them, through living in relationship and walking with them. This calling, our yoke, is heavy - but our burden is light. Because Christ has gone before, showing us how it is done. And His Spriit goes with us now, teaching us and equipping us.

We must go outside our comfort zones, outside our routines and our natural circles at times. We must be willing to be used as God calls us at different points in our lives. We must not be afraid to speak Truth and rely on the power of the Gospel. We must not be afraid to invite those who are different from us into our lives, to break bread and laugh and cry and do life with those who depserately need to see what it looks like to live in the fullness of Life.

We have the Light of the world in us and we are not to selfishly hide that Light. Christ asks that we follow His lead, startling the world with the fierceness of God's love. Let's walk after Him.