A Note From Our Pastor
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Our Greatest Need #2: What if?
8 Jan, 2021
January 9, 2021
What if we, as church members, really got serious and followed the counsel given us to spend an hour every day, 24/7, reading, studying, contemplating the life of Jesus? What if we gave ourselves unreservedly to the leading of the Spirit of God? Leonard Ravenhill, an English evangelist, has a moving question on his gravestone, “Are the things you are living for worth Christ dying for?” The book of Acts is many times referred to as “The Acts of the Apostles,” but I sometimes feel it should be called “The Acts of the Holy Spirit.” It is the story of the first century church powered by the Holy Spirit. It is a book of stories of miracles and mission adventures, stories of conversions of every type of person in the then known world. Stories of a church on the move with Spirit-filled passion and action. I also believe that the Holy Spirit was moving upon people in the sixth century during the Protestant Reformation. I also believe the Holy Spirit was again moving upon people in the 19th century all over the world in the wake of the third angel’s message. It is reported that over one million people were converted in America. God was awakening the world to receive the third angel’s message, but the remnant church had not responded wholeheartedly to the Laodicean appeal. A deep work of repentance was needed to fit us for the loud cry of the third angel. Had our church surrendered thoroughly, Christ would have come. Ellen White wrote: “God’s unwillingness to have His people perish has been the reason for so long delay. (Testimonies, vol 2, p.194). How much longer will we be asleep in the light while we watch the world and the USA sleep in darkness? “Are the things you are living for worth Christ dying for?”
What if we, as church members, really got serious and followed the counsel given us to spend an hour every day, 24/7, reading, studying, contemplating the life of Jesus? What if we gave ourselves unreservedly to the leading of the Spirit of God? Leonard Ravenhill, an English evangelist, has a moving question on his gravestone, “Are the things you are living for worth Christ dying for?” The book of Acts is many times referred to as “The Acts of the Apostles,” but I sometimes feel it should be called “The Acts of the Holy Spirit.” It is the story of the first century church powered by the Holy Spirit. It is a book of stories of miracles and mission adventures, stories of conversions of every type of person in the then known world. Stories of a church on the move with Spirit-filled passion and action. I also believe that the Holy Spirit was moving upon people in the sixth century during the Protestant Reformation. I also believe the Holy Spirit was again moving upon people in the 19th century all over the world in the wake of the third angel’s message. It is reported that over one million people were converted in America. God was awakening the world to receive the third angel’s message, but the remnant church had not responded wholeheartedly to the Laodicean appeal. A deep work of repentance was needed to fit us for the loud cry of the third angel. Had our church surrendered thoroughly, Christ would have come. Ellen White wrote: “God’s unwillingness to have His people perish has been the reason for so long delay. (Testimonies, vol 2, p.194). How much longer will we be asleep in the light while we watch the world and the USA sleep in darkness? “Are the things you are living for worth Christ dying for?”
