10/9/16 Andrew about 45
A coffeeshop question about his beliefs helped me to
quickly find out that Andrew, about 45, has had faith in Jesus for salvation
ever since he was born again at the age of 12.
I love to find out how people’s faith has developed, so I continued to
ask Andrew questions about his faith journey.
But Andrew soon proved that he would rather talk about politics than
religion, turning every one of my inquiries about his relationship with God
into opportunities to air his political views.
Given our debate about which is the lesser of two
evils this year, Andrew’s obsession with politics seems somewhat understandable. But it’s not healthy. It reminds me of Jesus’ admonition to his
disciples whom he had sent out into the world by twos, and who came back with
great excitement about what had been accomplished. Jesus told them “…do not rejoice that the
spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.” (Luke 10)
I have always been reassured by this statement,
because it reorders our priorities as God would have them. He send us into the world, but we are not to
be of the world. In ministry, we may be
tempted to become enamored with what appears to be success, or discouraged with
what appears to be failure, but we must never forget to be grounded in the hope
that we are children of another, far more important Kingdom. If politics is part of the ministry in the
world we have been called to, let’s not become enamored or obsessed by it as
Andrew is. “Do not love the world or
anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in
them.” (1 John 2) Brothers and sisters, let’s
not get carried away by politics. Our
names are written in heaven, and in the long run, nothing else compares!
No comments:
Post a Comment