If we want to speak to a man, we must learn his language first. This phrase means more than just learning a different language, from a different country. It mean that we need to understand the culture in which we live in. In learning a new language ( meaning from a different country ), we learn the new language and learn the culture and how to live with and relate to the people of the language, but we don't change our own morals and our own value systems, unless of course we find our values flawed from learning the new culture. The same goes, however, with learning how to be relevant in a culture such as the 21st century, we change the language in which we speak, but that does not mean that we change the content of what we speak. We definitely should not give up our Biblical standings in order to be more relevant to the culture at hand. So many churches, though, have this view that in learning how to be relevant they need to change themselves, and this, I believe, is a lie of Satan.
To often, as well, Christians when sharing the Gospel respond and interact with the person as if the soul and the person are separate. Yet this is not the case, and although our flesh is sinful, so is our soul and what happens in the flesh can not be separated from the soul and likewise in reverse. The two cannot be separated.
To understand and speak to sincere but utterly confused 21st century people is costly. It is tiring; it will open you up to temptations and pressures. I feel that to often we are told in the church to run from any kind of temptation and pressure, but we are never told that to effectively witness to people means that you are going to open yourself up to such pressures. I think that it is important to understand this, and address this more in our churches. Christians need to understand that if they are going to be involved in living out the Gospel, that means that they are going to be in the world and exposed to all kinds of temptations and pressures. If we are always running from any kind of temptation, like the church preaches, then we do not build up a sense of immunity when we are tempted. When it comes I feel that most Christians instead of attacking it head on, either give in or completely run. They don't know how to handle certain situations. To effectively live out the Gospel and share it with a dying world, we need to understand how to deal with certain situations that arises and live in a secular world that we are so often sheltered from.
Friday, June 26, 2009
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