The prophet murdered the minister (Literally) Part 5
What they see is a congregation of people that look at them as if they are crazy. We are to minister to the lost but when they come to us how do we treat them? How do we look at them? If they join the church do we do follow up and have some saints stay connected with them so they don’t get lost in the shuffle or forgotten all together?
Think of it as if we are a congregation of stewards. JESUS gave the great commission to spread the good news. That is the church’s main mission over anything else. So now these souls come into GOD’S house that HE gave us stewardship over to help minister to people as they try to find shelter of rest and we turn them away in our actions. GOD gives us stewardship over these souls and we can blow it.
For so long many folk out in the streets have viewed people in church as phony. Most people in general whether they be out in the streets or not just want realness. You have many doing ‘fake’ but many who want ‘real’. The image of ‘church folk’ has given the church a bad name and has hindered bringing more souls into the fold.
When we are saved why can’t we quit acting like we have never done anything? As I have heard many ministers preach, “Your ‘mess’ is part of your ‘message’. Your ‘tests’ are part of your ‘testimony’.” We do not have to walk around looking down on folk struggling with sin. We can’t look at these youth and bash them for the same things that we did. If you know some young girl that is out there sexually then why look at here like she is crazy if you know when you were young you lost your virginity in the back seat of an automobile? If this girl looks up to you as a GODLY woman that is all the more reason to share your story instead of hiding it because you do not want to ruin your reputation. Sharing that will show her how you can be at point A doing dirt over here then have GOD change you and bring you to point B. We do these kids a disservice when we keep our testimonies and stories to ourselves. We want to walk around as if we are super holy and clean yet these kids only see that and have no examples of what we came from to get to where we are now. All they see is point B. Tell them about point A. Tell them in rawness what GOD did for you and brought you out of. The stories are not to glorify your past but to let them know just how much GOD is able. Many times you have to minister to what you came from.
If a young girl or even a grown woman comes in the church and she is or was prostituting, don’t look at her like she is dirty when you were heavily fornicating in your past yet you feel it is not the same because you were not getting paid.
When youth and women start commending me about how great it is that I am 41 and have no kids out there I could act like I am the man and never did dirt to get to this point of having no kids, but I tell them about when I was 19, how I got my girl at the time pregnant and how she got an abortion. I have been told by some people who know I share that story with people that I should not tell anyone that but I want them to know that this guy that you think is free of kids because he is so wholesome does have a past. It has helped me in telling youth why they should not do it. It is not my story anyway to hold on to. I could easily hide it because my church is in a different city from the one I grew up in so no one knows my past other than what I share.
These kids are literally facing life and death situations and we have to stop with all this phoniness. Satan is getting raw and dirty with these kids and they die because we are not recognizing how dirty Satan is playing and we continue in the meantime to play soft and fake while our kids die from Satan playing hard and dirty.
There is a church I know about in Cleveland. Great church and it is prospering big time. The pastor there said bring all the people that the other churches don’t want. Bring the prostitutes, the crack addicts, etc. He has some of everybody in his church and it is blowing up. When I say that I am not necessarily focusing on the quickly growing numbers, the fact that he also has pro ball players there, the fact that the church now has multi locations or the fact that he is now on TV. I am talking about the fact that lives are being transformed and changed. Folk who came from the lowest of the lows are now doing well and knowing the goodness of GOD. Former prostitutes, addicts and so on. Someone took time to find value in them.
We have to stop looking at folk who are going through or doing sin and treat them as if they have no value. Do you know all through the Bible GOD does HIS greatest work through the most imperfect people? We are so busy trying to find GOD working through someone with a suit on or someone who speaks with great oratory skills and we miss it.
Let me share some things concerning this that I have seen a lot in my last 12 years in the progressive church.
More on this tomorrow. Blogs posted daily Monday through Friday. Peace and GOD bless, Jamaar.