Please click this NEW LINK to pray for us(March 9, 2010 to June 16)!!! Today’s Reading: James 2
Welcome! The purpose of this blog is to encourage Christians to have daily devotion - a wonderful and intimate time with Jesus.
There are three reasons for you to use this blog as your daily devotion:
1. A healthy spiritual diet - One chapter of the Bible daily. We really need at least one chapter of Bible daily so that we are well fed.
2. A good example of Spiritual Journaling - What I have committed for 1,189 days(the Bible has 1,189 chapters)to write this daily post is not for teaching purposes but this is my daily spiritual journal - I write down what I hear from Jesus and how I experience His intimate relationship with me each day. I have launched a wide-spectrum research on daily devotion and have found out that there are less than 10% of Christians that are having daily devotion. Out of that 10%, many having daily devotion are doing so because of guilt (they know that they are Christians and need to have daily devotion and feel guilty if they don’t do that), duty (they need to fulfill their duty as a Christian) or study(lots of Christians primarily use their daily devotion as a time to study the Bible). I do pray and hope that you will make up your mind to have a relational daily devotion so that you can have an intimate time with Jesus. I pray that you will write your own spiritual journal as well.
3. An online discipler – One of the reasons that so many Christians do not have daily devotion is because they do not have a disciple. A discipler can help them build up this basic element of discipleship when they first become Christians. The best way for you is to have a discipler to walk with you for a certain period of time so that daily devotion become a good habit. Or, you may have a small group of two to three people to encourage and be accountable to each other so that you won’t stop your daily devotion. I offer myself as your online disciple to walk with you daily to enrich your spiritual journey. So, shall we start this journey with Jesus Christ our Lord now!
Please read James 2 and listen to what the Lord Jesus Christ would like to tell you before reading my Spiritual Journal below. If you would like to learn a simple and good way of Daily Devotion method please read my “Count Down 5” from this blog. You may click this link directly for the method: Subject Shifting Devotion.pdf. (You may begin with a song to praise the Lord and complete you devotion by singing another praise song.)
Please click the links below to James 2:
Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him? James 2: 5
James does not want Christians to misunderstand that what Paul says about justification by faith. It does not mean that we have no need to do anything. So, what should we do?
It is so easy to say that I am going to pray for you and at the end we never pray for that person. Even if you did pray, that might not be enough if action is needed. James talks about favoritism, showing special attention to someone and discriminating others.
In a shocking result of the book "Reveal" - a two years self-examination research of Willow Creek Community Church, Bill Hybels(the Senior Pastor) was very disturbed for "nearly one out of every four people at Willow Creek was stalled in their spiritual growth or dissatisfied with the church - and many of them were considering leaving."
On the other hand, "Reveal" also shows that small churches may not be an answer to Willow Creek's problem for smallness can foster a "small town" mentality that is very much "outsider unfriendly." Bill Donahue in "Reveal" observes that the two larger churches in which he has served, in contrast to a small congregation of 120, were less intimidating, friendlier, and more open. He rightly says that the issue is quality of relationships and adherence to the gospel. All the above information comes from Dr. Eddie Gibbs' book "Churchmorph".
What I heard from Jesus today is we need to do lots of things so that our church will be a welcoming, friendly, open and relationally close church rather than a intimidating, discriminating and a church showing lots of favoritism. What is your next step to make it happen?
Dear Lord Jesus,
Help me to know what you need me to do and to have the gift and strength to do it. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.
Prayer items today:
For ACiC/AI
Bishop: Rt. Rev. Silas Ng
Network Leader: Rev. Peter Klenner
Network Leadership Team: Rt. Rev. Silas Ng, Rev. Peter Klenner, Rev. Ed Hird, Rev. Simon Neill
Bishop’s Chaplain: Rev. Ed Hird
Clergy Formation Advisor: Rev. Ken Bell
Administrator: Mrs. Zenia Cheng
Pray for one ACiC/AI church one day at a time
Toronto Emmanuel Church
Rector/Senior Pastor: Rev. Edmund Ho
Record for our 2nd phase of 100 days of prayers : this new link to participate in our 2nd phase 100 days/24 hours Prayer Campaign (Nov 29, 2009 to March 8, 2010)Record for our 1st phase of 100 days of prayers(2nd part 60 days): this link(August 20 to Nov. 28, 2009)
Record for our 1st phase of 100 days of prayers(1st part 40 days): http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AbI_guJWaO4DZGRnYjNqZzRfMTRmZHFndjMzZA&hl=en
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.