My hope for us all is that God would provide a hedge of protection around each of our hearts; that we would always be eager to press on to know the Lord and follow Him in joy.  God could do that, I pray for that, and yearn for that to be each of our stories when we arrive in Heaven to see Jesus face to face.

Knowing the brokenness of the world, and the brokenness of my own heart, I know that story is the exception rather than the rule.  I’ve been open to share that I neglected disciplines in my pursuit of God.  In my own life there has been more than one time when my heart became far from God.  It is the mercy and grace of God that calls us back to Himself, and the means God uses to accomplish this are His people.

It’s because of this truth, that I plead with those who claim to be Christ followers apart from the Church to find a church to belong to, and to find a group of people within that they can go through life with, both as an encourager to them, and as someone who can be encouraged by them in the Truth of God’s Word.

James 5:19-20 – “My brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.”

None of us is immune to the sin in the world or our own hearts.  1 Corinthians 10:12 – “Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.”  If we are not vigilant in our pursuit of God, we will drift from Him, and we will soon find ourselves in places we never thought we would be.  In those times, a voice of a brother or sister in Christ preaching the Truth of God to us, to bring repentance and renewed faith, praying for us, being with us, loving us, is the means by which God saves us.  Ecclesiastes 4:10 – “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil.  For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!”

If you were to fall away from God today (and any of us could), who would be the persons in your life who would call you back?  Are you that person to others in your life?  The biggest lie of cultural Christianity is that faith is private and personal.  It is neither, and any faith that may exist in that manner will not withstand a lifetime of trials in a broken world.

The people of God are a gift from God to us.  We are meant to be the hands and feet of God to others.  As our culture is turning against Christianity more and more, the trials will increase, and it will be even more imperative that we have each other.  1 John 4:10-12 – “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.  Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.”  Stay encouraged, keep running the race God has given you, and treasure those faithful brothers and sisters in Christ God has gifted to you, by putting them in your life.  

Grace and Peace,

Adam