Some Sierra Leonean ministers of the gospel who are not even living right are becoming too judgemental . But is that the way to really go ? They preach the gospel from a legalistic perspective, instead of being messengers of Jesus Christ. Who are they to judge their fellow Christians when they themselves are not living right with God ? This is a topic I want to deal with today in this short piece.
Man could not save himself so God sent Jesus Christ to come and die for us on the Cross and Romans 10: 9, 10 sets forth the modality for our salvation–If we believe and confess it with our mouth , we shall be saved . Jesus Christ had serious problems with the hard-hearted pharisees, scribes and religious people of his day who refused to submit to the righteousness of God and the standards set by Jesus Christ –They hypocritically wanted to set their own standards , which led to the powerful sermon by Christ –Woe unto you, you hypocrites, who clean the outside of your cups neatly but inside you are full of dead men’s bones. Self-righteousness and legalism are a problem to this day among heretics and apostates. Six times in Matthew 23, Jesus condemns the scribes and Pharisees for rigidly adhering to the letter of the law in order to make themselves look better to others.
I think the world has too many problems already and the world depends on messengers of Christ to lead them but to succeed, we need to preach JESUS CHRIST, not ourselves. We preachers must continue to point people to JESUS CHRIST , who is the only person that can change people through his Holy Spirit . We cannot change ourselves, LET ALONE CHANGE OTHERS , so how can we sit in judgement of others ? OUR DUTY IS TO CONTINUE POINTING MEN TO JESUS CHRIST. Let us change our methods of preaching or else we will drive people away from our churches.
Imagine a man of God telling his congregation from a purely legalistic point of view that God will not answer their prayers ? We are teach our congregation about things that hinder their prayers and admonish them to stay away from these things ( e.g. unforgiveness and bitterness ) . But we have no authority to tell people that God will not answer their prayers. Especially from a self-righteous angle.
Jesus Christ’s message to us is that our hearts must not be troubled. Our message should be : You believe in God believe also in him. He has saved us and gone to prepare us a place. Those who trust in him and follow his teachings have PEACE OF MIND that surpasses all understanding because they know that they have a living and faithful savior who never fails. This world can never give us the peace that Christ gives , because it is full of crooked men who will go all out to deny us peace because of the iniquity of their hearts and that is why Jesus warns us ahead of time . We must strive not to fail Christ by living right with him , but if we do err , we have the BLOOD OF JESUS CHRIST to wipe the slate clean and make us new again. We have to show our congregation the way out. We can preach hard against sin, but we must not leave our congregation hanging on the cross. We must point them to JESUS CHRIST, The author and finisher of their faith.
That is why He came down to earth from Heaven–to show us the way to God through penitence, humility and faith in the finished work of Christ . But many people today do not like to preach about the cross. They preach themselves. THE PREACHING OF THE CROSS IS FOOLISHNESS TO THOSE WHO ARE PERISHING but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. ( 1 Corinthians 1 : 18). The Cross is at the centre of our belief as Christians and we cannot diminish its essence. Jesus Christ told the apostates who wanted to stone the woman to death to consider : He that hath no sin, let him cast the first stone. None did because outwardly they looked holy but inwardly, their hearts were full of jealousy, evil, malice, envy, hatred, and all manners of sin. They just walked away.
Our hearts are troubled today by the Ebola ravaging our people but let us continue to put our trust in JESUS CHRIST and pray . Let us continue to give our people faith that God will answer their prayers. It is cruel for a man of God to insinuate to people that God will not answer their prayers about the Ebola busy killing people in our subcontinent. GOD IS A PRAYER-ANSWERING GOD. His ears are open to our prayers. He will redeem our land and we shall testify to his goodness . That is what true men of God should be preaching , not frightening and judging our people in the midst of their sorrow and anxiety.
All nations and all people, Job-like, undergo trials and tests in this world . This is our own moment of trial and testing, but God will save us like he did to Job and multiply us. This is the message in my mouth right now. I I have no time to fight people seeking undue attention presently. When our nation shall have crossed this huge test to our survival and normal times are restored, it will be time to fight once again. For now, let us continue to help to mobilize resources for our people to overcome this Ebola. Jehovah Bissau, Jehovah El-Shaddai, Jehovah Nissi , hear our prayers for our nation. Give us preachers who develop our faith not those who destroy it.
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