OzThoughts Thursday 12th March 2009.

OzThoughts Thursday 12th March 2009.

(Please forward this OzThoughts to your friends).

When an Australian Prime Minister was asked about his religion, he described himself as a “fellow traveller with Christianity”. If I understood what he meant he was saying he agreed with the philosophy of Christianity but had no commitment to Jesus as saviour or in the sense of daily religious observances.

I wonder if this was the type of thing that Jesus was talking about when he answered the bystander’s question in today’s reading. I wonder, too, if there is a warning there also for people inside the church who are “sometimes worshippers” or those who spend all their time arguing the minute details of belief and practice rather than serving Christ as Lord and Master.

What do you think?

Luke 13:22-30 (The Message)

22 He went on teaching from town to village, village to town, but keeping on a steady course toward Jerusalem.
23-25 A bystander said, "Master, will only a few be saved?"
He said, "Whether few or many is none of your business. Put your mind on your life with God. The way to life—to God!—is vigorous and requires your total attention. A lot of you are going to assume that you'll sit down to God's salvation banquet just because you've been hanging around the neighborhood all your lives. Well, one day you're going to be banging on the door, wanting to get in, but you'll find the door locked and the Master saying, 'Sorry, you're not on my guest list.'
26-27 "You'll protest, 'But we've known you all our lives!' only to be interrupted with his abrupt, 'Your kind of knowing can hardly be called knowing. You don't know the first thing about me.'
28-30 "That's when you'll find yourselves out in the cold, strangers to grace. You'll watch Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all the prophets march into God's kingdom. You'll watch outsiders stream in from east, west, north, and south and sit down at the table of God's kingdom. And all the time you'll be outside looking in—and wondering what happened. This is the Great Reversal: the last in line put at the head of the line, and the so-called first ending up last."



[Listen: Songsters : (Tune: Flow Gently Sweet Afton) : http://www.salvoaudio.com/audio/music/mus_1001.mp3

or

Band (Tune: Unsworth): http://www.salvoaudio.com/audio/music/mus_001.mp3 ]

My Jesus, I love thee, I know thou art mine,
For thee all the pleasures of sin I resign;
My gracious Redeemer, my Saviour art thou,
If ever I loved thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.

I love thee because thou hast first loved me,
And purchased my pardon on Calvary's tree;
I love thee for wearing the thorns on thy brow,
If ever I loved thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.

I will love thee in life, I will love thee in death,
And praise thee as long as thou lendest me breath;
And say, when the death-dew lies cold on my brow:
If ever I loved thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.

In mansions of Glory and endless delight,
I'll ever adore thee and dwell in thy sight;
I'll sing with the glittering crown on my brow:
If ever I loved thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.
Author: William Ralph Featherstone (1846-73)
The Salvation Army Song Book: Song Number: 357



[ In preparation for Easter read a Christian book during Lent which is now. ]


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