Smallest Seed

Pexels To a lot of people, a ministry favored by God is peopled, moneyed and garbed with impressive facilities. To them that's a growing church. If you're one of them, you'd always look for these things when searching for a church or when sizing up one because smart Alecks say it's how you know if your ministry is in God's will. But this standard is nowhere in the bible. It's man's invention. A church led by the Holy Spirit cannot be measured in the flesh or by any earthly measurement. God looks at it quite differently. To him, it's all spiritual because God is spirit. Going solely by spiritual merits is how you know if your ministry is in God's will or not. Here are 7 signs to watch out for: People deepen in the Word and make it always the priority. People live the Jesus LIFE and character. People give up everything. People don't care about programs. Church uses money on people, not buildings. Church operates in the 5-f...

Pexels Part 1 Here Is Being Small Sin? They've made it a doctrine that small is sin. They won't admit it but it's there. Most pastors lose sleep over it. They lose their health, happiness and temper wondering how not to be small. It's become these pastors' number one fear---being a small church. They think small is "dead" especially if you remain small. Some smart Aleck inculcated into their minds that God gets so angry when they're small. Actually, it's nowhere in Scriptures. Yes, God wants us to evangelize and make disciples of as many people as we can, but he never commanded anywhere that, "thou shalt be a big local church!" Numbers and growth remain God's decision alone. He decides the size of your church. Your only responsibility is to be faithful with what you're given, period. So, you shouldn't fear having a small church or even losing members. No reason for pastors' number one fear. So neither the one w...

Image from  Tenth Amendment Center. Most pastors, no matter how fearless or unperturbed they seem in ministry, have this number one fear---fear of losing members. A dwindling membership. In fact, a lot of them sacrifice their lives and families and plunge headlong to ministry, not because they love Jesus and lost souls, but because they fear losing membership. It's most pastor's number one fear. They fear having a small church. Well, not all of them, but most of them. Be free from the slavery of that fear. Click here. Something close to that is another pastors' greatest fear---no church at all. Because to them, having just 2 or three followers is not church. They laugh if you call that a church, especially if you quote Matthew 18:20---they'd say you're out of context. I've seen pastors, thinking they're smart theologians, laugh at this "uncontextualized" interpretation. You don't need human theology to understand this---you j...

PInterest This is among rarely noticed events in Scripture (in fact, among unseen Gospel truths) but which reveals a lot about Jesus, the way he operates and his Kingdom. This devil, from Gadarenes and whose name was Legion (because they were many), asked Jesus to let them transfer from the man they possessed to the herd of pigs nearby. And Jesus allowed them. Jesus granted the devil's request! Why? Sound reasoning would tell us he should've just sent them to the Abyss or somewhere else where they wouldn't cause harm or damage. That way, everyone would be happy. But no, Jesus granted the devil's request. He sent them to the herd of pigs which numbered about 2,000, says Mark, and they all drowned themselves in the nearby lake. Naturally, the townsfolk affected by the swine industry protested and begged him to go away. How much is a pig today? Just to get an idea what the picture is, let's say it's Php 4,000 a pig of regular size. With 2,000 pigs th...

Money Crashers Still in Luke 16 (on the crooked steward or manager who was commended by his boss), Jesus showed how to be trustworthy with worldly wealth. We need to. We need to prove we can handle worldly wealth the right way so God can entrust true riches to us. So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? A lot of believers misread this. They think being trustworthy with worldly wealth is keeping their money in banks and making it grow big there, buying big properties (doing so is "wisely" investing our money, they say), getting rich or being careful to put money only on things that will guarantee ROI. To many churches this is "good" stewardship. If you lose money, they'd say you're a bad steward. But Jesus tells us in the parable that using worldly riches to gain friends is how to be trustworthy with world wealth. Nothing is said about banks, investment or careful disposal. In the par...

DeviantArt Second Part Here Peter didn't like the idea how Jesus would suffer a lot, be humiliated and killed. He corrected Jesus about it. But Jesus rebuked him, equating him with Satan because his mind was only on man's concerns, not God's. Anything that serves only human needs and concerns is satanic, says Jesus, and that's where the church is headed for---man's glory. It has nothing to do whatsoever with Jesus' great commission, though they may be actively involved in "evangelism." That isn't God's plan at all. God's Strategy for Kingdom Come For the Kingdom to come ( Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven ), the church needs to live the Beatitudes on a natural, daily basis, where being least is glorified, being allied with the weak, the oppressed and belittled. Go over the Sermon and you'd see how God sees "Thy Kingdom come" coming about. It comes when we finally appreciate that havin...

Youtube First Part It's a glorious plan, bringing down to earth the Kingdom of heaven, so that in these last days heaven shouts saying, "The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah, and he will reign for ever and ever." [Revelation 11.15]. Jesus' great commission stated in Matthew 6 ( Thy Kingdom come ) is the Alpha and Omega of God's present move in these last days. And this great commission is to be implemented by Jesus' discipleship. Thus, Jesus' great commission is really in two parts--- Thy Kingdom come and make disciples . They cannot be separated, as the greatest commandment (love God with your all and love your neighbor as yourself) cannot be separated. We're to be a Kingdom within a kingdom. God's strategy is like yeast a woman mixed with three measures (60 pounds, says one translation) of dough until the whole thing is "worked through" or "permeated with" yeast. You...

Click here for UNSEEN GOSPEL articles. Everybody reads the letter of the Gospel, and in fact even the devil has been enjoying it for centuries. But very few see the Spirit of the Gospel---or the Unseen Gospel. Paul said the Letter kills but the Spirit gives life [2 Corinthians 3]. He was talking of the old and new covenant here, but the same applies to the Gospel, for both the Covenants and the Gospel are the Word of God. And even if our gospel is unseen, it is unseen to those who are perishing. [CSGV 2 Corinthians 4.3] Picture above from Pujiang Longsheng Crystal Art & Craft Co., Ltd.   Unless you are truly surrendered to Jesus (and you no longer live but HE lives in you), a spiritual veil covers your face to prevent you from seeing the unseen Gospel. If you remain unseeing, you perish spiritually. Again, Paul said it clearly to the Corinthians: The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays...