Smallest Seed

Image from Instash Today, the modern church has gotten quite creative. It's doing a lot of ministries that seem to compete even with government programs or the rotary club, like dental and medical missions, sports clinics, bikers' clubs and feeding programs, to name a few. It also has crowd-drawing programs like concerts, music fests and non-stop worship that target especially the youth. These are all good and in keeping with Paul's maxim, "All things to all men, that I may save some." Indeed, we can lend the world our creative minds in Christ to help more people. For instance, instead of just giving poor folks free meals or helping calamity victims with relief goods, we add a little spiritual color by sharing God's Word, too. What Jesus Actually Did But we should be careful not to neglect Jesus' real ministry in the bible. Ministry diversification is good---exploring more ways to reach people by becoming creatively responsive to their need

Image from Pinterest. Lots of times we forget that we're engaged in a spiritual, cosmic war, not a battle against flesh and blood. Often we think ministry is about competing with other churches for being the most numerous church of all. Thus, our actions are confined to the earthly realm, though we try to garnish what we do with prayers and worship to make it look spiritual in nature. Stuck to the Earthly A lot of churches can't go beyond the physical because that's all the realm they know. They grope in the dark once they try to venture even at the threshold of the supernatural. They can't tell between spirits and often mistake the devil's schemes as the will of God. How would we react, for instance, if someone is all praises to us? Paul met a girl with a demon who praised him and company as "servants of the Most High God who are telling you the way to be saved." Sounds good to the ego. We'd probably take the compliment all ears, es

Image from TripAdvisor. One day, Nehemiah asked Hanani and company about the exiles that had returned to Judah. They had been to Jerusalem and witnessed the situation for themselves. They told him: "Those who survived the exile and are back in the province are in great trouble and disgrace. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been burned with fire.” How the Problem is Seen Hanani and company understood the problem to be physical. The wall structure had been broken down, and because of that the Jews there were in big trouble and disgrace. Even today, many people cannot see beyond the natural. They see their need for a church building (or repair of the same), low attendance or church income, lack of musical instruments, or lack of good church programs. But Nehemiah saw the real problem at once. He prayed: Remember the instruction you gave your servant Moses, saying, ‘If you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the nations, 9 but if you return

Image from Reliable Plant. They always see it this way---a church that remains without a "daughter church" is on "maintenance mode" and in danger of extinction. Yeah? Says who? I don't know where they get concepts like this and treat it as bible-truth. Just because some popular guy (or a guy with a super mega church) said it, they think it's infallible word. So they collect all what he said and make a big deal about it. They base everything they do on his words. Church Idols They're all prone to worship popular ministers and theologians. What about the WORD? They've grown tired of searching the WORD and started pursuing man's words and precepts. I even heard it said that people in church have had too much of God's Word. They need to look at something else. What? Too much of God's Word? Really? They look for strategies and systems for church growth devised by some so-called church planters who have "proved" themselves

Image from AllWallpaper.in Here's the Past Article If you're a pastor, you should learn how to spot real generals of God in your church. As a pastor, you may or may not be a real general---yet. Earthly positions do not determine rank in God's Kingdom army. To be a general, you should understand how the least is the greatest and the greatest is servant of all. So, as a pastor, search for generals. These are lowly folks whose presence in church does not seem to count much because they are not that active and often merely sit in the back pews watching church does its thing---the usual operations and procedures in worship services and ministry. But they have strong faith and deep personal spiritual lives in Christ. They're well equipped in Scriptures and live according to the Word. Regular church members are good, but these low-profile generals move heaven and earth by their faith. Angels obey their every beck and call and devils shudder at their word. You r

Image from Play.Google.Com Here's Part 1 The patriarchs, apostles and prophets in the bible were authentic generals, of course. Not because of their accomplishments but God called them to be so. Gideon didn't think he was a general in God's army, but the angel convinced him so. "The Lord is with you mighty warrior!" the angel told him. Abraham, Moses, David, Jeremiah---they all didn't feel apt for the work. Yet undoubtedly, they were God's generals. On the other hand, those who were presumptuous were actually nobodies in the eyes of God. I remember Pharaoh, Korah, King Jeroboam, Haman (in the time of Esther and Mordecai), those who opposed the rebuilding of the temple and walls of Jerusalem, King Zedekiah and those who opposed Jeremiah and thought they heard from God---they all presumed they had God's favor on their side. Yup, even Miriam and Aaron who thought they should be equal with Moses. In the New Testament, the Herods thought t

Image from Saatchi Art. Often, when we say "great church leaders" today, we refer to people's visible leadership achievements---ministry size, money, building structure, titles and degrees, possessions---things the flesh appreciates. I very seldom see people refer to deep spiritual qualities. Thus we see "spiritual generals" today. They are leaders who produce what the physical eyes respect. Once upon a time I also saw things in that light. Physical size and quantity determined what I thought pleased God and merited his commendation, "Good and faithful servant." Because that was what we were taught in church. God had nothing to do whatsoever with anything small and simple. It had to be grand and glamorous. But then the Lord started showing me the truth. God's value system is the exact opposite of what the world commends. The least is the greatest. It's there in the Gospel but somehow we always fail to see it for what it really is.

Image from Dreamstime. That they may be one as you and I are one. This was Jesus' ardent prayer to the Father, asking all believers to be brought into "complete unity," the same unity the Father and Son have. Only through this will the world really see that God sent Jesus and that he loves us in the exact way the Father loves him. I've been urging believers about this since 10 or 15 years ago or so---perfect unity of all believers. In Acts, all believers were in  a near-perfect degree of unity. There was one single church spread out in various localities in the world. Just one church. Though partially united (because Paul said small schisms and divisions were starting in Corinth), they turned the world upside down. In Thessalonica, the complaint against the church was that, "These men who have caused trouble all over the world have now come here." See that impact? What more if the unity was really complete? But church never pursued this unity. The

Image from iStock. Here's Part 1 So Jesus went around preaching the Gospel to people and leaving them to make a decision on their own. He never encouraged or made it easy for people to believe his Gospel and follow him. He never visited people and checked if they were ready to believe in him. There were even times when he avoided crowds who were after him. Simon and his companions went to look for him, 37 and when they found him, they exclaimed: “Everyone is looking for you!” 38 Jesus replied, “Let us go somewhere else—to the nearby villages—so I can preach there also. That is why I have come.” 39 So he traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out demons. [Mark 1] I can't imagine pastors doing this today. Ignore a crowd that's after you? Pastors would give anything to keep that crowd. They'd sacrifice themselves just to have lots of people in their churches. But not Jesus. He seems to be saying, "You want to join me? Pursue

Image from Leisure OneHowTo. Here's the first part.  You can never kick out Jesus from his church---unlike most pastors today. They're often at the mercy of their members, especially the influential ones, and one mistake gets them kicked out so easily. So they try to please these members. I've seen it happen lots of times. How did it come to this? Because they started out pleasing people. They invite them to church and try to be nice to them and plead with them to attend church regularly and be regular members. They beg them to come back next Sunday and so on. This surely builds churches (by pampering people) and can make them grow fast, but Jesus never did any of them. He always had this challenge---take it or leave it. "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." [Matthew 16.24] I don't see this principle working in church anymore. I mean, for instance, here's this guy who tries your church and

Image from HuffPost. I've seen it happen countless times since I was among young people in church. Pastors doing everything they could to get people in so they can start a church. They'd been doing it then, young pastors are still doing it now. And what do they have? A disaster that often starts out right but turns horrible (and more horrible) as time passes. No "ever-increasing glory"  which Paul talked about to the Corinthians. Jesus wants a glorious church, without spot or wrinkle or any other blemish. He won't settle for less. I can't imagine Christ settling for a semi-glorious church with stains and folds and creases. They always say church is a collection of imperfect, flawed people God has accepted by grace and mercy. And that's what church has been---flawed and imperfect and getting worse as time goes by because some preachers pointed church to that direction. They taught us there's no perfect church so just settle for messed up

Image from workstride. If you haven't read Ecclesiastes yet, you should now. The Teacher (King Solomon) experimented on life and found out that nothing really makes sense in this world, even things we do for God if he's not in it. It's amusing to find Solomon (whom God gave great wisdom) saying,  "Do not be overrighteous, neither be overwise-- why destroy yourself? In this meaningless life of mine I have seen both of these: the righteous perishing in their righteousness, and the wicked living long in their wickedness. 16 Do not be overrighteous, neither be overwise—why destroy yourself? [Ecclesiastes 7] But it wasn't Solomon alone who saw it. Many other Old Testament prophets also did. Jeremiah was so pissed off with his life at one time that he wished he were dead at birth. He even felt "deceived" by God. Elijah, after performing great signs and wonders against Baal's prophets on Mt. Carmel, wanted to die because he felt everything was