Do you ever wonder about why you do what you do? Why do you minister? Why, as a Christian, do you have a blog?
I've asked myself these questions many times, and almost ceased the small amount of blogging I do achieve.
Robert Murray M’Cheyne, on the 8th July,1836, wrote in his diary, "Since Tuesday have been laid up with illness. Set by once more for a season to feel my unprofitableness and cure my pride. When shall this self-choosing temper be healed? ‘Lord, I will preach, run, visit, wrestle,’ said I.
‘No, thou shalt lie in thy bed and suffer,’ said the Lord.
"Today missed some fine opportunities of speaking a word for Christ. The Lord saw I would have spoken as much for my own honor as His, and therefore shut my mouth. I see a man cannot be a faithful minister, until he preaches Christ for Christ’s sake – until he gives up striving to attract people to himself, and seeks only to attract them to Christ. Lord, give me this!”
Why am I blogging? Why are you? Are my opinions and yours so important or profound?
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About Me
- Aussie John
- G'day mates! My name is John and I'm an old Christian bloke, retired, through ill health, from being a teaching elder (pastor) amongst God's called out people. I have seen my retirement as God's gift of a caesura (a pause prior to an emphasis.),and am looking forward to what He has in store. I am happily married, for 55 years, to Val, the most precious girl in the world.
6 comments:
Good question. I started my blog to help me think through some of my studies. I continue to study because I've found that I've learned as much from people who interact here as from books.
-Alan
Great questions, and great thoughts. I've always had a persistent desire to preach "the gospel to the saved," as Paul Anderson-Walsh calls it... helping Christians to live in the freedom for which Christ set them free. That's why I began blogging.
I can't deny that "ego" (self) has crept in from time to time. I suppose that would be true of just about anyone who has any type of speaking/writing/teaching/etc platform. For me, it's truly been the interaction with others, and their thoughts and opinions, that has played a large part in keeping me level.
I've also simply found it futile if "I" am the attraction... LOL. Who cares about me? (in that sense). It's all about HIM!
Alan & Joel,
Thank you for your comments.
I will reply more fully with my next blog. Sufficient to say you both encompass much of my own beginning attitude.
Interesting opening thoughts.
I've kind of taken 1 Corinthians 3:21-23 as my life verses and am seeing anything I choose to do [as an activity] is for me a legitimate thing when I see it as a gift and as a God thing.
Paul uses the men named in that passage as different and yet all/each a gift. The principle for me is that every different kind of thing in my life is a gift. So insignificant and even shallow things like blogging can be seen as a God thing for me.
This relates to things that don't violate the Word of God of course and things that don't harm life as a sacred thing or control life.
This has put a new spin on things for me so that I don't see a distinction between spiritual and secular any longer. All of life is a God thing.
Aussie John, I don't know how this will fit with what you may be going to say and I may be off target here with your purpose but, it's the direction my mind went.
As always, I enjoy your thoughts immensely.
Paul,
I'm pleased you commented. Your thoughts certainly resonate with my own.
Paul... I've come to see more and more what you're talking about - the erasing of the imaginary line between secular and sacred. I've heard others talk about it in the past and I've appropriated it to a point in my life, and I think it's becoming more of a reality every day.
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