Showing posts with label master teacher. Show all posts
Showing posts with label master teacher. Show all posts

Wednesday 16 October 2013

Pulpit reserved for the pastor

In the church-buildings we still find today with lesser attendants than some years ago the pulpit was and is still reserved for the pastor.
The Christian Flag displayed next to the pulpi...
The Christian Flag displayed next to the pulpit on the chancel of a church sanctuary. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)


Many Christians consider the pulpit a sacred space for someone who recognized the sacred duty. This place on a raised platform, usually surrounded by a barrier, set up in churches as the appointed place for preaching, leading in prayer, etc., is looke on by many as a holy sanctuary where nothing but the truth is been told. The church members would not dare to question those things which were said there.

Men of the cloth can find their honoured place where everybody looks at them as their teacher and guide in this world full of difficulties.

Those men of faith have now found their own soap on television in the United states of America.
"The Preachers of L.A." represents the distilled toxicity of Christianity combined with a money-obsessed generation of American preachers. Even to sympathizers, the show seems to reaffirm all the negative stereotypes about greedy prosperity preachers more interested in bling than the Bible.
Since large church pastors are on television and prominently featured in media, many think that’s what the church experience should reflect. In their eyes, Jesus would have failed miserably as a pastor (He had only 12—or 11 if you exclude Judas—faithful “members” of His ragtag band). 

People expect to hear from the pulpit how they can have a better life. By the teaching of those standing on that holy platform and their example, they showed a generation of believers how they could use their faith to change their circumstances.They wanted to have their flock to believe that faith could heal bodies, multiply finances, restore families and bring a taste of heaven down to Earth.

In the previous years the examples of many 'men of God' (mainly Catholic priests and bishops) did give the world a totally different picture than the Master Teacher Jesus would have loved to see, and presented them with something they would not like to happen to their children.

Though the pastor or priest was and is still seen by many Christians as God's mouthpiece. Many also expect from him that he will bring a message that is to deliver the people of God from bondage and sin. Recognizing this, the preacher's accompanying humility-laden approach to sermonizing would cause others to grow deeper in their faith. As John Wesley puts it, the preacher's duty was to "catch on fire" so "others will love to come and watch you burn."

asks

Have we doused the fire in the Black church? Have we grabbed our extinguishers labeled "prosperity," "tradition," and "justice," and forgotten about the Gospel? Do we just run across the pulpit as a shortcut to our next destination? Have preachers forgotten about that sacred space?
Let us be honest and recognise that today there are so many faithful men and women of God who are faithful to god His Word. For them it is not the word of a human being that should be the most important word. That pulpit where  many look at should not be that sacred space.

The television may make a caricature of ministry in the American church, but without the history of tradition and the equivocating vague and duplicitous religious language the holy books would not have reached so many. In time many modern believers have had to change the way they think about their holy books. Today all interested in religion can find many websites discussing all sorts of beliefs. The language used over there by some is not always nice but should give a good idea where the better people could be or where it is wrong to spend time and to follow the insulting words of those calling themselves preacher, pastor, prophet or man of god.

In the world of Christendom there are even persons who say:



Unless you’re a Young Earth Creationist Christian you have to accept these days that the Bible is not the inerrant word of God. At best it’s a human interpretation of the revelations it is supposed to contain.
Those interpretations made that many thoughts crossed each other. We can not ignore that some modern theists have almost squirrelled God away out of critical reach, making their Christianity virtually atheistic Humanism – which then raises the question of what they actually have faith in, and why they continue to put such store in a book like the Bible.

For a long time the Christian church world has gone far away from the Word of God. They seemed to have lost the way that recaptures the heart of the Gospel and can help fan the flame some have tried to extinguish by making other stuff the main thing.

We should get back to the basics and remember that Jesus was not standing in front of a mega church, standing on a pulpit presenting his own ideas. As a real man of God he enjoyed being with ordinary folks, talking with them as a friend, not as a higher being. for Jesus it was not his Word nor his will that was important. Ha wanted the will of his Father to be done. He also wanted that as many people as possible could find the way to his Father, the Only One God. to get them there, Jesus used the Holy Scriptures, the Torah, which was the Law for the people to follow.

By Jesus and his apostles the Word of God and the Good News or the Gospel was always center.

writes:

Today also all other church-related matters should be submitted to the supremacy of the Gospel. This removes the man-glory of the prosperity gospel and replaces it with God-centered preaching that says we were created for His glory. This removes the racist-worn stains of bitterness and hatred and moves us toward reconciliation. The Gospel bridges the generational gap and finds us all at the foot of the Cross. That’s the third way. Not every pastor wants to be famous. There are those who want to make Jesus’ name famous. Not every pastor waters down the Gospel for the sake of political affiliation. There are those who care more deeply about people’s souls than what they check on a ballot. And this third way, this Gospel way, has burned incessantly for centuries. And although I lament, I’m encouraged by the grace-fueled flame flickering in the darkness. And I echo John’s words in Revelation: Come, Lord Jesus.
Today, we have so many people that believe differently and preach different things behind pulpits.We should look carefully at them and see how they behave and if they live according to their preaching. We also should check what is first on their lips and where their own heart lies. That pulpit in the church like many know it is not thé place where we should hear the Word resounding. From everywhere around us we should hear the call to come to know Jesus and to come to know his Father, the Divine Creator.

Every person who believes in the offer Christ took on himself for the sins of so many, should follow his teachings and should go out in the world, making every possible place a 'pulpit' a 'platform' for the spreading of the Gospel. And that person presenting the Word of God should do it with love for everybody around him, believer, non-believer and other-believer.

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Wednesday 17 March 2010

The manager and Word of God

By reading the Bible thorough we can take it up in us. We can let the Word of God work in us, penetrate in us, and even let it change us.  In our everyday surroundings it can accumulate in us and let us take other actions then most of the world would take. As the Mind of God can inspire and lead us.  So God can even to come to live in us through the Holy Spirit and change us from inside out.  The Spirit in us produces fruit.  That is: tolerated love, joy, peace, kindness and goodness, belief, gentleness and self-control.  These beautiful qualities can we, as we let that belief work in us, also let to work in on others. When we are managers or bosses we do not have to be the dictators or the person in charge who does not take into account the human social relations and conditions. Our attitude, the way we treat the people under our management, has to show others that we are followers of the Master Teacher Jesus Christ, and that we are all children of God, or God's creation.

In Naargelang gelovige of niet gelovige baas I talk about the findings of managers of different beliefs and how they treat their workers.

In het Nederlands kan u een artikel vinden over het Verschil tussen protestantse managers en katholieke en niet-christelijke leidinggevenden
> Naargelang gelovige of niet gelovige baas

Thursday 23 July 2009

A Living Faith #12 The Love for Jesus

My love for the Lord Jesus

“And He took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, "This is my body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of me. Likewise, He also took the cup after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is shed for you.” Luke 22:19-20

& What does this mean in practical terms?

Ø  I must love Jesus more than everything else, even my family or my own life. Luke 14:26-27; Matt 10:37-38; Col 3:1-4
Ø  I must keep the commandments of Christ and by so doing remain in his love. John 15:10
Ø  My one goal is to show my love for the Lord Jesus Christ and that he might dwell in my heart through faith. Eph 3:17-19
Ø  Jesus must be my example in everything and I will try to be like him. 1Peter 2:21-23; John 13:15-16
Ø  Only through Jesus can my sin be covered, therefore I must remain in him.  John 15:5-7; Heb 2:1-3
Ø  I will remember Jesus each week by breaking bread and drinking wine in the way he has commanded. Matt 26:26-27; 1Cor 11:24-26; Acts 2:42; 20:7
Ø  I was bought at a great price by God who provided salvation through His Son the Lord Jesus Christ, therefore my life is not my own to live as I please, but must be lived to the glory of God. 1Cor 6:19-20
Ø  Jesus is the most important person in my life; therefore, I must acknowledge him before others. Luke 12:8-9; Mark 8:38
Ø  My aim must be to prepare diligently for when Jesus Christ returns. Because of this, I will not get too engrossed with the work and interests of this life. Matt 24:44; Luke 12:35-38, 40; 2Peter 3:10-14
Ø  The need for endurance to face hardships and difficulties is essential; I must remain confident and persevere until the end. Matt 24:11-13; 2Tim 2:3; Heb 3:13-14; Rev 2:10&25
Ø  In times of weakness I will remember that Jesus was tempted in all the ways that I am, yet without sin and is now able to mediate for his people before God and seek forgiveness through him. Heb 4:15-16; 1Tim 2:5; Heb 8;6, 9:15
Ø  I will always offer prayer to God through the dear name of Jesus. John 16:26-27
Ø  I will not accept any man ‘Rabbi’ (teacher) or Master because only Jesus is my High Priest, Teacher and Master. Matt 23:7-10
  - Andy Peel