Showing posts with label follow Jesus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label follow Jesus. Show all posts

Monday 9 March 2020

Church indeed critical in faith development

Some two thousand years ago, Jesus approached twelve seemingly unsuspecting Galileans and bid them:
 “Come, follow me.”
For the next three years, they walked alongside him as he discipled them. Toward the end of his earthly ministry, Jesus commissioned his disciples to go and do the same — to take the Gospel message to the world and make disciples in all the nations.

The Great Commission is an audacious undertaking, all the more so given the fast and sweeping changes taking place in the broader culture. People in this day and age have become the new slaves? The slaves of the international companies. But they also have become slaves of their own materialism and want for more.
Their aspirations to come somewhere in life, to reach the top or to get this or that, makes that they are often under a lot of stress. Each person has his or her own stresses: Mountains of laundry wait, errands beckon, and another pressing meeting extends the workday. Prayer life, if it still exist by certain people, reduces to the minimal communication of mealtime grace and thank-you-Lord-for-this-day bedtime amens.

By the majority of Christians there are no moments any more of contemplation, or of being together in the household taking time, to read the Bible and to say prayers.  No listening ear for God’s voice. Little thought of discerning His plans for the day.

Those who still find time to go to church love to find the pastor or priest doing all the talking and doing all the work. They settle into a church home, then rely on pastors and small group leaders to guide them into maturity. They might know that Church is indeed critical in their faith development.

But something is not working if most of the Christians report little spiritual growth over the course of a year.

The “spiritual journey” language is most preferred among non-practicing Christians. We can wonder how they build up such a spiritual journey. While spiritual growth is very important to tens of millions, the language and terminology surrounding discipleship seems to be undergoing a change, with other phrases coming to be used more frequently than the term “discipleship” itself.

Today the word "discipleship" also seems to have a negative co-notation, giving the impression that one is weak when one wants to become a disciple. Not many do want to be a disciple and having to let others know that one still has to learn.

Engagement with the practices associated with discipleship leave much to be desired.  When in  certain regions there still could be 20 percent of Christian adults involved in some sort of discipleship activity, it would not be bad to come to see that more than 6% would come to be active in church planning, attending Sunday school or fellowship group, meeting with a spiritual mentor, studying the Bible with a group, or reading and discussing a Christian book with a group.

For sure Church needs a new fertilizer and new seed. It needs also people who can ignite the fire in  others. Church leaders must be diligent in finding tools that help people examine the reality of their spiritual growth, not merely how they perceive it.

It is high time that churches start to rethink what is working in connecting with today’s younger Christians and non-believers, particularly when it comes to relational and mentoring forms of spiritual development.

Friday 26 July 2019

Looking at what the Gospel of Thomas Teaches

Biblical Christian Gnostic Teachings looks at "The Theology of the Gospel of Thomas".

The non-canonical sayings gospel or writing of logia by the apostle Thomas, commonly known as "Doubting Thomas" , brings not a narrative account of the life of Jesus, but some 114 of the sayings attributed to his master teacher Jesus Christ. Almost half of these sayings resemble those found in the Canonical Gospels, while it is speculated that the other sayings were added from Gnostic tradition.

Originated in Hellenistic Judaism we may find in this second of seven contained in what modern-day scholars have designated as Codex II from a school of early Christians, possibly proto-Gnostics.

In this book is said that Jesus is alive and is called the living one meaning the risen lord. It tells us we can live by Jesus' sayings and should take into account about things which Jesus speaks.

The listener should seek the truth, which can be found in the Holy Scriptures whereto Thomas gives some overview of things Jesus said we should remember. With his writings Thomas wants us to join him on a journey 
that will make us kings and at the end it will lead to rest (Greek Saying 2)
 Naturally being it a gnostic writing we have to look at it as not a divine inspired book, but as just one of the several civic writings about the Nazarene master teacher Jeshua (Jesus Christ). Though it request us to be exclusively committed to the truth like the fisherman who came to follow that son of man who said to them he was the sent one from God.

Also in this book we are assured that the kingdom we are looking for should be found on earth and not in heaven (saying 3 82 113) It is within us and it is to be spread out upon the earth. it is not in the world of the dead (saying 59).

The work tells us there is a spiritual kingdom on earth right now. It is within us if Jesus is in us and all around us (saying 3 24 22 51 77 82 113).

In this work we also come to know that if we follow Jesus we can become 
a man of light lighting up the whole world (Saying 24) like a city built on a high mountain (Saying 33)
and that Jesus tells us to tell others (33 50).

By presenting this writing the apostle Thomas points to the fact that we should look at Jesus as the Kingdom near us, him being the origin of the new creation (77 82 3 49 14 50 7) and that we should pass by the thinking of the flesh and be passers by of all other teachers and teachings (Saying 42)

> find to read

  1. Casting the Fire of Kingdom upon the World The Gospel of Thomas
  2. Non-Docetic Gnosticism in the Nag Hammadi Library
  3. My siblings and My mother The Gospel of Thomas Saying 99
some of the sayings: 
  1. Prophecy in the Gospel of Thomas
  2. seeks rule and rest Gospel of Thomas Saying 2
  3. Gnosis is to Know Thyself Gospel of Thomas Saying 3
  4. Gnosis And Intuition Gospel of Thomas Saying 3
  5. it is not “pie in the sky when you die, bye & bye.” Gospel of Thomas Saying 3
  6. Gospel of Thomas Saying 4
  7. James the Just Gospel of Thomas Saying 12
  8. The Light Within The Gospel of Thomas Saying 24
  9. Taking Off A Garment Gospel of Thomas saying 37
  10. meditating about death gospel of thomas saying 63
  11. The Gospel of Thomas Saying 77
  12. Should we worship mary Gospel of Thomas saying 79
  13. The “twin” of Christ Gospel of Thomas Saying 108

+
  1. The nature of Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas
  2. Miracles in the Gospel of Thomas
  3. Forgiveness in the Gospel of Thomas
  4. Love in the Gospel of Thomas
  5. The Doctrine of Sin in the Gospel of Thomas
  6. The Theology of the Gospel of Thomas
  7. Does the gospel of Thomas teach the Trinity?
  8. What the Gospel of Thomas Does Not Teach

Wednesday 11 August 2010

Getting of at the fence



"It doesn't matter which side of the fence you get off on sometimes.
What matters most is getting off.
You cannot make progress without making decisions."
- Jim Rohn
"I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot.
Would that you were cold or hot!
So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot,
I will spew you out of my mouth."
Revelation 3:15-16
Me dear God,
let me not want to compromise somewhere in between.
Give that I get sufficient understanding to take the right decisions.
Give me also the power to undertake the right steps to be accepted
 
as a full follower of Christ
and a truly loving son of YOU  my God
.


Nederlandse versie / Dutch version > Uitstappen aan het hek


+++

2016 linkupdate

Friday 30 January 2009

Courage is fear that has said its prayers

"Courage is fear that has said its prayers."
- Karl Barth

"And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth,
he began to cry out, and say,
'Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me.'
And Jesus stopped and said, 'Call him here.'
So they called the blind man, saying to him,
'Take courage, stand up! He is calling for you.'"
Mark 10:47, 49

I want to have courage and follow Jesus,
but I am often so weak.
Give me strength o Lord that I can take up the courage
to go through all the problems which surround me.

Dutch version / Nederlands >Moed is angst die haar gebeden heeft gezegd




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