DON’T
CLOSE YOUR MOUTH II
Memorise:
Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that
your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the father in my
name, he may give it you. John 15:16
Read:
Matthew 28:18-20, Bible in one year: 1st Kings 5-6, Luke 2:1-21
In addition to opening our mouth in
prayer, opening our mouth as witnesses of Jesus is another obligation we must
perform. Evangelistic outreach is for all children of God; not for God’s
ministers alone. We must all bear fruit of souls into God’s kingdom as
commanded by our Lord in today’s memory verse. To back us up in this
obligation, our Lord Jesus Christ assures us that all power in heaven and on
earth belongs to Him. It is therefore a settled matter that no power on earth
or in the spiritual world can stop us from carrying out His instructions. We
are therefore inexcusable if we fail to win souls. He instructed us to go and
teach all nations, baptising them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Ghost. The Great Commission therefore involves teaching. Let us
pause and think about what this assignment of teaching means.
To teach is to expound truth that will
bring about change in the taught. We are faced with a two-pronged problem in
the area of fulfilling this assignment today. One aspect of this problem is
that the teacher who is supposed to expound the truth is often afraid of what
the reaction of the student would be to a demand for change; hence, he shuts
his mouth. But the Bible in 2nd Timothy 4:2 says:
“Preach
the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all
longsuffering and doctrine.”
The other aspect of this problem is that
the people to be taught are not comfortable with the cry for “change”. They do
not want to be “intimidated” by the “dos and don’ts” of their new found faith
in Christ. Such people are deceiving themselves because the Bible does not say
we called into lawlessness. As a matter of fact and whether we believe it or
not, a yoke of “learning and change” is attached to our calling into the faith.
Jesus in Matthew 11:29a said:
“Take
my yoke upon you, and learn of me;”
It is our duty as children of God to
open our mouths wide to this perverted generation and teach them the counsel of
God without fear or favour. I was in a church sometime last year and I heard a
sister teaching on tithes. In order to make people accept the doctrine of
tithing, she said they could start by giving 5% of their income and gradually
increase it! What an erroneous teaching! We must not hold back the truth from
those we are sent to. This is the only way our fruit can endure, and then our
prayers will be answered.
Action
Point
Determine
to properly disciple your converts through sound teaching of the Bible from today.
0 Comments
Please drop a comment. God bless you!