The Christian's Responsibility to the World

“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.  And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”  (Matthew 28: 19,20  NIV)

Image courtesy of NASA

   The last words that Jesus gave His disciples clearly set forth their responsibility and our responsibility to the peoples of the world—tell them all about Jesus and the Good New He brought.  We are told to tell them about the three members of the Trinity, Father, Son, Holy Spirit.  We are to teach them to obey everything, that’s right, EVERY COMMANDMENT that Jesus taught.  Now that’s quite a job—to teach everyone and to teach them everything.  I know very few people qualified to do this.  We are all qualified to tell how Jesus has had an effect on our own lives.  That will do much to obey this command of Jesus.  Telling of our personal experience with Jesus Christ is the most effective sermon we can preach.

   Matthew 7:12 tells us of another responsibility we have:  “Here is a simple, rule-of-thumb guide for behavior:   Ask yourself what you want people to do for you, then grab the initiative and do it for them.  Add up God’s Laws and Prophets and this is what you get.”  (MSG)   This is commonly known as the Golden Rule.  I like the way the Message translation reads.  It tells us to take the initiative and do good first.  When we do this, people are blessed, and God is glorified.

   Additional words of Jesus give the same message in a different context.  In Matthew 22:36-40 we are told, “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?  Jeus replies, ‘Love the Lord your God with all you heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it:  “Love your neighbor as yourself.”  All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”  If each of us were to love his neighbor as he loves himself, there would be much more peace in the world.  It sounds very important when Jesus says that it is like the greatest commandment, love God with all you’ve got.

   In a vision that was given to Isaiah, the prophet, God was specific and to the point: “Learn to do right; seek justice.  Defend the oppressed.  Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.”  (Isaiah 1:17  NIV)  

   The Word of the Lord has shown us many responsibilities that the Christian has toward the world.  All we have to do is what Jesus said, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”     

The Christian's Responsibility to His Church

“But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be.  (1 Corinthians 12:18  NIV)

   As the verse above says, God has assembled the parts in every church, and if He assembled them, they must be right.  Now it is our part to make them work.  It’s time to find out what our roles are in the local church, and then it’s time to get to work in those roles.  It may be hard to believe, but God does have a particular job for you to do in your church.   

   God does require one thing of each of us.  In Hebrews 13:17 we are told, “Have confidence in your leaders and submit to their authority, because they keep watch over you as those who must give an account. Do this so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no benefit to you.”   Our pastors have an awesome responsibility for the spiritual life of the church, and we should be doing all we can to support them.  They need to know that we trust and appreciate the Word that they preach.

   Malachi 3:10 gives us another responsibility that we have toward our local church.  “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house.  Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.”  In the verse before Malachi 3:10, the Word says that the whole nation of Israel had been robbing God by not giving the tithe.  Financial responsibility is, indeed, one of our responsibilities to the local church.

   Paul encourages the church in Thessalonica by complimenting them on encouraging each other, and then exhorts them to continue encouraging each other.  He says it a little differently in Ephesians 4:29: “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.” (NIV).  We all need encouragement sometimes, and we all need to give encouragement at times.

   We are all given a specific gift to use within our church, and there are also responsibilities that we all share.  The church works better and God is glorified more when we all work together.  

   I didn’t mean to get long-winded, but the Church is God’s tool in this world, and the local church is at the center of the Church.  So it is of prime importance that we all work together to represent our Lord well through our local churches.    

      

To Represent God Well

“Jesus knew that the Father put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothes, and wrapped a towel around his waist.  After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.” (John 13:4,5 NIV)

   And thus, our Lord demonstrated that He had come not to be served, but to serve.  If our Lord came to earth to serve, then should we not do the same.  Jesus had all the power of God—all the power in the universe—yet He chose to humble himself and perform a duty and a service usually assigned to an underling, the washing of feet.  He later humbled Himself to the religious leaders who questioned and accused Him, the Son of God, for the crime of blasphemy.   He humbled Himself to the Roman leader, Pontius Pilate, underwent scourging, and finally crucifixion.  Jesus, the omnipotent and omniscient One, humbled Himself in obedience to the Father so that God could have fellowship with you and me forever.

   With Jesus as our example, how can we do other than serve our fellow man?  God gave His only Son; cannot I give of my time to help someone in need?  Jesus gave up His omnipotence and died on a cross; cannot I give of my earthly goods to someone less fortunate than I?  Stephen, the first martyr, gave up his life in a painful manner, stoning to death, because he proclaimed the Gospel boldly; cannot I tell a friend about Jesus?  John was boiled in oil (but they couldn’t kill him), and Peter was crucified upside down; cannot I share the love of God with those I meet?  

Lord, help me to represent you well. 

Responsibilities of Being a Christian

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength”   (Mark 12:30 NIV).

   These words were spoken by Jesus in response to the question, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” (Mark 12:29)  Jesus’ answer was plain enough and definite enough to let us know that according to God, in the person on Jesus, the most important thing we can do is love God and love Him with all we’ve got.  When we do that, the other things He asks of us become easier to do.

   So how can we show our love for our Lord?  One obvious thing we can do is have conversations with Him—pray.  I have never once had God say when I called on Him, “Not now.  I’m busy.”   He is available all the time, as we might say, “24/7.”  We may think that prayer is a one-way conversation, or at least we act like it is.   When we pray, we need to give God time to speak.  I believe that He answers while I am praying, and if I don’t hear Him, it isn’t His fault.   Effective prayer is a skill that takes honing, and the best way to do that is to pray a lot.  I also believe that sometimes His answer is, “Not yet, you are not ready to understand or accept the answer.”  Sometimes His answer is almost immediate with an assurance in my heart that my Lord has heard my prayer and will act on it.

   If we don’t read the Word, we are not showing love for our God.  After all, He had numerous people over many, many years write 66 books that give us a written foundation of our faith.  This is another very important way to draw close to our Lord.   The Bible tells us how we came to be and how we will live through eternity.  It explains the one and only way to spend eternity with God in heaven—accept Jesus as Lord and Savior.  It has many intense personal stories that relate to our lives today as much as they did to the people when they were written.

   There is a song entitled, “Trust and Obey,” written by John Sammis and Daniel Towner after an evangelical meeting held  by Dwight Moody.  During testimony time a young man stood up and said, “I’m not sure, but I’m going to trust and I’m going to obey.”  That’s as good a description of another of our responsibilities of being a Christian.   Once I’ve read the Word and talked to my Lord in prayer, it is my responsibility to trust what I have read and heard, and if I trust it to be truth, then I must obey it.  Besides that, we know that our Lord has immeasurable love for us, and it is our joy to love Him back, and if we love Him, our desire will be to trust Him and obey Him.

    Along with all the blessings we have received from God, we have taken on responsibilities, but they are responsibilities that provide joy and peace in our lives as we take them on.

Giver and Receiver--We Are Both

“Give, and it shall be given to you.  A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap.  For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you” (Luke 6:38 NIV).

   “Give, and it will be given to you,” the words of Jesus assure us that when we give we will receive.  “A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over”—that’s what we will get.  Wow, sounds good, that sounds like we will get a lot.  But we can’t miss the last part of the verse, “For the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”  I’m pretty sure that means that if I am stingy, I won’t receive an amount running over.   I also don’t think that it means that we will get back just the same amount as we give.  The “amount” we give is not strictly measured by the amount we put in the gift, but by how much of it is given from the heart.  If we can easily afford a gift of $1000 and we give $100, it’s probably not given from the heart.  If we can afford to give $10 and we give $25, that’s a heart gift that the Lord will return abundantly—pressed down, shaken together.  I don’t mean that we should take money needed for food from our family, but I do mean that we should think of giving the cost of the fancy dessert.

  We usually think of money when we read this Scripture, but we can give more things than money.  We can give of our time, we can give of our effort, and mainly we can give of the love that God shares with us.  If we give up the time it takes to watch a tv show, or a baseball game, and share it with someone who may just need someone to sit and talk to, or if we give up that time to mow a neighbor’s lawn, it’s a heart gift.  We can share the produce we grow in our gardens or we can provide meals for someone who is ill.  We can give rides to church or the doctor, or we can help someone change a tire.  God sees all of these gifts, and He will see that we receive help when we need it, when we need assurance from a friend, and when the pantry is getting low.

   The point of this Scripture is that God sees when we give, He expects us to give, and He rewards us in a manner appropriate.  We may not even realize that we have received the help because we gave help.  God is aware of everything we do, and He loves to reward us when we share the love that He has so richly given us.