Tuesday, March 29, 2016

I Got My Faith At The Salvation Army Thrift Store

My Utmost For His Highest
 
You also be ready… —Luke 12:40
 
“If we are going to be ready for Jesus Christ, we have to stop being religious. In other words, we must stop using religion as if it were some kind of a lofty lifestyle— we must be spiritually real. If you are avoiding the call of the religious thinking of today’s world, and instead are “looking unto Jesus” (Hebrews 12:2), setting your heart on what He wants, and thinking His thoughts, you will be considered impractical and a daydreamer.”  CHAMBERS
 
What does it mean to be “religious”?  It means that a person is following a way of life that has the appearance of living in the “Way”, but is actually following a modified version of Christianity.  It is estimated that there are 6.7 billion people in the world of which an estimated 2.1 billion (or 1/3 of the world's population) identifies themselves as Christian. Just because a person has a label does not mean that they are genuine.  After I returned from Vietnam, I enrolled at a local junior college. One day, I say a guy at school wearing an Army field jacket.  On the right sleeve was a patch (in the Army, if you have been in combat you wear the patch of the unit you served with on your right sleeve) for MAC-V (Military Assistance Command – Vietnam).  I had served with MAC-V in the Mekong Delta, Advisory Team 68. So I walked up to him and asked him what “team” he has served with.  I thought I was meeting someone who had served as I had.  He looked at me, confused.  So I asked again, pointing to the patch on his sleeve.  He said “Oh, I bought this jacket at the Salvation Army thrift store , man.”  I wanted to tell him to take the patch off of his sleeve because he was misrepresenting himself, but I just walked off shaking my head.
 
(Matthew 7:21-23) “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’  And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’”
 
If you were from another country and the only thing you knew about the United States was what you read on our currency, you would think that people in this country followed and trusted God. I mean, it is written right on our currency.  Judging from the speed at which our country is moving away from God and Biblical values, my guess is that one day, any mention of God will be removed from our currency.  But I digress.  There is only one way to the Father – that is by faith in Jesus (John 14:6).  There are many people sitting in church, who bought their faith “at the Salvation Army thrift store”.  What they wear on their sleeve is not theirs.  There was a time when I wondered why a Pastor always talked about the way to Salvation in a church that was “on-fire” for the Lord.  But on reflection, I realized that many people in that church may be religious, but they might not be Christians.  Salvation comes through the hearing of the Gospel and something supernatural.  The yielding of our hearts to the Holy Spirit.  Don’t take it for granted that everyone around you is heaven-bound.  ELGIN
 
Charley Elgin

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