"Survivor" may have a negative impression. No one can force us to go to church, or force us to believe in any religion, why then, a “church survivor”? When I name this blog "church survivor" simply want to share with you that we may find hard time to survive in our church, or even may have difficulty to get along with other church members. For sure, there are all kinds of people, but we are sinners, even we are church members. Some may even behave like gangsters, while some may look like a sheep, but actually a wolf, but these shall not be the hindrance to anyone to become a member of church and a son of God. Neither people nor their behaviours shall be the barrier between a person and God. Thus, a "church survivor" has a deeper meaning. If we truly believe in God, our Christian faith will act like a mirror which will reflect the behaviour of ourselves and others. Through this, we will see all the evil things that we do if we look at ourselves sincerely and honestly. This has been written in the Book of Romans 7:14-25 by St. Paul.
"We know that the Law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.... What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God - through Jesus Christ our Lord!"
If church is a place full of sinful people, it is almost impossible to avoid we sin one another due to our sinful nature. By the Grace of our Lord, Jesus accepts us all when we are still a sinner. At the same time, we are saved by His Grace too; we should then stay away from sin. That is what St. Paul has taught us in the Book of Romans 6:1-2
"What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?"
To be a church survivor, it may have two folds. One is because Jesus saves us by Grace. Without God’s Grace, we can’t survive. The second fold is because we all are sinners, and we sin one another too. Therefore, we all should ask God to help us to behave good enough so that we will not hurting one another.
Even all we can do is to survive, but we still can enjoy the Christian living that we can’t find anywhere else, but only in the church.
1 則留言:
As I think you suggest, many people are hurt in the church...maybe because we think that Christians should be better (and in general they should be). But Christians are certainly still sinners. The Church is more a hospital for sinners than a museum of saints. While we need to be together with other Christians (the body needs all its members), we should not be surprised when we're sometimes hurt by other members. We should also not put our "faith" in other members, for they do sometimes let us down. Our faith is only in our Lord Jesus Christ, who forgives the other members and also us.
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