Bible Thoughts

December 28, 2003

Most congregations are attendance conscious. Much labor and effort goes into an attempt to have a steady increase in the number present at services. It is certainly good to teach the truth to as many as possible. It is also proper for each and every saint to be present at all of the services possible. Who can deny that steady attendance is a good index to one's spiritual condition? This writer knows of no spiritually minded person who willfully absents himself from services.

Much effort is currently being exerted by many congregations to increase the number present at services. Some use a bus ministry, with all of its attendant prizes and unscriptural practices. Others utilize incentive gifts to have people attend. Some have created a country club atmosphere in an effort to keep folks coming. Everything from scare tactics to Dale Carnegie approaches to "prayer partners," etc., are currently being put into practice to be able to boast of the number attending.

No one is opposed to having as many as possible at all of the services possible. Every single person who comes should come for the right purpose: worshipping God and learning His will. To have other motives makes one's sincerity highly questionable.

There is a most effective way to promote attendance without all of the trappings that have been utilized by so many congregations of late. Just preach the truth and practice what the New Testament commands. This may not produce the same crowd that a hidden five dollar bill produces or that an opportunity to "egg" a bus captain will, but you can rest assured it will produce the right kind of crowd.

When a congregation preaches and practices the truth, it will promote the attendance of people who are:

1. Desiring to please God. They recognize that truth is the only means of reaching Jehovah(John 17:17).

2. Interested in Heaven. One lays up his treasure there when he pleases God(Matthew 6:20), anticipating the actual claiming of that prize(I Peter 1:4).

3. Willing to sacrifice error for right. Such a demand is made of people throughout the New Testament(II Peter 2:18).

4. Concerned about their own souls and the souls of others. Is it difficult to see the spiritual nature of the kingdom and the emphasis that is given to the welfare of the spiritual part of man in the New Testament? Read John 18:36; Acts 2:42; Ephesians 4:11-16).

While it is admittedly true that promotional gimmicks of the nature offered by many churches will draw a crowd, are you sure that is the kind of crowd that needs to be drawn? On the other hand, you can be sure that if a congregation is teaching and practicing truth, it will attract a crowd with the desire to do what is right with a motive to please God. It may not be the largest--but it will sure be a GOOD one!

This is the message of a bumper sticker that I noted several years ago. Upon consideration, the message can bring home to each of us two lessons: What are we doing with OUR LIVES and there is something LATER ON. Consider carefully these two most important messages.

This is your life. For all of its woes, failures, successes, questions, etc.--it is all you have. Take a good long look at it. Are glad for what you see? Are you sad? Could it be that you have let the years slip by without doing anything worthwhile? How much have you done toward fulfilling your ambitions? Are you drifting aimlessly, year after year, planning SOMEDAY to do something, but just putting it off until a better time? This is your life! What you have now is all you have on this earth. Is it spiritually motivated? Are you acceptable to the Lord? Are you benefiting yourself and others by your conduct? Will you be able to look back with satisfaction upon what you have been when it comes time for you to die(and unless the Lord returns before that, you will die)?

What's next? After all, there is a next! It can be a place of joy, exaltation, and enjoyment with God. You can live with those great worthies of God who took the time to serve God in this life. You can be in the very presence of the Father and of His Son, Jesus Christ. OR, it can be never-ending punishment in a place called Hell. A place where the devil and his angels reside. A place wherein every type of transgressor, every hypocrite, and every obnoxious rebel will be found.

You can do something for your life. You can obey the gospel(I Peter 1:22), your can live faithful unto the God of Heaven(Revelation 2:10), and you can claim the price awaiting the faithful(I Peter 1:9). It is up to YOU. No one else can live the kind of life that will please God on your behalf.

This is your life. What do you observe about yourself and your condition? What do you see? What's next? Do you anticipate the future or dread it?

Let us direct our efforts in the direction of making Christians and churches what God desires they should be. We should not seek to substitute anything else in place of this. To do this is fatal to the cause of Christ. We should seek to make every man and every woman an earnest worker to save others. The most successful way to do this is for each to go earnestly to work. The working spirit is contagious. It is a mistake to think we can do proxy work, that we can pay others to visit the sick, look after the needy, and preach the gospel to the lost. Personal service is needed for our own personal benefit. Spiritual exercise in these things is necessary for our spiritual growth. We cannot satisfy the demands of the law of God on us for effort to save our fellow man by paying others to preach. We might give every dollar we have to others to preach, it would not release us, in the sight of God, from the obligation to teach our families, neighbors, and all with whom we come in contact, the way of life. The fatal error of this age is that we attempt to work for the cause of Christ by proxy.-David Lipscomb, Commentary on Philippians, page 220.

Friendship has certain essential characteristics without which it is unworthy the name. The basis of true friendship is self--forgetfulness, disinterestedness, truth, virtue, constancy, and oneness in spiritual aspirations.

"Blessed is the one who has the gift of making friends; for it is one of God's best gifts. It involves many things, but, above all, the power of going out of one's own self and seeing and appreciating whatever is noble and loving in another."

Genuine consideration of others is more than courtesy--it is sincerity.-Van Amburgh-Gospel Advocate, June 16, 1932