Jesus and the Rose

Last week Doug and I started listening to Matt Chandler's sermon: A Shepherd and His Unregenerate Sheep from the Desiring God Conference '09. From the moment he started talking, I was intrigued and amused. He has a passionate love for the Lord and is a good preacher.

In his opening, he shared his background and one particular story that I want to share with you. As a young Christian, his heartbeat was to share the gospel and lovingly become intertwined in sinner's lives for the purpose of sharing God's grace and mercy. Then, he ran into an enemy: The church.



Tell me if you can relate. Not with how the church has failed to communicate truth, but how you personally have failed to handle God's word with reverent, humble, utter dependence on the Spirit to reveal that truth.

God has been doing a work in my own life, showing me how I was living by tradition and not by the simple truth of God's own word. I too, have tried to make a biblical point outside of the gospel. The results were confusing at best and left me looking like a know-it-all, unloving "religious freak".

I echo the prayer of my church that we crawl over the rubble and get into our community with one. simple. message. The gospel of Jesus Christ.