“Judge Softly” ~ by Mary T. Lathrap, 1895

“Pray, don’t find fault with the man that limps,
Or stumbles along the road.
Unless you have worn the moccasins he wears,
Or stumbled beneath the same load. Continue reading ‘Judge Softly’ »

“We draw people to Christ not by loudly discrediting what they believe, or by telling them how wrong they are and how right we are, but by showing them a light that is so lovely that they want with all their hearts to know the source of it.”

(Madeleine L’Engle)

Do you agree or disagree with this?
How do I relate to people I disagree with, that I think are wrong?
Do they find me ‘so lovely that they want to know the source of it?’
“Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.” 1 Peter 2:12)

“Even though I am free of the demands and expectations of everyone, I have voluntarily become a servant to any and all in order to reach a wide range of people: religious, nonreligious, meticulous moralists, loose-living immoralists, the defeated, the demoralized—whoever. I didn’t take on their way of life. I kept my bearings in Christ—but I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view. I’ve become just about every sort of servant there is in my attempts to lead those I meet into a God-saved life. I did all this because of the Message. I didn’t just want to talk about it; I wanted to be in on it!” (1 Corinthians 9:19-23, The Message)

I’ve read this passage in the NIV before, but I love this version of it.
A servant to any and all, I enter their world, to experience things from their point of view.
Not taking on their way of life, keeping my bearings in Christ. Continue reading ‘A servant to any and all!’ »

“The Church exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christs. If they are not doing that. all the cathedrals, clergy, missions, sermons, even the Bible itself are simply a waste of time. God became Man for no other purpose. It is even doubtful, you know, whether the whole universe was created for any other purpose.” (C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity)

This quote captures what I think the focus of Jesus’s followers ought to be.
If we are not seeking to be like Jesus in the world, then we are not following Jesus.
If we are not helping others find the Jesus way, we are not developing followers of Jesus.
Continue reading ‘Becoming little Christs’ »

“The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.”

G.K. Chesterton, What’s Wrong with the World

“We modern teachers from the West are by nature and by training persons of restless activity and boundless self-confidence. We tend to assume an attitude of superiority towards all Eastern peoples and point to our material progress as the justification of our attitude.

“We are accustomed to doing things for ourselves, to finding our own way, to relying upon our own exertions, and we naturally tend to be impatient with others who are less restless and less self-assertive than we are. “

“We are accustomed to an elaborate system of church organization and a peculiar code of morality. We cannot imagine any Christianity worthy of the name existing without the elaborate machinery we have invented.”

“We naturally expect our converts to adopt from us not only essentials but also accidentals. We desire to impart not only the gospel, but also the law and the customs.”

From “Missionary Methods: God’s Plan for Missions According to Paul” by Roland Allen.