Monday – Gospels

Reading – Matthew 13

Highlight Verse:

“Then they scoffed, “He’s just the carpenter’s son, and we know Mary, his mother, and his brothers—James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas.”
‭‭Matthew‬ ‭13‬:‭55‬ ‭NLT‬‬

The modern version of this could be complacent Christianity.

It’s easy to take Jesus for granted when the culture is saturated by churchy things.

Even in the Bible Belt, it is easy to relegate Jesus to a social activity on Sunday morning.

I once personally knew a healing evangelist who held revivals in the Southeast US and in India.

His meetings in the US might have 50 to a hundred people attend and a handful of healings. It was rare that unbelievers attended, much less found Jesus.

In India, thousands flocked to the meetings and hundred were healed and saved.

You might not agree with the tactics of a healing evangelist (I had a hard time dealing with his style), but you can’t deny how much more God moved in areas where Jesus wasn’t a household word.

While we strive for Christian values to be restored in America (a worthy cause), we should also strive for people to truly trust Jesus as a life changing savior, not just a cultural icon.

Our faith should lead to life changing commitment, not just cultural conformity.

If someone threatened your life unless you renounced Jesus, how would you react?
How can we help others move from cultural acceptance to trust in Jesus?