Friend Day

Today was "friend day" at church...the kids did an amazing job! The Children's classes did extremely well..the 5th and 6th grade class had 18 children! The kids were told that whichever class had the highest would get to have a pizza party in the youth house..and boy they wanted it. For the youth the goal was 50 in the youth house. We ended up with exactly 50...although we were stuck at 48 for a while. Joe actually took off and woke two of his friends out of bed to make it to the magic number! (the prize for the youth was a new wii for the youth house) What was revealing to me was how some were willing to go above and beyond to reach the goal...while others didn't seem to try at all. I know that I cant necessarily judge a students efforts by the results, they might have invited till they were blue in the face, and no one showed up for them. But the truth is that if just our students had shown up for this day, we would have had way over 50! That's without inviting anyone outside the church. Now, I'm not saying that I'm not extremely proud of our students efforts, because I am...but I wonder about whether or not we have our priorities right. If we can't even be coerced into inviting someone to church, how can our priorities be right?

In John 8:31 Jesus said, "If you continue in My word, you really are My disciples..."

Jesus was saying this to Jews who had believed in Him. He was saying that if you do what I have commanded, it's an outward sign that you belong to me. I am fairly certain that anyone who has spent any time at all in the Word or under sound preaching, would know that Christ wants us to lead our friends and family to Him. When we refuse to do this, is it safe to say that we are not continuing in His word and showing that perhaps it would seem that we are not "His disciples?

Later in chapter 8 in verse 47 Jesus went on to say, "The one who is from God listens to God's words. This is why you don't listen, because you are not from God."

I am certainly not trying to draw some kind of conclusion between students inviting or not inviting friends to friend day and their salvation. I'm just pointing out that eveeeeentually, when someone refuses to do what God has called all believers to do...they must examine themselves and their attitude and check up and make sure that the reason they aren't listening isn't because they aren't "from God."

The great thing is that Jesus says that "the one who is from God listens to God's words!" God will convict us and guide us every step of the way...so that when we stray and don't listen, we will hear from God the Holy Spirit, and this will let us know that we are "from" Him and He is truly ours!