Last year the Christadelphians and several Bible Students in Belgium had a lot of worries and tried to get more and better contact with different believers in the Low Countries. They wanted the different communities sharing ideas and working more together.
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From all up the North (Riga) there was real sabotage which ignited also opposition from the United Kingdom and Australian bases, making the Belgian Christadelphians even more isolated.
We only now came acroos this interesting writing by Phillip J. Long which also looks at the writing of the apostle Paul which we also took as our guide in this difficult time of making church.
Often we as simple humans forget the role of the guiding or directing hand of the Most High in His time period. We so often want to hurry up things, not taking into account that it is perhaps not according to God His Plan or time scheme.
Often we worry too much about worldly matters, getting enough people at the meeting, being able to pay the bills, getting the publications ready in time, etc. instead of letting it come like it comes…
The difficulties we encounter today or nothing compared to the difficulties of the first followers of Christ. In our civilised industrialist democratic countries we are not imprisoned for our beliefs and do not have to worry to be executed for our faith, yet we are so often afraid about what others might think and how others react. We should learn more from the examples of the apostles, like Paul who rejoiced in his circumstances, modelling the kind of attitude not only he desires from the congregation, but which Christ would like to see as the ignition key for a trusting Christian congregation.
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You may read also:
- A rebellious movement founded on a fake?
- Are you religious, spiritual, or do you belong to a religion, having a faith or interfaith
- Inculturation today calling for a different attitude
- Problems attracting and maintaining worshippers
- Others that hinder the message
- Vision blurred by cumulative burden of divisions
- Church has to grow through witness, not by proselytism
- Let us not forget it was God who chose us
- Faith because of the questions
- Fear of failure, and fear of the unknown
- Disciple of Christ counting lives and friends dear to them
- Aim High: Examples of Godly Characters to follow
- Follower of Jesus part of a cult or a Christian
- Being Christian, following Jesus Christ
- Parts of the body of Christ
- What part of the Body am I?
- The Church, Body of Christ and remnant Israel synonymous
- Being Missional
- Flowing out from a genuine spiritual “heart”
- Our openness to being approachable
- Words in the world
- Looking from different perspectives
- Belonging to or being judged by
- Jerusalem and a son’s kingdom
- Anti-church movements and Humanism
- Quibbling siblings united or allied children of an organisation or a church
- No reconciliation possible between CBM and Duncan Heaster from Carelinks
- Delay in publications because attack from outside
- A man from the North wanting to have control in Belgium
- Our openness to being approachable
- Let us not fret or worry about next season
- Fearing the right person
- God’s Time is Best
- Together tasting a great promise
- Change of name
- New Name a fact
- To whom do we want to be enslaved
- Are you being swept along by the world
- Encouraging one another
- A participation in the body of Christ
- Disciple of Christ counting lives and friends dear…
- Priority to form a loving brotherhood
- Not words of any organisation should bind you, but…
- Gods hope and our hope
- Fixing our attention
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Related articles
- Moving Through Time: Timeline of Religion (pcr.wpengine.com)
Since the beginning of time, mankind has formed beliefs of the unexplainable and unknowable. Over thousands of years, these beliefs became traditional, customary, and institutionalized within regional societies. People continue to express an interest in spiritual matters from all corners around the world. Everybody has pondered the meaning of life, what happens after we die, what existed before us, and whether any other life exists in the universe. Mankind may never know concrete answers regarding the spiritual. In fact, humans may destroy the planet before we can discover the remaining life in unexplored regions. Nevertheless, we continue to seek spiritual enlightenment and a connection with our Creator.- Without the Spirit one is not lead and guided into all truth (reformedontheweb.wordpress.com)
Since the imagination of man, like all the other faculties of his moral being, is permeated and vitiated by sin, the ideas it suggests, even when pondering the Divine oracles, are prone to be mistaken and corrupt. It is part of our sinful infirmity that we are unable of ourselves to interpret God’s Word aright; but it is part of the gracious office of the Holy Spirit to guide believers into the truth, thereby enabling them to apprehend the Scriptures. This is a distinct and special operation of the Spirit on the minds of God’s people, whereby He communicates spiritual wisdom and light unto them, and which is necessary unto their discerning aright the mind of God in His Word, and also their laying hold of the heavenly things found therein.- About us / Over ons/Belgian Church (muchadoaboutbiblicaltruths.wordpress.com)
In the first century church, the ecclesia took place in people’s homes. It talks about the apostles and disciples going from house to house teaching and preaching the gospel of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.- Not bounded by labels but liberated in Christ (christadelphians.wordpress.com)
As followers of Christ we should have taken on new clothes and though we may have the same old physical brain, we should have been transformed in a new being. Every day again we should be working on our new construction and should we learn to think an entirely new way.- 5 Reasons to Join a Small Group – An Introduction (mycrosspointechurch.wordpress.com)
In a matter of weeks, God had brought exponential growth the church. What so astounding is that, even with that many people, there were no needs among the people (which was the reality by the end of Acts 2).How was it that the church met those needs? How was it that there was such a unity in their midst. The answer is tucked away for us, I believe, at the end of Acts 5. Acts 5:42 reads, “And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching that the Christ is Jesus.”
- Prayer for the Whole Church and Those in Authority (prayerfromtheheart.net)
Give grace, O heavenly Father, to all ministers and all your humble servants, that they may all, by their lives and doctrine set forth Your true and lively Word, and rightly and duly administer Your holy Sacraments.- VATICAN – Pope: Conform to Christ and not this world, and follow His path (asianews.it)
At the Sunday Angelus Pope Francis warns against becoming “worldly” and “tasteless salt”. “Watered down Christians” are like watered down wine, “you do not know whether it is wine or water”. Read the Gospel every day. Gospel, Eucharist, prayer help us to safeguard the newness of Jesus.- When The Sin Of Contention Comes (Bible tools commentary by John W. Ritenbaugh) (prophecynewsandviews.wordpress.com)
A quarrel that could be easily settled if both parties were humble continues indefinitely when parties are arrogant. Why? Because pride plows the way for contempt for the others opinion. Pride inflames passion and wounds feelings. Because of competitiveness, also an aspect of pride, a person feels he has to fight back. And so the argument goes back and forth.- Let us not fret or worry about next season (belgianbiblestudents.wordpress.com)
Last season we like the Belgian Christadelphians perhaps had set our hopes to much on human beings, hoping they would not be as partial to prohibit brothers and sisters in Christ to join hands and have meetings together.In the midst of our many activities our minds should have been on the eternal and the magical ways of the universe, trusting God He would be the One Who brings the Chosen ones unto Him.
While the following commands from Paul seem unrelated to the theme of unity, Frank Thielman argues they ought to be read in the context of persecution (Philippians, NIVAC, 217-9). While this is not an Empire-wide systematic persecution of believers, we have already seen several times in the letter than the church at Philippi was a small community of believers who are in many ways “different” from the Roman culture around them. The existence of a group of people who “have the mind of Christ” is enough to be suspicious, and suspicion easily gives way to gossip, wild accusations and pressure to conform. This sort of social pressure can be difficult to accept and a source of great fear for the church. Paul’s series of short exhortations in these verses are therefore designed to give comfort and encouragement to endure.
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