Thought for the Week – 31st July 2016 – Dennis Pethers

After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.  Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves.  Luke 10:1-3

Sometimes being part of a church can discourage people who want to share their faith. 

Not long after I became a Christian I was so excited about Jesus and the changes that were taking place in my life.  I remember enthusiastically sharing with people in the church that ‘I want to tell everybody about Jesus’.  The response I received from most of the people I told was, ‘It is often like that when you first become a Christian but, don’t worry, it will wear off’.

The people that said this to me were not seeking to be unhelpful, they were simply speaking out of what they had experienced, that often, the longer a person has been a Christian, the less passion they have about sharing their faith and the less people they are connected with who don’t know Jesus.

What can so easily happen in church is that we become accustomed to meeting in the place where we come together and run all kinds of activities and programmes.  As we busy ourselves with ‘church life’ we can slowly forget the people who are outside, we can forget that we are ‘sent to go’!

Jesus sent the disciples out two-by-two and I am utterly convinced that encouraging one another in faith sharing must become woven into what we mean when we say the word ‘church’.  This encouragement will only take place when each of us in church has at least one other person that I am encouraging and who is encouraging me

I urge you, this week, to identify a Christian that you know, go out for a coffee together, and talk with each other about how you can be an encouragement to one another as you seek to share Jesus with people.